Blender 2.5 texturing help

[Elleh]

First of all - greetings Nexus Forums! I know a plea for help isn't much of an introduction, but hopefully I'll be forgiven. I'm a lurker. I lurk. I've done my homework to the best of my ability before posting, but I have a feeling I'm just being incredibly dense. I hope a wonderful person could hold my hand a bit...

 

I'm attempting to make a set of custom mage robes based on the lovely bit of promo art for the mage origin. I've been trying to follow this mesh and texture combining tutorial. I've edited my meshes* and combined each set of DDS files, and now I need to assign the meshes to the texture files. I select the individual mesh I want, switch to UV/Image editor, load my combined d.dds file, and resize/translate the mesh to fit over the portion of texture I need. What I don't understand is how to match up the parts of my mesh to the proper parts of texture (now that I've hacked the original hf_arm_nuda mesh to bits). Here's what I'm looking at:

http://i1107.photobucket.com/albums/h383/EllehBella/blender_screencap-1.jpg .

I feel as though there's a large general concept I'm missing. Do I actually need to reorganize my textures in photoshop somehow? Or is there an issue with how I'm unwrapping the mesh? Also, there's an odd bit of mesh extending to the upper-left-hand hand corner in the UV editor that looks suspiciously like an error, human or otherwise.

http://i1107.photobucket.com/albums/h383/EllehBella/blender_screencap2.jpg

Or not. I don't know.

 

*I actually want to totally overhaul the robe and create my own texture. I've altered it so much at this point that the original texture wouldn't really look right. The body portion is rather important though, I really want to keep the original nude texture.

 

A few other questions while I'm here:

hf_rob_appa_0 has no specular map? When I extract the files using DAtool, there is no 0s.dds file saved. Should I be concerned?

I cannot seem to get NewByPower's Blender Import/Export script to work. (I'm not sure if I installed it improperly or if I simply am using it wrong. At any rate...) Is there any other way to do a bonewieghtcopy? (When I get to that point. If I get to that point.)

 

Thanks in advance! I know I'm being especially newbish, but this is all so foreign to me. I'm a 2D girl. :)

 

Also, there's an odd bit of mesh extending to the upper-left-hand hand corner in the UV editor that looks suspiciously like an error, human or otherwise.

Eureka! I had some stray quads in there still. Also, I've been playing around with the DDS files in photoshop. Looks like that's the way to go. I'm a bit confused as to why the texture is flipped and rotated, though.

Don't you just love it when n00bs answer their own questions? I'm still still curious about how to do boneweights though....

Edited July 21, 2011 by Elleh

[amycus]

Oh gee. I'm not too familiar with blender since I use 3ds max, but I will try to answer to the best of my ability (if its a problem with the process of UW mapping it might actually be better to post those questions in the forum for blender, http://www.thenexusforums.com/index.php?/forum/320-blender/). Also one thing - you do realize that the game engine automatically will render the naked body below the robe, as long as you tell the game that it is robe and not a massive armor (done in the .gda file, one of the last steps before it can appear in the toolset). You can in other words make a completely new UW map without worrying about the texture of the body - Just remember to not export the human body at all, just the robe. So delete the hands and feet meshes I can see there (note that it would be adifferent story if you wished to make a massive armor, I can talk about that later)

 

I can however add that the weird stretching in the second pic is indeed because of en error of the computer. 3ds max also gives me that bug sometimes. To resolve that I usually have to select by polygon, select the weird stretched parts and choose "flatten". Then I just have to combine the relevant vertexes so that the wireframe looks like it should. - You shouldn't need to do this for now at least since you said you will do a completely new UW map. Still, good to know if you encounter it again later.

 

hf_rob_appa_0 has no specular map? When I extract the files using DAtool, there is no 0s.dds file saved. Should I be concerned?

Should have one, but it might be named differently. If you wish to redo the UW map and add this robe as a completely new item you shouldn't need to care about it though - you will need to create your own later anyway if you are going to make a new UW map.

 

I cannot seem to get NewByPower's Blender Import/Export script to work. (I'm not sure if I installed it improperly or if I simply am using it wrong. At any rate...) Is there any other way to do a bonewieghtcopy? (When I get to that point. If I get to that point.)

 

Since I use 3ds max I don't use that plugin - but how did you get that mesh into blender if you didn't use such a plugin?

Otherwise to answer your question: As long as you have the skeleton you can paint the weights on your own, though it will save you a lot of time if you can copy-paste it from a vanilla robe.

 

 

Hope I was of some help. I can take a look at that import/export script tomorrow, but for now... need sleeeep...

 

EDIT:

Don't you just love it when n00bs answer their own questions?

Yes, I especially love it when I see that edit right after I posted *mumble mumble* :wallbash:

Just kidding, glad you got some of it worked out.

 

I'm not sure what you mean by the textures being flipped and rotated though, but as long as the textures looks right on the mesh it should be ok...

 

Like I said, will look a bit on that blender script tomorrow, unless some DAmodder who also uses blender helps you before then.

 

EDIT2: Oh yeah, the difference between robes and massive armor when making their meshes... Depending on the armor category, the game engine will render different parts of the body under the mesh no matter what. So for a robe, pretty much the whole body is rendered. If it is a massive armor though, it will render nothing at all of the body underneath, except from 2 eyeballs.

Edited July 21, 2011 by amycus

[Elleh]

You are awesome amycus! Sorry, I somehow I missed the blender forum. I'll definitely start lurking around there as well.

 

No, I had absolutely no idea that the game engine rendered the body for robes. That makes my life considerably easier. So I can just, say.... import the robe mesh and then use the body mesh as a reference to get things lined up right, then delete the body mesh all together? The robe mesh actually came with hands and feet, though. And to answer your question about how I got the mesh into Blender: I exported the files with DAtool, then used Tazpn's DAO tool to convert the .MMH file into .3ds, which Blender can import.... and I have this sinking feeling that this is bad, somehow. I should start taking on simpler projects.

 

I can however add that the weird stretching in the second pic is indeed because of en error of the computer. 3ds max also gives me that bug sometimes. To resolve that I usually have to select by polygon, select the weird stretched parts and choose "flatten". Then I just have to combine the relevant vertexes so that the wireframe looks like it should.

I actually fiddled with that before I read your post. I'm really happy to know I'm on the right track.

 

As long as you have the skeleton you can paint the weights on your own, though it will save you a lot of time if you can copy-paste it from a vanilla robe.

I don't think I have the skeleton, actually - or at least, not a version that blender can handle. I haven't looked into it extensively yet, so I can't make any intelligent query's at the moment. (Like I've done so far... dripping sarcasm.)

 

I think my "flipped textures" has something to do with importing the .3ds file. The mesh doesn't show up anywhere near the origin and isn't oriented on the z axis - I have to reorient it myself. I experimented a bit to see what would happen if I imported a mesh without making any modifications and then applying the unaltered texture.... and it was still weird. But as I mentioned, a bit of cut-n-paste/shifting things around in photoshop seems to be a way to work around this, although a little tedious. But I'll deal. Would you really look at the import/export script? That would make me unbearably happy. It's been a bear trying to find other methods... especially when all the tutorials say "using NewByPower's script so on so on". I'd like to use it, but... well. And I'd like to note that I was using blender 2.49b with the script as suggested. I really just think it's an operator error.

 

I'll work on just getting my robe mesh all figured out. I think I need to take a really extensive look at the toolset before I start asking about how to get things working in the game. I've really only used it to do headmorphs.

 

Thank you again. That was immensely helpful!

[amycus]

No, I had absolutely no idea that the game engine rendered the body for robes. That makes my life considerably easier. So I can just, say.... import the robe mesh and then use the body mesh as a reference to get things lined up right, then delete the body mesh all together? The robe mesh actually came with hands and feet, though. And to answer your question about how I got the mesh into Blender: I exported the files with DAtool, then used Tazpn's DAO tool to convert the .MMH file into .3ds, which Blender can import.... and I have this sinking feeling that this is bad, somehow. I should start taking on simpler projects.

 

I don't know what process you followed, but it does seem weird that the feet and hand follows in the armor part. If you are unsure, take a look on the other robe models for robes with DATool. I've never mad a mage robe specifically, but I see no reason why that should be different. I would take an extra look on this if I could, but I'm unfortunately overseas at the moment and don't even have the game installed on the one I'm using right now.

 

If it somehow DOES turn out that the robes need an exported body underneath (I doubt it, but still), then you might prefer to just delete the current body mesh, and import a new one. That one should have an untouched UW map. You then just need to delete the polygons that are "covered" by the robe.

 

Using DATool to import the mesh is likely cause of the problem. I remember that I once wanted to export my scene with a rigged armor in max to a 3ds, but apparently the skeleton didn't like that... I will look into the rest a bit later. Just woke up.

 

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EDIT:

Puh, I'm not really into blender, and I also seem to have trouble getting that script to work. I think you will either need to wait for someone else more knowledgeble about blender (and maybe ask the parson who made that script), or try out gmax (Gmax is a free 3D modeling program based on a stripped-down version of 3ds Max ), then you can use eshme's tools instead for importing and exporting the game meshes. I tried it out, and it actually seem to work pretty well. The only problem I found is that the controls for UW mapping are quite stripped down from 3ds max.

 

Sorry I cant be of more help...

 

2nd EDIT: If you can finish the UW mapping in blender you can export it to gmax and do the weightpainting and exporting from there (you just need to install some other plugins, but eshmes instructions in the .pdf file shows all needed download links).

Gmax: http://www.turbosquid.com/gmax

Eshme's tools: http://social.bioware.com/forum/Dragon-Age-Toolset/Toolset-Project-Announcements-amp-Recruiting/DAO-Model-and-Animation-ImporterExporter-for-3dsmax-and-gmax-1823736-1.html

Edited July 21, 2011 by amycus

[Elleh]

2nd EDIT: If you can finish the UW mapping in blender you can export it to gmax and do the weightpainting and exporting from there (you just need to install some other plugins, but eshmes instructions in the .pdf file shows all needed download links).

 

I will definitely give that a shot. The whole reason I've used blender thus far is that it's free. I'm not comfortable shelling out money for a program that I may or may not end up using frequently.

 

And you've been immensely helpful, really. I truly appreciate your patience. Up until this point, I've tried teach myself and make sense out of the massive amorphous cloud of info called the internets. The major frustration of being a newb is not knowing how to ask the question in the first place, rendering search engines rather useless. (Heh. Bing actually had to check to make sure I wasn't a robot last night. Apparently I was doing an abnormal amount of searching.... gave me a chuckle.)

 

Anyway now that I've got a direction to go on, I'm off to fiddle some more. Hopefully I'll be able to come back with something a little closer to completion. Thanks again!

[amycus]

2nd EDIT: If you can finish the UW mapping in blender you can export it to gmax and do the weightpainting and exporting from there (you just need to install some other plugins, but eshmes instructions in the .pdf file shows all needed download links).

 

I will definitely give that a shot. The whole reason I've used blender thus far is that it's free. I'm not comfortable shelling out money for a program that I may or may not end up using frequently.

 

And you've been immensely helpful, really. I truly appreciate your patience. Up until this point, I've tried teach myself and make sense out of the massive amorphous cloud of info called the internets. The major frustration of being a newb is not knowing how to ask the question in the first place, rendering search engines rather useless. (Heh. Bing actually had to check to make sure I wasn't a robot last night. Apparently I was doing an abnormal amount of searching.... gave me a chuckle.)

 

Anyway now that I've got a direction to go on, I'm off to fiddle some more. Hopefully I'll be able to come back with something a little closer to completion. Thanks again!

 

You are welcome to ask again, if it is about gmax I should be able to help more with the process

[DarkeWolf]

Well, I'm afraid that I can't actually contribute to this one, as I know nothing about 3d stuff.

But I did want to stop in and say...

 

WOW!! o_O This exceptional!

Thanks for all the help that you've been giving here Amy. This is really awesome. Its members like you that make me so proud of our family here in the DA forums! :thumbsup:

[Elleh]

You are welcome to ask again, if it is about gmax I should be able to help more with the process

Oh you haven't seen the last of me, I'm sure. XD I'm working very slowly, so it may be a bit before I formulate more questions. I do have gmax up and running, and eshme's tools are working nicely. I've yet to try anything with the bones but.... little bits at a time.

 

WOW!! This exceptional!

Thanks for all the help that you've been giving here Amy. This is really awesome. Its members like you that make me so proud of our family here in the DA forums!

Seconded! I think I like it here. :)

 

Ah. I'm babbling. Stop that, me. Work now!