A way to add tracks?

[South8028]

12 hours ago, ChuckYufarley said:

The animations for the recorder depend on what you want it to do. If you want to be able to utilize connected power, and you don't want the lights to switch off between songs, make the sequences like I described in the example using no behaviors. Off, lights turning on, reel-to-reel animation (with lights on), lights on but no reel-to-reel animation, and lights powering off. Animated switches should have 2 sequences, Stage1 and Stage2. Stage1 no animation. Stage2 animated. For the reel-to-reel animation, you might want to delay the animation for a split second to allow for the timing of the button animation. 

If you want to place the speakers separately from the recorder, we can do the same thing I did with the second jukebox, make them act like radios. The sound will play from them and you'll be able to change the volume if you want. The volume adjust would require a pop-up menu, and if you want, an animated volume knob. I don't know if playing the speaker animation is possible doing it this way, though. At least not in sync with the music.

Otherwise, if you want the sound to come from the speakers, you could make them as part of the recorder nif and place NiNodes where you want the sound to come from.  My scripting knowledge is limited however, when it comes to placing objects separately, but having one script control everything. I'm sure it's possible,  but I've never done it. I could write the script so that it spawns the speakers, and then you can move them to where you want them,  that way I can still have the sound play from them and you can use the speaker animation as well. No volume control, though.

I did install the update, however. I'm not sure how that would impact this project.

 

Edit: I just looked at that NetLink mod and it looks really cool. I'm going to have to investigate that one for sure. Is F4SE working at this point, or are we dealing with a rolled back game? 

No, I don't care if the speaker animation is synchronized or not. I will do it as it was in my old speakers. On a sine wave, there is a small stroke of the speakers (jitter) and a large stroke with a pyramidal graph. Then you will get an abstract animation that is universally suitable for any music, because it is difficult to understand exactly what schedule the speaker is performing. 

No, f4se did not work after the update, as of the last moment, as I looked. Therefore, I made sure a long time ago that it was impossible to update the game without my knowledge. It makes sense to install an update only when all custom tools are ready for it. Any forced update is a legal violation of human rights.

Edited May 17, 2024 by South8028

[niston]

@South8028 Behold, the fabulous ZENITH Space Command:

Spoiler

First Version:

Early Version for Color TV: 

Released in 1965:

Originally developed in 1956. Works by ultrasonic transmission. Early ones used tiny chime rods to create the ultrasonic, struck by a tiny hammer as you pushed the button. Later ones used electronic generators.

There apparently was an even earlier product (1955) that worked with a "highly directional" flash bulb, using photoresistors in the tv set to detect the flash signal. It was prone to malfunction due to ambient sunlight and fell out of fashion quickly.

[niston]

@ChuckYufarley I'd guess the easiest way to have custom wire meshes actually transmit power is to make them snappable and give them the required AV.
But I'd again campaign for a wireless power design: It's just way more flexible and you won't need stuff like my other mod's "buried wires" to get things set up nicely and clean.

Question: I suppose that using radio receivers to implement the speakers would require a custom radio station? Is it possible to select (back/forward perhaps) individual tracks via such radio station?
And would this limit workshop constructed systems in such way that they would all have to play the same music file (track) at one time?

Other question: Would you happen to know if a Sound Output Model can be made to actually output just one specific channel (for example, Left channel) without downmixing the other channels to it? Im thinking of stereo sound, which would be fantastic if you can freely arrange speakers - You could set up the sweet spot to your liking and according to your furnishings.

And if we go that route, what about having a component system? @South8028

Speakers, Amp, Reel Recorder, Radio Tuner and maybe Turntable*? The  Amp would be used to select listening source, volume and perhaps balance. Recorder and Turntable would handle records of each format. Tuner would serve to find and select radio stations, finally the speakers would act as sound sources, or rather "decorative placeholders" with NiNodes in them to which actual (invisible) sound sources could be refattached to and removed from, as desired. So if you want to listen to a radio station, the tuner tells the amp to placeatnode() "radio type" sound sources dialed to the appropriate frequency on it's attached speakers, while the reel recorder could perhaps tell it to spawn sound descriptor based emitters instead, etc. The amp finally sends the command to it's attached and selected speaker pair, which would then receive the command and spawn the sound source(s) with the playback volume selected on the amp itself.

*There is a mod with component amp and turntable already, but unfortunately it's scripts were first attempt by someone not familiar with scripting. Which is really extremely unfortunate cause the mod would have been really great otherwise.

I'm thinking that the network layer protocol for this would have to emulate some sort of virtual circuit, so that a "permanent connection" can be established/torn down between components, or at least between amps and speakers. Ideally, it'd also have some sort of ping-like mechanism that will help us detect if the network connection is disrupted (for any reason), causing the speakers to delete() any active sound sources and stop playback. I'm also thinking that the "named group" scheme from my GPC protocol would work fine for this application, too. Say, "MYHOME.LIVINGROOM" for speakers in your livingroom. You'd configure the Amp for that speaker group name, and each of your speakers as well. But instead of GCP's channel numbers, we'd let user select between L and R (and maybe surround channels if that's even possible) for speakers built in workshop.

Damn it. Sounds like another high effort mod. >_<
On the plus side, there'd be 3 of us working on it.

What you guys think?

[South8028]

I can just make a left and right speaker with mirror symmetry. And for them it will be possible to distribute separate descriptors with sounds for which the left/right channel is disabled. Unfortunately, I don’t understand anything about scripts, but I know that the engine literally reproduces sound... Stereo, mono, quad, whatever, just wav. If it is possible to run 2 descriptors synchronously from SoundNode, collected into separate nifs, then there will be a separate left and right channel. 

I have already made all the parts that Chuck asked for. All buttons and switches are separate, 4 sequences for the base. But this idea came to my mind... Why not make the mechanic rewind tracks like in a real tape recorder? Make buttons "Play", "Forward", "Back", "Stop" along with animation of the reels? I mean... Sequence 1 (button in home position), sequence 2 (button click animation), sequence 3 - cycle (button pressed, reel spins in Play mode, or rewind, or fast forward; depending on the button). Sequence 4 (animation of the button returning to its original state). The coil can be hidden with the NiVis Controller at the end of each session and replaced. 

[niston]

Haha I was thinking about the rewind fast foward thing as well just a minute earlier!
Yes, that'd be a great eye candy FX I think. When you skip tracks, it goes WHIRR for some second or two and then starts playing.

Depending on how the system is implemented, the sound descriptors (or radio references) would be spawned/destroyed by script.
If the reel animations had gamebryo sequences, they could easily be invoked from Papyrus as well.

Oh and on topic of radio stations, if we use SUP F4SE because NetLink, we get ability to scan for all radio stations in the game very quickly (100ms or so) for free.

I think @South8028 u have already seen the nixie displays I made? They are single tube with numbers 0 to 9 and up to 6 symbols. Combination of multiple type tubes into one segment is also possible, if someone thinks we're gonna need more symbols. A panel of them can show float numbers (there is a decimal point available), so we could use the small nixies I did for the rewire-o-tron machine and have them display the selected radio frequency on the tuner, if so desired. These Nixies are ofc programmable from Papyrus already and even feature a programmable character set.

[niston]

Also I'm not sure if you guys know this already, but you can combine Gamebryo animations. For example, imagine 2 lamps on a panel having 4 animations:

ANIM_LIGHT_1_ON - animates light 1 emissive multiple to 1
ANIM_LIGHT_1_OFF - animates light 1 emissive multiple to 0
ANIM_LIGHT_2_ON - animates light 2 emissive multiple to 1
ANIM_LIGHT_2_OFF - animates light 2 emissive multiple to 0

-> you can now turn both lights 1 and 2 on and off independently, by sequencing 1_ON, 2_OFF. Or 1_OFF, 2_ON, etc from Papyrus with PlayGamebryoanimation() .
The only thing that is not possible is addressing both lamps at the same time from script, it always has to be one after the other. So they must have a fixed duration and Utiltiy.Wait() is used to wait for the anim to finish.
But this is mostly a non-issue if the lamp animations are of very short duration, 0.003 (Nifskope units) for example.

I've used this technique, as spawning individual lamp objects with PlaceAtNode() gets very tedious and slow if you have a lot of lamps on a given panel. The lamps on the elevator controller in my elevator framework are animated like this.

[South8028]

27 minutes ago, niston said:

Haha I was thinking about the rewind fast foward thing as well just a minute earlier!
Yes, that'd be a great eye candy FX I think. When you skip tracks, it goes WHIRR for some second or two and then starts playing.

Depending on how the system is implemented, the sound descriptors (or radio references) would be spawned/destroyed by script.
If the reel animations had gamebryo sequences, they could easily be invoked from Papyrus as well.

Oh and on topic of radio stations, if we use SUP F4SE because NetLink, we get ability to scan for all radio stations in the game very quickly (100ms or so) for free.
I think @South8028 u have already seen the nixie displays I made? We could use the small nifs from the rewire-o-tron machine to show radio frequency on the tuner as well, if so desired. These Nixies are ofc programmable from Papyrus already.

Now I'm interested in the possibility of replacing coils with a script. I'm guessing that in sequences 1 and 4 for each button, the coils need to be made invisible. Then the Stop button will work as the default state. Sequence 1 (the “Stop” button is pressed - the coil is visible). Sequence 2 (the “Stop” button is in the initial position - the coil is not visible). So these separate nif's from the base will not only animate the button being pressed, but also play the reel animation for different states (Play, Fast Forward, Rewind) depending on the button. All these 3 nif... Play, Forward, Backward... Will be replaced by one nif Stop with a static position of the coils. Is the theory correct?

As for the possibilities of running sequences from papyrus... You know better... I don't care, I can make you a hundred sequences in one nif and animate them all, if you want. It will be even easier for me. I don’t know... If it is possible to call any sequence in nif with a script, then this method is clearly more convenient than many separate nifs.

Edited May 17, 2024 by South8028

[niston]

With coils you mean the tape reels, correct?
I think the recorder nif should have several states for the reels:

- Unloaded (no reels on recorder)
- Loaded (reels, but not turning)
- Playback (reels rotating slowly in counter clock wise direction)
- Fast-Forward (reels rotating quickly in CCW direction)
- Rewind (reels rotating quickly in clock wise direction)

Not sure if it would be possible to animate the amount of tape on each spool. For the ultra-immershunz, lmao.

What buttons would there be needed to control the reel machine?
- Power
- Load/Unload, could be a lever (give loaded reel back to player, or show container menu to load/unload reel into/from machine)
- Play ofc
- Stop
- Fwd fast forward
- Rew rewind

more?

Each button should have "idle" and "active (pressed down)" at least. Perhaps also "pushing"/"release" and, if very high effort mod, a "illuminated idle" and "illuminated active" state, I guess.
 

[South8028]

14 minutes ago, niston said:

With coils you mean the tape reels, correct?
I think the recorder nif should have several states for the reels:

- Unloaded (no reels on recorder)
- Loaded (reels, but not turning)
- Playback (reels rotating slowly in counter clock wise direction)
- Fast-Forward (reels rotating quickly in CCW direction)
- Rewind (reels rotating quickly in clock wise direction)

Not sure if it would be possible to animate the amount of tape on each spool. For the ultra-immershunz, lmao.

What buttons would there be needed to control the reel machine?
- Power
- Load/Unload, could be a lever (give loaded reel back to player, or show container menu to load reel into machine)
- Play ofc
- Stop
- Fwd fast forward
- Rew rewind

more?

Each button should have a "idle", "active", "pushing" and maybe a "illuminated" state, I guess.
 

Well, the main buttons specifically on the crown800 (I made this model from the photo of the crown800) are forward, backward, game, stop. The panel contains many switches, toggle switches, 2 volume controls for 2 magnetic tape channels, 2 recording controls (they are probably not needed). I tore off and animated absolutely everything except a couple of toggle switches that I didn't understand what they did and the recording controls that we didn't need.I will not highlight the buttons, because they are not in the original. There is a backlight for the counters along with an AddOnNode of light from them.The amount of tape can be animated, but I don’t know what to do with the fact that, firstly, this is a cycle (how can I make the amount of tape in the initial frame match the amount in the last?). Secondly, how to synchronize the amount of tape on all these reels (or I don’t know what they are called correctly)? There are 4 coils in 4 separate nifs, which replace each other.

Edited May 17, 2024 by South8028

[niston]

Looking at the picture of a crown 800 front panel, I don't even understand where the play/stop transport control buttons are. Is it the set of black ones near the big metal lever to the right?