Ship/Factory 3D Models and Stats Viewer version 1.1.1.6 (spoiler?) NEW VER. APR 07

Deleted User · Post by **Deleted User** » Tue, 10. Apr 07, 00:26

MJALowe
I posted just after you

Interesting looking ships, do I spot a theme here David & Goliath.
Perhaps you should have a Harpy, an Achillles & an Argonaut.
I've wondered why no-one seems to modded the Sargon ship before,
it's a good looker imo.

MJALowe · Post by **MJALowe** » Tue, 10. Apr 07, 01:02

because of the vertexes inside the ship the glowy engines makes it REALLY hard to modify...the m7 took me about 8 hours to get the model to look right (about 1 hour to position the hardpoints)...where as the fighter took me about 2 hours all together...(scaling/splicing is easy, stretching/deforming is not)

the theme actually started with the leviathan...goliath was originally my TL...but on my comp i got leviathan set to be a TL im asumming that the only functional difference between a TL and an M1 is that TLs can deploy stations

anyways, im currently working on balancing the ships stats/weapon selections...

the TS just so you know is on the same scale as the M7 (more volume than)
the side modules on it that you see are not rescaled...those are orignal size...meaning the same size as the iguana vangard (each), im reclasifiing it as a TP so that it can do the bbs mission that someone mentioned in another thread

race wise im gona say these are basically a mofia syndicate design (no actual race) and obviously im intending them to be superior to anything else in thier class

edit: i got another idea for a feature...maybe an "overview" window that shows that highest of each stat for all open ships and all the weapons (nothing big...not really needed except for moders that want to speed things up...instead of looking up every ship in the tships)

halo112358 · Post by **halo112358** » Tue, 10. Apr 07, 06:33

Dave Toome wrote:
I also remember that I had create d3d draw surface errors back with version 1.0.2.1
Did you have a different card then?

nope, that was just the first version that I tried

Dave Toome wrote: I could try a few things, but unless someone's got a spare 8800, it could be a long to & fro process
It's probably something simple but there's many parameter to the d3d CreateDevice method.
What I (also) don't understand is why you've also got no ship stats showing, these aren't dependant on d3d being created.

Ah, that ship was an unpacked bod

I'm willing to try a few things, I'll pm you.

MJALowe · Post by **MJALowe** » Tue, 10. Apr 07, 06:48

something i noticed...when you open an unpacked scene file...it looks for the rest of the data in the cat files, instead of pathed from the current tree, or from the current directory...

makes sense why its done this way, but it means if you open a scene file directly you need to have its bod files packed (with correct paths) into a cat file

Deleted User · Post by **Deleted User** » Wed, 11. Apr 07, 01:40

New test, version fixes missing weapon firing indicators on some ships,
(and fixes the missing factory node indicators):
http://www.Exogenesis.co.uk/XModels3DViewer_1.1.1.6.zip
If you want to try this see instructions at the end of the previous post
http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php? ... 60#2068360

MJALowe
The paths to components not found in an unpacked scene have to be found somehow,
the dir structure in ES's cat files at least enforces some sort of likely success
(if you have 'load from extracted files' on,
it should pick up the files from the equivalent disk location, not from the cat file).
'Raw' mode loading has been requested/mentioned before (where you specify disk paths
for the various ES equivalent dirs) & coding was started, but got waylayed by RL & then
by (not-good-enough-yet) shader-render implementation.
It will be back.
(The current delay for raw-mode, is due to me attempting to implement docking bay/arm animation)

The list of *intended* features is quite long & suggestions stretch back quite a way,
including export-all-ship-stats-to-file, languages(!), video-texture rendering.............

The overview-window idea is interesting, but 'highest' of which stat?

MJALowe · Post by **MJALowe** » Wed, 11. Apr 07, 03:24

the something noticed was incase it helps the poster that wasnt having something rendered (i didnt read everything)

as to the "highest" of which stat, well...for weapons it would show every weapon possible on all the ships open, for speed/accn....you have a from and to value...if one ship was 80-160 and another was 50-240 it would display 80-240, as for the the accn and steer values....having the actual values that is in the tships would be helpful (hard to figure out what values to change when the values shown arent the values present) , cargo would work the same as steering

i hope im making sense....this day has been one rush all day long...

BugMeister · Post by **BugMeister** » Wed, 11. Apr 07, 23:07

about that piccie..

MJALowe wrote:edit: was hoping one would actually show the pic...rather than a link to the pic...oh well

- you probably broke forum rule No. 8:
"Images posted should not exceed 640 x 480 and 100kb in size"

- if you resize your image before you upload it to Imageshack, you can use
their "Share it" facility to post the whole thing to the forum..
..always provided it's less than the 100kb limit.

[ external image ]

halo112358 · Post by **halo112358** » Thu, 12. Apr 07, 02:14

MJALowe wrote:something i noticed...when you open an unpacked scene file...it looks for the rest of the data in the cat files, instead of pathed from the current tree, or from the current directory...

makes sense why its done this way, but it means if you open a scene file directly you need to have its bod files packed (with correct paths) into a cat file

I checked into that - even loading ships from the "load ships" (from the buffered cat files) doesn't give a d3d draw surface. It works fine on the 7600gt at my work though

edit: figured it out, I had the d3doverride program that comes with rivatuner running

Deleted User · Post by **Deleted User** » Thu, 19. Apr 07, 22:36

Now satisfied that ver. 1.1.1.6 is stable & good.

Thanks to Flybye, MJALowe & halo112358 for testing this out.

Original post updated.

darkelfsin · Post by **darkelfsin** » Sun, 22. Apr 07, 02:29

thx man, a great work...........................

belizariuz · Post by **belizariuz** » Fri, 4. May 07, 17:43

Dave, you are incredible. Genius would be an understatement. Your app is super-mega-fantastic. It makes me want to run two computers, one for the game and another running your fantastic graphics full-time. And build a cockpit to put them in. And turn off all the lights. Then if I could get someone to shake the house around when I'm playing, the illusion would be perfect.

Deleted User · Post by **Deleted User** » Fri, 4. May 07, 21:19

Thanks for the ego boost

Perhaps I'll put different deep-bass music for each ship, then you could
turn up the volume & shake the house.

Cockpits: actually that's not a bad idea, an option to view from the main
cockpit, assuming you've got a cockpit mod installed.

halo112358 · Post by **halo112358** » Fri, 4. May 07, 22:16

I've got an idea for a feature if you're still adding things, there's a simple implementation and a more complicated implementation.

I'd like to see the location of the various cockpits on a ship and their orientation (much like the current 'toggle weapons' feature). An arrow starting at each cockpit location and pointing outward to represent it's facing direction would be awesome. This, combined with the facing direction of the turrets, allows you to infer the valid firing arcs for each turret.

If that's got your interest then here's the same idea taken one step further. Turrets can rotate +/-90' in each plane, so can cameras. The intersection of the turret's rotation area (half sphere in front of turret) and the assocated cockpit's camera rotation area (half sphere in front of camera) defines the area that the camera can aim to and the turret can turn to, aka the firing zone for the turret.

If it were possible to represent that in the viewer it would be really cool.

I know I'm not likely to get this, but I thought I'd throw it out here anyway - can't blame a man for fishing

Deleted User · Post by **Deleted User** » Fri, 4. May 07, 22:45

Turrets can rotate +/- 90' ?, didn't know they could do that in all planes, that's a hell of a lot.
But why, just 'cos the intersection of those two hemispheres ends in a given 3D arc, does that define the tuuret's
firing limits?, isn't that just the bit of the firing arc that you can see, the rest is 'off-screen' ?.

Anyway, the first is quite easy, the second I think would be fairly arduous to represent,
so instead maybe a semi-tranparent green hemisphere over the turret & a similar orange (say) hemisphere
(with central direction indicator line) over the cockpit camera.
This probably would give a discernable intersection volume between the two.

I think about it, good suggestion

Phieeel · Post by **Phieeel** » Sat, 5. May 07, 10:01

Dunno if it's been asked, but I've installed several custom ships, and I was attempting to use your program to view them, and it gives me a buffer overrun error. I'm tired and don't feel like trying to figure it out right now, so I'll post asking for help before I collapse.

No, I haven't been playing too much X3, why do you ask? =p

halo112358 · Post by **halo112358** » Sat, 5. May 07, 11:14

Dave Toome wrote:Turrets can rotate +/- 90' ?, didn't know they could do that in all planes, that's a hell of a lot.
But why, just 'cos the intersection of those two hemispheres ends in a given 3D arc, does that define the tuuret's
firing limits?, isn't that just the bit of the firing arc that you can see, the rest is 'off-screen' ?.

It's a weird thing but you can see it in action if you load up the argon M1. The turrets on top of the ship face straight forward (rotated 0,0,0), this means that the guns can potentially turn +/- 90 to the left/right and up/down, basically they get that whole hemisphere to rotate in.

The camera, much like the guns, can rotate +/-90' left/right and up/down, you can test this on any turret mount to prove it to yourself.

When you put the two together it gets interesting, you can turn the camera any way you like - but you can only fire the guns if the direction you're looking in is available for the guns to rotate to...

Here's how this applies to the Argon M1 - the turret is rotated 0/0/0, the camera is rotated -90/0/0 (facing straight up). If you pivot down from your initial position you can fire the guns, if you pivot up you can't. What ES has done in that scene is restrict the turret's firing arc by placing the camera at 90' to the turret - the intersection of the two only allows you to fire forward and up, ie: that 1/4 of the sphere. It's a clever way to keep the turret from firing down into the deck, since the guns will only fire in a direction that the camera can face and that the guns can face. I wish I could do a 3d sketch to represent it, it's difficult to explain well

This is why there are 'dead zones' where turrets will not fire, if place your camera forward of the turret and with the same rotation you'll always have the full half sphere to fire within.

Deleted User · Post by **Deleted User** » Sat, 5. May 07, 13:47

Phieeel, see
http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php? ... 04#2111404

halo112358
Heh, hadn't noticed that effect I'll have a closer look.
Presumably fixed guns (weapondummy) have a firing cone,
so this cone must be added to a turret's physical aiming-hemisphere?
Or maybe it different for fixed-gun turrets.

halo112358 · Post by **halo112358** » Sun, 6. May 07, 23:08

Dave Toome wrote:Presumably fixed guns (weapondummy) have a firing cone,
so this cone must be added to a turret's physical aiming-hemisphere?
Or maybe it different for fixed-gun turrets.

Nope, X3 is incredibly simple in how it handles turrets - they're all equal

The only difference is that there is no animated model for the fixed turrets (it's possible to make one, I've already made a few small animated turrets.)

The front guns are the only "fixed guns" and they're only fixed because they're bound to the main cockpit - every other turret has that half sphere that it's allowed to move in.

edit: I should clarify, the half sphere in front of a turret's or camera's center is the possible aiming area. The turret will only ever turn to an area that both the camera and gun can aim to, and the turret will only ever fire if it can turn to the point where you are currently aiming the camera.

What makes turrets confusing is that it's often possible (because of camera placement) to point the camera somewhere that the gun isn't allowed to point, that's why there are dead spots.

Bleh, specifics

A simple/rough estimation (for camera & turrets that are close together) is the intersection of the allowed half sphere for each object.

edit2: </beatdeadhorse>

Deleted User · Post by **Deleted User** » Mon, 7. May 07, 01:57

OK, the simpler the better, I think i've got it now

Which way do you find best?
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halo112358 · Post by **halo112358** » Mon, 7. May 07, 02:13

Dave Toome wrote:OK, the simpler the better, I think i've got it now

Which way do you find best?
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I think I'll take #1 [ external image ]

Ship/Factory 3D Models and Stats Viewer version 1.1.1.6 (spoiler?) NEW VER. APR 07

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