a blender question

[Asgarath83]

Recently i got a large assets of 87k models. they are on bmd format but i found a tool that can convert to 3ds and obj,

so they can be port on blender 2.68 or 3d studio max. or directly on gtk radiant. (but this is tricky).

i would directly use on JKA if there is not a stupid problem:

personally i see after a lot of try that 3ds format is really more better and much workable of MD3

for two reason: i tested with success usijng a .3ds mesh on radiant, and also on JKA too with success, not crash map no problem on building maps etc.

the test stuff was an entire scene, a level part, i ripped from a low poly game months ago with 3d ripper dx. .

with 3DS i not get any trouble regards the two big limitation of MD3:;

no more of 1k of vertexes on a mesh and no more of 32 mesh for a model.

but they have a problem: they read the texture by base folder by default or by the mod base folder.

a texture also cannot have a name more long of 12 characters.

the problem of 3ds is that: MD3 read the textures by MD3shader relative path fields on Custom properties of model, when you put on blender when you create a MD3 using MD3 export of mrwonko. no prolbem of path of long name texture, is highly customizable.

also with 3d max MD3 export of ashuradx is pretty nice, but a little more hard to use, because you need to apply photometric texture to model before export, and also, to rename material of model with texture relative path and also, to have on the folder export the texture of model. 

Because i not human possible to manually convert one for one on Blender or 3D max 87 K of models without take an entire lifetime into MD3 format with the custom properties and material assign methods of 3d max or blender i wanna try if there is some way for create working 3DS by blender.

BUT... there is a trouble

basically...

 

ON 3DS FORMAT, gtk radiant and JKA read the textures and materials name by Material slots. so, also if on blender i see the model with the correct texture assignment, display and uvmapping, if i port as misc_model on radiant the same model i get the error 

Texture load failed: "Material_1"
Texture load failed: "Material_2"
Texture load failed: "Material_3"

Radiant search the material name of 3DS! not the textures name!!! so the unique way for force radiant and JKA to read the 3ds texture is to manually set the name on blender and re-export the 3ds. (without put a name more long of 12 character, folder \path included)

i see i have no problem to read on Gtk radiant and Jedi Academy a 3ds exported by 3d max of a scene ripped by 3d reaper, because into the exporting the material name match with texture name, so radiant and JKA can read without trouble. (and i have also a batch rename tools on blender for add a prefix to materials name on blender. for example if texures are 398eeef44.dds  and 343eeb239.dds, i can use this tool for rename as Sr/398eeef44 and sr/343eeb239. this allow also to have a custom folder where slap the texture instead of get spare on all Base folder of JKA or the mod folder (is sufficient to put the converted Dds inside a pk3 into a subfolder with desired name for resolve any problem about eventually texture overwrite name or have hundreds of textures scattered on base folder of mod or radiant base path, this should be really annoying). 

 

otherwise, i have serious trouble with 3ds created by 3d object converter. because material not match with texutre name but are "material1, material2, material 3...

i have two folders of object that i can use.

the firsr folder contain just 150 files... i can do the sacrifice to manually convert on MD3 with blender 2.68 because i have a plug in that copy custom properties on all object on the scene.

but about the other folder with 87 K files !! oh damn... they are low poly and very nice textured models but how damn i can get on JKA without become crazy? :\

 

So my question regard this huge amount of staff: there is any plug , addons or script for blender 268, that can assign for every object and every material the same name of his texture??? this can make this job a little less crazy?

 

More better: there is any program that can batch convert *.BMD format of 3d models into 3DS compatible with radiant or JKA , also with an autorenaming of materials of models for match the name of textures assigned?

example: if there is material_1 with texture 3d6.dds material_1 must be renamed too 3d6.dds or 3d6.

thanks for any answer.

 

[Asgarath83]

i can also guarantee that 3DS format works wonderful with JKA and radiant 1.5.0, if is solved the problem of texture assignament. i tested with a scene of a inside of a great cathedral stronghold ripped with 3d ripper and exported to 3DS format and load on JKA with the textures assigned with the tecnique i told and it support a scene with more of 32 part for mesh. there is a mesh of the 3ds file that have 19k of vertexes!!! and on 3DS format not crash on JKA and also on radiant too. there is only the problem of textures assignment.

[Asgarath83]

I want also get a little proof of what i tell becuase i can understand if the idea of use 3DS instead of the historical MD3 format or ASE for static mesh can get some skeptical reaction.

To show a little image gallery of a test i did with another part: the docks of Hylden City by games bo2. this is NOT a MD3, this is 3DS scene. and as you can see it works nicely on JKA.

 

 

 

 

[Noodle]

Nice, thought the lighting is non-existant. Can that be fixed?

[SomaZ]

Noesis 3D can batch convert complete folders. Also to md3, though I wouldn't recommend md3 for this project. No idea about the texture assignments though. Will think about it, maybe I can find a solution.

 

Edit: no idea if noesis supports bmd.

[Asgarath83]

@@Noodle the roof of hylden city is little inclinated because i have not fix model rotation (and fov on scene imported on 3d max lol the unique trouble of 3dripper is the fov issue, big map can have inclination deformation problems if camera is not perpendicular to level plane or if import option are not setted fine. i fixed later. about light. well, i created a tested skybox without any sky shader, just for contain the scene of hylden docks and prevent issues of map leaked. water of the ocean was remove by level before exporting, can be easily recreate with a brush and a water shader, much better of original bo2 game. lighting enviroment is missing because i did this test on 3DS misc_model format some months ago and i was focused to fix the problem of how to match textures because the method for apply texture of 3DS imported misc_model is very different related to MD3 tecnicque of apply textures. so the map was just on -META build, NO Vis, Not lighting. i use the simple META build for 99% of my map works and test, i use the light building only for final release and for ... well, for make the map lighting and shadowcasting, obvious. so this explain because there are not lighting and shadows

for complete the level is sufficient to clean up scene by NPC stuffs of original game, separate the interactive object movable into other model respect to the scene .3DS (in this case, the interactive part of the map is the coffinslab door and the lift at the end of map (i not screenshoted him) and put light . i thing a spectral blue-green enviroment ambience light with sunset evening and some green flames torch spotted in some places are sufficient for create a deep glooming and scary level ambientation. :3 

 

@@SomaZ. ew, i already tried with Noesis as first thing and it not process .MOX or BMD. i admit that target files was by the mmorpg of perfect world international. with a MD3 \ 3DS full compatibility they should be really a deep total assets resources. this old mmorpg have nice graphic, wonderful texture quality and also low poly models. the unique trouble is the difficult to manage the format of mmorpg static meshes. not much user friendly. (obvius, game is chinese) .-.

about hylden city instead, it was for my Legacy of Kain MOD. this is related to my old topic when i asked about how to recreate game locations like hylden city or eternal prisons. i have not the heal or time for recreate a map for scratch, so ripping scene on 3DS and rebuild location with modular puzzles for me is the faster way. almost for games like defiance, blood omen 2 and soul reaver 2 this works like a charm.

about pw... well, i really prefear to avoid to rip stuff of building and cities by game directly. i not found exactly legal or legittim. accounts that do that can be banned by servers. but also apply texture manually to 87 thousand of models... well... ARGH! @.@

 

the best way i guess should a scripts \ addons for 3d max for automatically assign a texture name to his related  material name of a scene and export to 3DS OOORR... the same thing but that assign texture name automatically on blender customproperties, for MD3 exporting. 3d max method for export MD3 is too much complicated for manage thousand of static meshes. :\

 

 

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[Asgarath83]

Well at the end i make catalogue of all 87k models. they are not really 87k. this crazy assets place models not for tipology but for territories. every folder is a territory and contain all models calls in territory as static mesh. what a silly waste of hard disk space -.-

otherwise i watched all folders with 3d object converter preview and inside folder itself of original game i found minimaps of dungeons and info related to world map locations. so at the end i figured how to make a catalogue.

otherwise, without a blender plug in for assign texture name to material name, this works is unuseful. too many stuff to convert into MD3. is better if i'll rip alls so i can have textures already fine assigned on max.

thanks however for reading. @@SomaZ and @@Noodle :3

[SomaZ]

Well at the end i make catalogue of all 87k models. they are not really 87k. this crazy assets place models not for tipology but for territories. every folder is a territory and contain all models calls in territory as static mesh. what a silly waste of hard disk space -.-

otherwise i watched all folders with 3d object converter preview and inside folder itself of original game i found minimaps of dungeons and info related to world map locations. so at the end i figured how to make a catalogue.

otherwise, without a blender plug in for assign texture name to material name, this works is unuseful. too many stuff to convert into MD3. is better if i'll rip alls so i can have textures already fine assigned on max.

thanks however for reading. @@SomaZ and @@Noodle :3

Just tell me exactly how the blender plugin should work and I will write you a little script for it. You just have to give me an example file to work with.

 

I could also write a script for batch importing complete folders.

[Asgarath83]

Just tell me exactly how the blender plugin should work and I will write you a little script for it. You just have to give me an example file to work with.

 

I could also write a script for batch importing complete folders.

mmm well, ... wow a massive import script should be pretty useful. for me is sufficient a script that import all wavefront OBJ format and all 3DS format of autodesk inside a folder to a scene. for avoid to become crazy after to separate the meshes should be best also if the script rename the object mesh with some kind of progression (like example object1_1, object1_2, object1_3) this is for OBJECT name. you know on blender there are the object properties panel (when you add md3shader as customproperties on a mesh if you to assign texture for export a MD3) , the edit panel for edit geometry of object add modifier, decimate etc.

the material panel with material names and material properties. and the textures panels where there are stored info about the textures assigned to the model.

my problem is that the object in questions, on 3DS, or OBJ format too, have material slots name names ... well.

mesh1: material: material_1 texture: abd.dds

in that way, radiant and JKA cannot read a texture because the texture name , when JKA engine and radiant read a 3DS misc_model, is read by material field.

what i need, after i imported on a scene an object with fine textured, is some that autobatch rename and change with one click the material name of every object inside the scene, with his texture name.

for example

this:

 

mesh1: material name: material_1 texture: abd.dds

mesh2: material_name material_2 texture abc.dds

mesh3: material_name material_3 texture abf.dds etc

 

need after i run script \ plug in, to become this:

mesh1: material name: abd.dds texture: abd.dds

mesh2: material name: abc.dds texture abc.dds

mesh3: material name abf.dds texture abf.dds

and so away...

 

so i need simply a script addon for blender 2.68 that rename material tab of all object mesh inside the scenes with their textures tables name.

 

so a script for change all material name of object inside a scene (into material tab, i signed on red with an X what is wrong) with the name of texture of texture tab (i signed with "ok" the name renamed on material tab with same name of texture tab )

[SomaZ]

Alright, I'll hack something together this evening. Not sure if I can finish it today. We will see.

[Asgarath83]

Alright, I'll hack something together this evening. Not sure if I can finish it today. We will see.

not rush not rush. take it easy! thanks : 3