Using art resources - Ethical Question

[pegasus1820]

Hi all,

I jest learned how to make models for oblivion. I already made 1 from scratch ( see my sig :) My question is this. a few friends and I are making a mod and im trying make make a quest reward sward. The only problem is, I do not know enofe about modeling to make the dragons head. on this sword. So i copied The head off of the "statuemartyn.nif" file. It came out but my question is this. Is this ethical? If I give credit to the original artist is it ok? Should I email Bethesda?

I think it is ok if i give credit because most mods use art assets in the game already (caves, building, clutter, ext.).

 

What do you guys think?

 

PeG

 

Add: here is a basic test I did:

 

http://img153.imageshack.us/img153/9330/oblivion20080417220923tp2.png

[DarkWarrior45]

As long as the model stays in Oblivion it is fine. Now if you export it to another game (even Morrowind) or use it outside of Oblivion, then that's when you run into issues.

 

EDIT: BTW, I like the initial looks of that model!

[Vagrant0]

As long as the model stays in Oblivion it is fine. Now if you export it to another game (even Morrowind) or use it outside of Oblivion, then that's when you run into issues.

 

EDIT: BTW, I like the initial looks of that model!

Pretty much what was said there, with a few additions. That is only in reference to base game resources, not resources which are added by an expansion, or official mod. And as it should be no suprise, using content made by other modders when they have not given permission to is also a bad idea.

 

As far as your usage there goes, you might want to try reducing the polygon count of anything you intend to use on weapons. Any weapon over 1000 polygons can cause framerate issues on lower-end videocards.

[nosisab]

pegasus1820: is just me or really seems the screenshot is missing the textures?

 

this is a common issue if you duplicate the files related to textures, meshes, nifs and so on.

 

The trouble is than the nif have a path pointing to the textures. and if you rename the files or just move to another directory they are not found. So in doing those replications (and just if it is absolutely necessary, like if you would edit then) you should change the path on the nif too.

[pegasus1820]

Thanks everyone, I jest wonted to get some input from the community before using this in the mod we are developing and I'm glade it is positive :happy: We will be releasing the mod in about 6 - 8 weeks and is going to feature the sward as a quest reward. I will post more info and screen shots in about it soon when i finish the website for our team.

 

PeG out