Quake 2 Map question

[Electfried]

I wouldn't use Quark for anything else than mapmaking to be honest. For any kind of editing of things like playermodels and skins I use MilkShape for the building and for the Export to MD2 I use Q2Modeler (which is quite a decent tool if you know how to use it). I looked around in my old backup archives knowing I had saved some old links to a very basic Q2modeler tutorial, which still seem to work; Q2MTutorial1, Q2MTutorial2, Q2MTutorial3

Of course as you found out yourself, you can't go overboard with the polys which is always going to be a hindrance in any kind of Q2 editing. Many times before I've come to the conclusion (after much work) that the things I really wanted to create are just too much for Q2 to handle, which resulted in redoing a lot of shit and taking out all the cool parts, in other words completely ruining the initial idea. The only positive side effect I can think of when it comes to editing for a game like Q2 is that it helps you greatly develop your improvisation skills.
As for models and skins, it's always best to let the skin itself add most of the "details", not the polys. But even then it will still only look kind of okay from a distance. Perhaps it's also on their website, I don't know, but if you haven't got it already I attached an extented MShape3D Manual that I had downloaded a long time ago.

Hey arn't you the guy that made the orange and grey pak for quake 2?

[|iR|Focalor]

Git r done. Got r did.



Was a real bitch and a displeasure to texture map. Preciate the hints and help, anyone and everyone. Look for it in the next pak I put out, dunno when it'll be done, maybe a month or two.

[Jay Dolan]

That looks sick, man. Nice work!

[|iR|Focalor]

It's "done", but I still probably wanna do a little more work on it. To get it to that point, I think I exported it to MD2 about 3 or 4 different times - once from Milkshape, then from Quark to get the skin directory correct and semi-position and scale it properly, then I spent hours mapping the texture triangle by fuckin triangle (and wanting to slit my wrists), then I loaded it up in Quark again to raise it off the ground a little more once I looked at it closer in-game... and there might've been one or two more exports in there I can't remember off hand, who knows. Point is, every individual time I export it to MD2 from any program, it's gonna clusterfuck the lines of it a little more each time.

So now that I've got a model with texture mapping exactly how I want it, I'm wondering if there's some way I can load up the original .MS3D I saved of it, then load the semi-final MD2 version I have right now, apply the texture mapping from the MD2 to the MS3D, get rid of the MD2, then export it only one single time from MilkShape so that any tweaking of vertices will be kept to the absolute bare minimum.

[fdrjk]

noice

[The Happy Friar]

My tip would be to learn Blender and paint the model right in that next time.  You can use a default unwrap method and paint the color/texture you want on your model.  Saves a lot of time, then tweak it in your image program.

Besides that, you just found out modeling is a lot of grunt work. 

Also, nice.

[|iR|Focalor]

You can use a default unwrap method

I hear ya talking up Blender, and it's tempting to try it, but I'm pretty happy with the looks and functions of MilkShape. I gave it a look not long ago, but it looked way too complicated with all the options scattered out all over the place. I also looked for an "export to MD2" option and couldn't find it anywhere, so I figured it wasn't gonna work for me anyway.

I'm guessing that "unwrap method" would automatically map all the triangles connected and in proper proportions. If that's the case, that's the most tempting part about Blender. Because skin mapping with Npherno Skin Tool ain't too bad when it's simple model like a 6 faced box or a bottle shape or anything with less than a couple hundred triangles. But when it's some 1,300+ triangle model like this last one, that crap gets sooooooo boring and tedious copying all the triangles to the 2d view and then stretching them into place. Even more so because Npherno Skin Tool is really buggy and crashes in the middle of things all the time. Nothing like getting a couple hundred triangles mapped, it crashes, and you gotta do it all over again.

[PANTONE 7717C]

Hey arn't you the guy that made the orange and grey pak for quake 2?

Yes, the same although that was a long time ago. I just saw your PM. I also made this BluePak (image1, image2) for weapons and Hud.

[|iR|Focalor]

That slayer_damage is looking hot already, bit bright on the colors but for an item like that it works well. Lol man, for some reason this editing stuff is always laborious and tedious, I know exactly what you mean.

I think you might be right. Just taking PNG's and sticking them directly into the game as is makes the models WAY WAY to bright, so I was using the Hue/Saturation adjustment in PhotoShop to tweak the lightness down to darken it and then raise the saturation a tad to bring some vividness back to the colors after darkening it. Guess I should go a little darker on the skins than I've been doing.

Think I found the solution to the model getting hammered and dented all to piss from the multiple exports to MD2. Luckily Npherno Skin Tool has some kinda "retro-map" option. I was able to make a fresh version of the model already positioned and scaled properly and exported only once from MilkShape, then loaded that up in the skin tool, imported the .NMP retro-map I made from the crappy dented version, saved, and it's all good. Model's still fucked in a couple places. Theres one spot on one of the top talons on one of the top swords where the talon has a small vagina lookin' gap between the talon and the pommel, but overall, it looks much better.

[The Happy Friar]

I initially got in to Blender to unwrap models then decided to learn more along the way.  I've attached an example of a model I made up & unwrapped in Blender (and it's painted too, but that's beside the point). That was either automatically done with the Lightmap option or the smart projections, I forget.  You can also manually mark edges to unwrap models and for more complex ones I do.  But hey, that was for a children's play so it's more then perfect. 

You got me thinking tonight that I should write up how to take your model and unwrap & export to md2 from Blender.  Then at least you could take your model and do the unwraping and painting in Blender if you don't want to learn the UI for modeling.

[|iR|Focalor]

You got me thinking tonight that I should write up how to take your model and unwrap & export to md2 from Blender.  Then at least you could take your model and do the unwraping and painting in Blender if you don't want to learn the UI for modeling.

Oh my GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWWWWWWWDDD, please do! I'm fed up to my fuckin' eyeballs with mapping textures in this damn Npherno's Skin Tool. This pile of shit is so god damn buggy that it borders on being completely useless. You go to select a few triangles on the model, then select a rectangle on the skin image where to stamp it, go up to "Rectangle>map from 3D view", choose parallel and no backfaces, and then it either squishes the triangles flat in a single straight horizontal line... or it skews and stretches the selection INFINITELY off the edge of the texture image and crashes the program out.

I hate the idea of having 2 different modelling progs, but I'll do ANYTHING at this point not to have to keep using this Npherno garbage. I'm ready to fucking shoot someone.