New Texture mod WIP

[xander2077]

yeah i agree, but before i change it to the final version i have to create a dome mesh that i can use in all the towers and just scale up or down as i need to.

 

here is the example of what i am working on for parts. there are walls, and one column and a doorway, with arch, and these can be duplicated in the pagoda style stack to replace the other features im using as a placeholder. i figure keeping the platform part is ok since it is already duplicated and refined about as much as it is going to be, maybe a little more but not much is needed.

 

now i can take these parts and use them on other ruin buildings too. once i start the tower base model i can then use its parts on other towers to keep the style consistent but provide the necessary size variation needed.

 

that is the beauty of duplication rather than building all of it from scratch. intersecting faces wont really matter in game, since the engine does that anyway and deals with it ok. as long as i minimize the intersection as much as possible, and reduce the polys to only visible parts (deleting things that wont show anyway) then i can reduce the poly count down to a reasonable number and still maintain high detail.

 

things to do for these sets, is various roofs, one dome, one square dome, and one rectangular dome. some kind of a false front for stone murals, both round ish and square ish columns, various windows and doors for different ruins. i also want to make some ornaments and tech stuff to spice it up here and there. there also needs to be some statues and gargoyles of some kind, that are disticntly dwemer but i have not settled on that yet. they dont need to scream skyrim ripoff, but need to be in the same general style family. i also need to make a general tower platform and some skywalk meshes both broken and in one piece. broken columns and butresses. broken statues. etc. perhaps after i finish the remodel of the centurions and other machines i can borrow things from them or make statues out of some of them as well once i pose them and strip them of animation. there also needs to be some stone platforms both outside and inside. just makes sense.

 

http://i.share.pho.to/a1a6b887_o.png

http://i.share.pho.to/ee069c58_o.png

 

 

now i am satisfied with the level of quality in these parts i just made enough to know they will blend well with the new armor. i still have to add some cirular features too in some places, but not sure where yet. perhaps a gear or two, maybe just circular ornaments, i dont know. just something to keep in mind later. and of course the textures will really make them pop later.

 

for now i need to set this aside though to run some errands.

Edited March 8, 2016 by xander2077

[xander2077]

update. the latest collection of nurnies/greebles/widgets... whatever you want to call them.

 

the structure to the left is the base models to the dwemer ruin 50 walls/roof/doors/pillars/platform. which will be duplicated once they are textured. i cloned the doorways to the right to be textured on the top half as windows, perhaps even having broken ones. but they will have some transparency, and still be cloudy so they wont be clear. the last doors were cloned to be either open thresholds, or to be locked gates that you cant get through. and oc course the grates for keeping nosey people out.

 

now on to the towers to try and get some of the same kind of junk made up for those. i probably wont create any round pillars til i do those but every time i make stuff for a scene i want to dupe, i wll export them as a greeble pack in an obj file.

 

http://i.share.pho.to/6e783c97_o.png

[xander2077]

http://i.share.pho.to/8088debc_o.png

[RubberMan01]

MUCH better.

 

P.S. sorry for the short answers but been very busy mate.

[xander2077]

its ok, i wasnt very typative last night either. i was dead by the time i posted the tower. i dont know if you caught on, but the skywalk is away from the tower because i want to be able to edit and texture the group of pieces before i move it closer. just easier. i also have to add damage before it is done. plus i want to export it as a group for later use in another way. this one looks good as it is, but needs to look like it was smashed in half or something instead of like a balcony. so the base model will be that and it will be refined so the slab looks cracked and there is a cracked panel or two jutting out into thin air. and i will have to do the same for the panels around the platform on top of the tower. that one is just the main one, and other derivatives will be developed from it.

 

one of the things i finally figured out is how to edit the existing bounding box, but that still doesnt help me replace the one or two i deleted on accident. i guess if all else fails i could just move all the new objects to the side and reimport the vanilla mesh to replace it. but i would like to know how to build one and then designate it as the bounding box so morrowind recognizes it.

 

doing each feature in parts makes it a lot easier. sure it doesnt look complete yet, but with the parts i have for each model assembled and multiplied over the main body of the building, it will bring a lot of detail and realism to it.

 

i may just use this model as well to build the other towers from. the only thing i have to keep in mind is the size of the platforms. the rest can be adjusted and scaled to be about the same size footprint as the vanilla one.

 

since all i really need is the bounding box to designate the position of the old model i want to replace, i can theoretically open the blend file and import the nif on top of it so they are in the same workspace, and then arrange the items from the new stuff after i get rid of the old stuff. i may use this technique for just about everything once i get a good collection of greebles to choose from.

 

i was thinking that the round short building, the one i tried to make look nicer but really dont like much still, could be a good way to add an additional entrance to the ruins (assuming that this building is present at the particular ruin) it could be reconfigured so there is a hidden key somewhere (like your atonement sphere) that can be activated to open the gate (this would be redesigned to have grates instead of windows) and then use your elevator to fast travel down to the interior ruin. the key could be hidden inside about half way through the monsters and it is up to the player if they want to use it or not. but an incentive would be to have a chest visible inside the building that they have to go back around to get to and have to use the key to even access. and the door the elevator leads to could be locked until the player opens it from the right side. maybe activated by a lever or something simple to avoid scripting issues. so it could only be unlocked once the player takes the elevator down and throws a lever.

 

and even if the ruins dont have this building, it could be added easily.

 

there is a lot of complexity that could be added with the lift, your traps etc. i like that dynamic because it can also be a good way to make treasures just out of reach but add a mini quest to find the key so the player can get the treasure they saw on a ledge way up. i was also thinking someting like a tesla coil trap would be cool. it would be easy to make a spere object cast a lightning bolt spell, and it would also add some sense to having all these machines running all over the place. why of course! it is to power all the nasty booby traps the dwemer left behind when they disappeared!

 

anyway, just musing. time to wake up and drink some coffee, and start the day.

Edited March 9, 2016 by xander2077

[RubberMan01]

Matter of interest. Where you from?

 

I agree about the lift thing. Maybe use some grating (like prison bars) from one room to another so you can see there is more to the ruin to give you a reason to carry on hunting.

 

As for traps. They would need to be placed manually in world wherever you wanted them. There aren't many limits to trap types it just depends if you can think of them lol and I'll script them up.

 

Tesla trap! Sounds lore friendly to me. Anything with shock seems to fit in with the Dwemer so yes that is a good idea.

 

Just on my way to fit a new sink and taps for a neighbour lol (I do stuff like that for free for the old ones cos I'm soft!) The riggers of everyone knowing you're a builder....... someone always wants something and they want it for free!

 

My email: [email protected]

 

Feel free to share your thoughts.

 

bbfn

[xander2077]

size comparison: the scaling is the same for all imported nifs, so in game the relation in size between these two ruins is drastic. the tower truly is an imposing feature now that it has been redesigned.

 

this shot was possible by taking and importing the OBJ i exported from the first ruin to the new tower and then rotating it so it was on the same x,y,z. then i moved both off the center of the grid next to each other and selected both object groups, leaving the bounding box alone, and hit ctrl-j which joined them into one workspace instead of having to jump in and out of object mode to move things around. the further along i get building the ruins the more cluttered the nurnie file will be, but the easier it will be to assemble the parts and have a comprehensive file to go shopping from. and i will never lose an object where i dont remember.

 

the thing that blew me away was how big this tower really is. i mean it dwarves (lol) the smaller ruin 50. i am almost afraid to see how huge it is in he game. event he skywalk door is tall. but that is what i wanted. i was just surprised it came out as big as it did.

 

this is also important for scaling, because i can make everything consistent and things i am not sure about can be seen side by side so railing is not too tall ect. the doors are fine, archways etc. i would rather they be imposing and awe inspiring than just run of the mill.

 

to give you an idea of how tall the tower is, just think about the character being able to walk on the ledge of the smaller ruin. and able to stand in the doorway of the smaller one. that is how large the tower is. just to be sure i think it would be wise to adjust some of the dimensions on the samller one so the doorways are similarly tall. especially on the smaller ruins top platform. i guess what i could do is import a character nif just to be sure the scaling is correct.

 

http://i.share.pho.to/51e14d10_o.png

[xander2077]

Matter of interest. Where you from?

 

I agree about the lift thing. Maybe use some grating (like prison bars) from one room to another so you can see there is more to the ruin to give you a reason to carry on hunting.

 

As for traps. They would need to be placed manually in world wherever you wanted them. There aren't many limits to trap types it just depends if you can think of them lol and I'll script them up.

 

Tesla trap! Sounds lore friendly to me. Anything with shock seems to fit in with the Dwemer so yes that is a good idea.

 

Just on my way to fit a new sink and taps for a neighbour lol (I do stuff like that for free for the old ones cos I'm soft!) The riggers of everyone knowing you're a builder....... someone always wants something and they want it for free!

 

My email: [email protected]

 

Feel free to share your thoughts.

 

bbfn

 

im from america (probably guessed that) midwest. and yes my spelling is atrocious, but dont let that fool you.

 

i have never been to the UK, but have travelled the world. intended to long ago, but life gets busy. my grandmotehr used to be an antiques and art curator and would travel to london all the time, as well as france, to find old furniture mostly. but she still has wuite the collection of old treasures. she used to frquent the tower of london every time she went there, because some or another exibhit was open to the public for a limited time, and then they would hide it away again. so she would bring back pictures and books of the tower, and i was fascinated by the architecture and the armor. i ahve always been sort of a medieval history buff, but not really into the renaissance fair dress up game. one of my uncle in laws is though. taught me how to make chain mail from scratch. that is tedious work.

 

anyway now my fascination with armor and architecture is transposed to morrowind and other games. playing is fun, but building something that people can enjoy is even better.

 

i aslo do a lot of carpentry for people as part of my work. im sort of a freelance ranch hand/carpenter/mechanic. usually im fixing someone elses mistakes. especially on the carpentry front. last summer i reinforced the interior of a sea container with lumber so it could be turned into a root cellar and tornado shelter. the problem was the owner wanted to bury it before it was reinforced, so it was literally caving in. only the corners are strong enough to hold the weight of even a foot or so of dirt. so i had to use jacks to get the roof back up and then force all the supports in place from front to back. but it looks pretty now and smells like pine inside. too bad they wont be staining the interior. tornado shelters and root cellars are big in farm country. that way people have a place to run if the weather turns evil, and they have a place to store food besides the house when they make their monthly grocer run. plus most people live in trailer homes or prefab homes, but that makes no sense to me in tornado country. i would rather build a house with a shelter inside it somewhere instead of having to run 20 yards and possibly not make it. but to each their own.

[xander2077]

problem. trying to import a creature of some kind to the blend file doesnt really work. the scaling of character or creature models is different than the buildings for whatever reason. so the dwarven spectre, for instance, i can export from nifskope to an obj, and when i import it to the blender scene, it is giant compared to the buildings and its bofy parts are sperad all over the place. so that wont work for scaling. i guess i have to just see how the buildings look in game first before they are complete and just COC my character to the nearest ruin to make sure things are not all wonky. this will present a few minor issues with placement since i will most assuredly have to adjust the meshes (roofs and doorways etc) to look right next to the average character size. i may also have to make my character taller with the console so it is more representative of the average PC size or the tallest of them. so that means i will have to add a simple texture so the buildings are not invisible and then see them in game just like the armor. joy...

 

this is also going to make things difficult when i get ready to import and save the dwemer centurions. i was trying to just import the spectre to old blender, since new blender doesnt have the import script working yet, snd it started to run into import problems with the bones. and even though i only wanted the mesh without the bones, it was importing all the animations etc. it started to run hard, so i forced it closed. it was getting too close to danger temperatures.

 

now once i import it sucessfully, (crossing fingers) a creature model should not be hard to work on if it stays in the same configuration it appears as in nifskope. if however it gets dismembered like the spectre, and spread all over creation, then that will make things really difficult to redo.

 

that is not what i wanted to find out, but hopefully there is a workable solution to getting things sorted out.

 

i guess if worse comes to worse i could always have someone import the vanilla mesh for me and send me a copy i can use in blender, but i will have to try everything before i resort to that.

anyway, that kind of puts the ruins on hold for finalizing. not necessarily the modeling part, but certaily making sure scaling is correct. which must be done prior to textures and final assembly.

 

so i guess it is on to the next one, and more stuff added to the ruins collection.

 

btw, i just realized you had put your email in your reply, and i will pm you shortly.

[xander2077]

http://i.share.pho.to/eb59ecf3_o.png