[FO4][HELP] A New Kind Of .lip File

[SirMcSourTowel]

Hey everyone!

 

I was hoping someone with experience could help me out. I'm trying to understand the method/source code of the .lip files a little bit better.

 

Heres my project idea:

I'm making a new android/robot follower that has no real facial expressions/emotions. Instead I'm trying to have his mouth and eyes get brighter and dimmer as he speaks. Much like everyone's favorite, HK-47.

I believe it was SWToR where his mouth/speaker also illuminated as he spoke? Haven't found the video to back that up. I've seen it though. This just seemed to be a more aesthetically interactive way when engaged in conversation with him.

 

Anyway, I know how to generate the .lip files for humanoid characters that have facebones and such, but have no idea where to start with this. Originally my plan was to make a glow map with standard brightness to it for the illuminated areas, and then a more intense glow map to layer over top of it. Then have a "slider" of sorts migrate between the two glow maps as his pitch changed. I have (kind of) found a way to do this in UE4, and as well as making a small python script to make it happen outside of game engines.

 

This all being said, I have no idea how to integrate this into CreationKit. Since .lip files have their own section and function in the dialogue section, on top of being a .lip file (which I have no idea how it's even generated), I'm not sure how to add them to the mod.

 

The last thing I tried was making separate head animations using the two glow maps, and just matched intensity based on a phonics guide. All well and good, right? No. I'm not even entirely sure if different facial expressions of speech(the HKX, NIFs, etc) reside somewhere in the character animations. Most recently I was looking in the Meshes>>Actors>>Character>>FaceGenData>>FaceGeom directory for a solution.

If that was the case, the lip files would be calling those separate animations and combining them to generate .lip files in the 32-bit version. Then I could just tell the .lip generator to call/use my "face" animations specifically for my android. Problem is, I have zero idea how it does that, or if that is even how it works.

 

Thus, I was hoping someone had source code/Papryus info or a guide to help me out with this.

and before anyone posts the link to the Creation Kit Papyrus Reference, I have already seen and reluctantly read through the majority of it.

 

Many thanks!

 

 

 

 

EDIT:

 

I thought I would link something fairly useful I found.

 

Material and Texture Animations in NifSkope. I'm not entirely sure if this would help me or not. This is definitely something worth while, but it doesn't point me in the right direction in regards to the lip files.

Still open to any suggestions or advice.

 

EDIT 2:

 

I have posted this help request on a few more modding forums I use regularly, and someone posted a response that made me realize I needed to clarify some things I said.

 

 

I wanted to do the exact same thing for DARRYL from the Extended Lore project. And I've been looking into Talking Activators, which have the red led-light up when they speak. Some robots have the same, if I recall correctly. I'll try to search for a solution with you and if I find anything of use I'll drop in the thread. :)

So I double checked the light animations for the Robobrains and the Protectrons, no luck. Went ahead and checked the other robots as well. All of them just use a looping blink animation that isn't linked to their speech, sadly.

I researched the Securitrons from FNV as well revealing the same result more or less. Theirs were alittle more in depth adding flicker and distortion to their animation.

 

He continues:

But this is how you generate lip files by batch, I used this method all the time for Ivy:

How to generate voice files by batch

 

I have no idea what the trick is to linking the model to the 'animation/texture change' but this is how you generate lip files by hand:

Lol i should have been more descriptive; I know HOW to make(generate) standard .lip files in the CK-32bit version, make a batch, and all that good stuff to skip having to go into CK. The part I'm lost on is how the Creation kit takes audio files, then calls on the appropriate facial animations., and then compresses that animation montage into a .lip file. (The shape of their mouths and expressions when they speak.)Â

 

If I knew this, I could just tell the CK's engine to call on my custom animations instead of the human's face animations. (This was my theory until recently.)

 

Upon further experimentation, I realized that if I just renamed my animations to match those in the /Data/ folder and then replace them, it would break the rest of the game's .lip files for every other NPC.

Keeping the originals (obviously) and copying them back and forth doesn't work. The .lip files still use the face fbxs continuously to be referenced for those specific .lip files.

 

Since I couldn't find them originally, that's when I tried making scripts and whatnot. The NifSkope tutorial from the Nexus I mentioned above was incredibly helpful, but that still didn't help with the .lip files.

 

The search continues.

Edited May 31, 2019 by SirMcSourTowel