Making Modified Helm

[DarthDudo]

Hey there folks this is my first time ever editing a mesh and Im having some trouble trying to edit a helmet from a mod basically im trying to recreate this

 

Heres the look im trying to recreate

 

but everything ive tried just crashes my game when I load it with my mesh in the override Im using 3DS Max by the way and as I said this is my first time editing a mesh so any help would be greatly appreciated!

 

P.S. I messaged the person who made the one in the pic but got no reply so I figured now is as good a time as any to learn to do it myself :thumbsup:

Edited June 7, 2011 by DarthDudo

[amycus]

Hi, I also got one of your messages but you never specified exactly what you were trying to do (new helmet or edit an existing one), but reading this I will assume that the question was in regard of this specific problem (editing a custom helmet you downloaded, and make the face visible).

 

Note that I've never done this specifically myself, and that I'm on vacation overseas without 3ds max in front of me and will have to write from my experience and memory. Also note that If you are goint to work from somethign someone else have done, you will need permission if you wish to share it later on (shouldnt be a problem if you only wish to use it for yourself):

 

.You will need:

3ds max

Eshme's tools (plugin to 3dsmax)

The toolset

Winrar/winzip

The mod you wish to modify

 

Start my downloading the mod "underworld armor" (I think that was the name?), and you should have a dazip. CHange the ending ".dazip" to ".zip" and you should be able to open it with either winrar or winzip (your choice).

 

Go through the different folders and try to find the ".erf" files. Assuming they have put the meshes where I usually do, you should go to Contents\packages\core\data and then extract the .erf file there to you desktop.

 

Run the toolset and select file -> open file. then choose the .erf file you just extracted, and the toolset will show you a long row of files. Right click one of them and choose "extract all" to a folder of you choice.

 

Now run 3ds max and use eshme's tools to import the helmet. I dunno what exatcly the creator of that mod might have called them, but it should be hm_hlh_xxxxxx or something like that (note that "hm" stands for human male. if you want to play as an elf female you should instead look for ef_hlh_xxxxx - the mesh itself should be the same, but the skeleton and the height differs depending on that. So if you want to make the helmet look as you want ti to for all races and genders, you will need to repeat the process below 7 times) Note that you can ignore any messages about textures at this point.

 

When the mesh is in 3ds max, select it and look in the upper right white field, where you should see something like:

Skin

Edit normals

Unwrap uwv

+Editable poly

 

Hold "CTRL" and select "skin", "edit normals" and "unwrap UWV" at the same time. Then right click and choose cut. You should now only have "+editable poly" visible.

Press the "+" sign in "editable poly", and choose "element". Then press the deafult human head that is visible inside the helmet itself. Delete it, and any parts that you might not get on your first try.

 

Now go back to the white field in the upper right corner, press "editable poly", and right click just above that text to choose "paste". It should again look something like:

Skin

Edit normals

Unwrap uwv

+Editable poly

 

Now it's time for the textures, You already have them extracted as .dds files, but you need to tell the game to use them.

 

Go to the material menu (button somewhere in the upper row in case you are new to 3ds max). You see initially 9 grey balls. Select one of them. Press the "material" button below the 9 grey balls, and a menu will pop up. Choose "dragon age material" (should have been added when you installed eshmes tools. In the bars below (don't remember their names, sorry) Choose "character" in the first one, and in the second bar you should choose something with no emmissive (once again, don't remember the exact one. Hard when you don't have it in front of you. Hopefully someone else can add that information for you below).

 

Then if you scroll down further, you should see a list with diffuse, normal and specular maps. Thes maps should also have been extracted from the .erf file earlier. If you can't figure o which is which from the naming, try to differ them from the looks. The diffuse map gives the map it's color. The normal map is usually purple in other games, but in DA they are apparently in greyscale. It is there to give the mesh the illussion of structure that isn't there (like cracks or smaller details. The specular map tells the game how glossy all the parts should be. Is USUALLY only lightly coloured. Might look like a "washed out" version of the diffuse map.

 

When that's done, pull thetextured "ball" in the upper part of the menu on to the mesh. Also, right below the 9 initial ablls you should decide on a name. This name is suppossed to only be read by the game, and that's why you get it right from the beginning. If you make a human male it hsould thus be something like "hm_hlf_uw1a_0" Where "hm" means human male, "hlf" means (if I remember correctly) medium armor class, UW1 is just used in the toolset as a name on the item variation. I just wrote UW for short for underworld and added a 1 as the first type. The "a" in the end should always be there. Same goes for the "_0".

 

Now it's time to export it. Make sure to give it exactly the same name as when you named the texture in both rows (in my example, hm_hlf_uw1a_0), and yes you want a new .mao file.

 

Go to the folder where you exported it, and then add the 3 .dds files you extracted earlier. From here on you should be able to follow this video tutorial:

 

 

Just remember that when you do the .GDA file you will need to set it as a heavy helmet. Otherwise you will just get some floating eyeballs in the helmet. If you wish to know the reason for this:

 

The game will automatically render the PC's custom head when the helmet type is either light ot medium. When it is heavy it just shows the face, it won't tender the throat. If you make a massive helmet it will refuse to render the head at all, it will only render the eyes. That's why the helmet you now orked on, and all other massive helmets have a deafult, black head inside their own mesh. If we take my own mod, the armor "warden's burden", you can see on the item stats that all arnor pieces are "massive", except from the helmet. It originally was, but then it just showed some floating eyeballs in the head. So if I later plan to change my helmet to massive, I will first need to add a black custom head inside the mesh itself. Now you know the reason for the "cartoon eyes".

Edited June 8, 2011 by amycus

[DarthDudo]

First let me say THANK YOU!!Ive never used 3DS Max before in my life and you made all that seem like cake walk I was going about it the completely wrong way!

 

Now I've done everything up to the point below however when I click on Dragon age material there is no "character" to choose from instead I have all the maps "Map_Diffuse, Map_Normal, Map_Specular" etc and I cant find "no emmissive" anywhere im sure its just me being completely new to this and im sure its something right in front of me I just cant find it?I clicked Material Editor is that correct?when I hit that I can see a list of materials Dragon Age Materials are there but again I can find no "Character" or "No Emmissive" when I right click or double click them I just get all the maps?and the only grey balls I can see are all labelled Default standard 1 -24 with the materials bar above them?I think Im in the wrong place?

 

 

 

Go to the material menu (button somewhere in the upper row in case you are new to 3ds max). You see initially 9 grey balls. Select one of them. Press the "material" button below the 9 grey balls, and a menu will pop up. Choose "dragon age material" (should have been added when you installed eshmes tools. In the bars below (don't remember their names, sorry) Choose "character" in the first one, and in the second bar you should choose something with no emmissive (once again, don't remember the exact one. Hard when you don't have it in front of you. Hopefully someone else can add that information for you below).

 

 

Edited June 8, 2011 by DarthDudo

[amycus]

First let me say THANK YOU!!Ive never used 3DS Max before in my life and you made all that seem like cake walk I was going about it the completely wrong way!

 

Now I've done everything up to the point below however when I click on Dragon age material there is no "character" to choose from instead I have all the maps "Map_Diffuse, Map_Normal, Map_Specular" etc and I cant find "no emmissive" anywhere im sure its just me being completely new to this and im sure its something right in front of me I just cant find it?I clicked Material Editor is that correct?when I hit that I can see a list of materials Dragon Age Materials are there but again I can find no "Character" or "No Emmissive" when I right click or double click them I just get all the maps?and the only grey balls I can see are all labelled Default standard 1 -24 with the materials bar above them?I think Im in the wrong place?

 

 

 

Go to the material menu (button somewhere in the upper row in case you are new to 3ds max). You see initially 9 grey balls. Select one of them. Press the "material" button below the 9 grey balls, and a menu will pop up. Choose "dragon age material" (should have been added when you installed eshmes tools. In the bars below (don't remember their names, sorry) Choose "character" in the first one, and in the second bar you should choose something with no emmissive (once again, don't remember the exact one. Hard when you don't have it in front of you. Hopefully someone else can add that information for you below).

 

 

 

Glad that I could be of any help. The part you are confused about is probably largely bacause of my bad memory where I don't use the exact terms. Fortunately the same guy who made the previus video I linked also did this one:

 

 

The only difference will be that you need to choose "character" as material type (if you do choose "weapon" here the mesh won't follow the skeleton and will instead just hoover above the body in a weird way). And then under "render semantics" (I think that's what it says? Like I said, I don't have access to 3ds max now, I'm just looking at the vid now while trying to remember), you will have a buch of choices. I don't remember them all, but it should be something noted with armor and [additive tint] [no alpha] [no emissive]. That's at least the one I used for my custom armor. Oh, and those "9 balls" I spoke about earlier are the ones on 0:23 in the vid (though he only have 6 shown at a time), just in case you are confused.

Edited June 8, 2011 by amycus

[DarthDudo]

 

Glad that I could be of any help. The part you are confused about is probably largely bacause of my bad memory where I don't use the exact terms. Fortunately the same guy who made the previus video I linked also did this one:

 

 

The only difference will be that you need to choose "character" as material type (if you do choose "weapon" here the mesh won't follow the skeleton and will instead just hoover above the body in a weird way). And then under "render semantics" (I think that's what it says? Like I said, I don't have access to 3ds max now, I'm just looking at the vid now while trying to remember), you will have a buch of choices. I don't remember them all, but it should be something noted with armor and [additive tint] [no alpha] [no emissive]. That's at least the one I used for my custom armor. Oh, and those "9 balls" I spoke about earlier are the ones on 0:23 in the vid (though he only have 6 shown at a time), just in case you are confused.

 

 

Thank you thank you thank you!Did I say thank you??Th reason why I was so confused was not because of your description it was because I didnt have the material editor in compact mode so I was seeing thing a little differently than what was in the video Ill let you know when Im done

 

Kudos to you!

[amycus]

Glad to hear. Just post here again if you get stuck on something else.

[DarthDudo]

OK got the model finished but I cant make the GDA excell processor just wont well process it been editing my worksheet for about an hour now :wallbash:

 

I have been following the first link to the letter but no matter how I change my worksheet it just wont process any ideas?I tried the bat file but getting the same results there everytime it just says ERROR:Cannot Process file C:\ blah blah blah press any key to terminate grrr so close!

 

EDIT:Ahh It keeps saving my spreadsheet as an .xlsx this be the problem?

Edited June 8, 2011 by DarthDudo

[amycus]

OK got the model finished but I cant make the GDA excell processor just wont well process it been editing my worksheet for about an hour now :wallbash:

 

I have been following the first link to the letter but no matter how I change my worksheet it just wont process any ideas?I tried the bat file but getting the same results there everytime it just says ERROR:Cannot Process file C:\ blah blah blah press any key to terminate grrr so close!

 

EDIT:Ahh It keeps saving my spreadsheet as an .xlsx this be the problem?

 

Only one way to find out, but most likely. Mine always save as a .xls by deafult.

I personally never had to make a bat file, for me it works by just drag and drop.

EDIT: Oh, and it is supposed to be done in seconds, so if it keeps working in more than a minute there is most likely something wrong

Edited June 8, 2011 by amycus

[DarthDudo]

 

Only one way to find out, but most likely. Mine always save as a .xls by deafult.

I personally never had to make a bat file, for me it works by just drag and drop.

EDIT: Oh, and it is supposed to be done in seconds, so if it keeps working in more than a minute there is most likely something wrong

 

Ok I've tried saving it in every different file type in Excel with the same result the closes I get is .XLSX is there any other file type Excel processor will accept??

[amycus]

 

Only one way to find out, but most likely. Mine always save as a .xls by deafult.

I personally never had to make a bat file, for me it works by just drag and drop.

EDIT: Oh, and it is supposed to be done in seconds, so if it keeps working in more than a minute there is most likely something wrong

 

Ok I've tried saving it in every different file type in Excel with the same result the closes I get is .XLSX is there any other file type Excel processor will accept??

 

I don't think so, and don't know how much help I can offer in this case where I have never had the same problem, added to the fact that I can't test my own excel processer ( me bein overseas and all), but can't you use a convertor? I just quickly googled ".xlsx .xls" and found a buch of links to convertors. I got the idea since I have often used .docx to .doc convertors...

EDIT: This page might help you: http://www.killertechtips.com/2009/04/23/xlsx-to-xls/

2nd EDIT: further search found me this, thought it would be weird if you can't choose to save as .xls just because you have a newer version:

Click Office > Excel Options (in 2007) or File > Options (2010)

Click Save

Select "Excel 97-2003 workbook (*.xls)" from the "Save files in this format" dropdown.

Click OK.

Edited June 8, 2011 by amycus