My First Tileset

[Legacy_Zwerkules]

               I guess I can't explain what I meant with two textures overlapping without the help of a screenshot.



These houses are taken from NWN2 and in NWN2 the whole house except for the windows is one object with one texture, not made of several objects with different textures like NWN1 houses.
If you look at the roofs you will see the transparent edges of the reeds overlap with other parts of the roof and the effect this causes in game because they are all part of the same object.
You can avoid that problem if you do what Six suggested.
I haven't fixed those roofs yet, but I guess if I isolate the faces with the transparent parts of the textures and put all of those that are at the same level of the roof in separate objects so there's no overlapping within one object any more, the roofs might be fixed. Very tedious work, so I haven't done so yet.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Zwerkules, 11 décembre 2010 - 11:11 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Renzatic]

                Eradrain : Yeah, I could do that. It'd make for some simple, quick foliage off in a place where the camera wouldn't usually swing. It wouldn't work for everything though, specially since I'll need to do alot of scraggly foliage to make things look the way I want them to.

Six: I think I get the jist of what you're saying, that it's all hierarchy based, and if it's set up correctly, it'll render all the alphas in the tile properly. I think this is something I'll have to experience firsthand before I can say I really understand it, though. Right now, you could say I got the theory down, but the execution still has me a little confused.

On a good note, I managed to dig up an old as ancient trial CD of Max 5.1, so I'll be able to use NWScript. I think my next step should be figuring out how to get my tiles ingame, instead of building more and more, then getting stumped because I'm trying to import a bunch of overly complicated objects.

Edit

Zwerkules: damn your ninja posting

Actually, other than the thatch in the middle being discolored, I don't see any problems with the alphas in that shot.

But the way it sounds, it isn't so hard to fix as long as the alphas are on separate objects. Considering all my branches and bushes will be just that, it shouldn't be too too difficult to get around. 

Edit 2

Man, I remember why I hated Max. Getting .obj files into it has been like pulling teeth. I can export as an .fbx file, but that destroys my UV, and flips all my faces.

GWAAAAH. I'll figure this out. I just had to vent.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Renzatic, 12 décembre 2010 - 04:15 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Renzatic]

               Well, after alot of struggling, I've finally managed to get my tiles and depot into Max. It wasn't a fun experience. And after reading a few tutorials, I've come to realize that I've got alot to learn before I get my stuff ingame.

So unless I intend on boring you all to tears with all the little details of my learning experiences, I guess I'll be running silent for the next few days. Once I get a few tiles ingame, or have some really important question to ask, I'll be back.

I'll be lurking in the meantime. And thanks again for all the help thus far. '>

edit: but before I head out to slog on the less fun aspects of game editing, I whipped my first tree together in Max to learn the interface (I still hate it). This is the little scene I made to show em off...



At 440 tris, they're a little expensive at the moment. I need to get em down to around 350ish, and make them not not quite so goofy when viewed from the side.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Renzatic, 13 décembre 2010 - 07:46 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Calvinthesneak]

               I think they look pretty good compared to some of the trees you see.  My only question is if you have tiles full of them how heavily are they going to hit system performance?
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Jez_fr]

               Renzatic, be brave! Again, very nice start. Can't wait to see the rest =)
               
               

               
            

[Legacy__six]

               Well they certainly look a lot better than my trees, which are more like 1000 faces each - so I'd say you still have quite a bit of room to increase the detail. Though I agree, from first glance, your current model may well fall to pieces from a lower camera angle. Very nice work, though.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par _six, 13 décembre 2010 - 06:03 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Renzatic]

                

Calvinthesneak wrote...
I think they look pretty good compared to some of the trees you see. My only question is if you have tiles full of them how heavily are they going to hit system performance?

Well, if they are about half the polycount of Six's trees, I could (in theory) have double the amount at the same performance hit. Not that'd I do that with this particular tree. They're too dense when you put them together en masse.

Jez_fr wrote...

Renzatic, be brave! Again, very nice start. Can't wait to see the rest =)

Thanks again. I can't wait to show off the finished product...that's still a ways in the future, at the pace I'm going. '>

_six wrote...

Well they certainly look a lot better than my trees, which are more like 1000 faces each - so I'd say you still have quite a bit of room to increase the detail. Though I agree, from first glance, your current model may well fall to pieces from a lower camera angle. Very nice work, though.

I dunno if they look better than your trees. I consider your stuff, and the guy who did the Mirkwood/Boggy Swamp tilesets as the NWN gold standards. I mean mine look pretty decent from that angle, but once you push the camera in steeper, they do sorta fall apart. From up above, they look full and lush. From the sides, they look like Dr. Seuss trees.

But if you have over a thousand tris on your trees (I thought they were about 300 from looking at them in NWNExplorer), then I'm not so worried about pushing the polycount at least a little higher. When I was playing around with your tilesets, the performance was nice and smooth even after I loaded it down with extra tree placables from the CEP. I could probably bring it up to 600-700 tris and still have enough room for other relatively high poly objects.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy__six]

               

Renzatic wrote...

But if you have over a thousand tris on your trees (I thought they were about 300 from looking at them in NWNExplorer), then I'm not so worried about pushing the polycount at least a little higher

Oh, the trees I was referring to were my pine trees which aren't in any of my tilesets yet (just made them as placeables for Project Q). Though my main issue was that I modelled each branch individually rather than using the more umbrella like approach. That said I've tested them ingame and even at that poly count there doesn't seem to be too much lag.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Eradrain]

               Honestly, it's really not a problem.  I've made areas with half a thousand placeables without encountering any lag except during the loading process, and each individual placeable was anywhere from 300 to 3000 faces.  That's without even counting the polycount of the tileset models.

It's good to err on the side of caution, so that people with older computers can enjoy your work, but don't sacrifice your artistic vision for it, and definitely don't worry.  400 faces for a tree is extremely manageable.  I've seen areas built with multiple 12,500-poly helicopter models and they ran just fine.

My one concern is the scaling of that scene you've rendered.  Someone like Six should correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe 1 tile is 10x10 meters in-game.  If the scene is supposed to be one tile (And I assume it is just based on how neatly it all fits into the one perfect square), you might find that the train depot and trees end being extremely small in-game.  More like a shack and saplings.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Eradrain, 13 décembre 2010 - 09:51 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Renzatic]

               Alright. I won't worry over adding a little more, but I'll still try to keep it under 750 or so. Maybe less if I can get away with it, and still keep things looking good.



Eradrain: This is actually a 2x2 tileset, and each tile is 10 meters length and width (or at least it is in Modo. The way things are looking, I might have to scale it back up in Max). I even have a 1.8m tall block that I use to represent a person to make sure everything is proportional. Knock on wood, but I'm pretty sure I'm solid on that front.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Renzatic]

               This took way longer than it should've, but...here we go

The Final Trees

608 tris. If it looks as good as this in NWN, I'll be happy.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Renzatic, 14 décembre 2010 - 07:49 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Zwerkules]

               Those trees look great. They already looked good in the previous screenshot, except that the tips of the tree tops looked a bit unnatural, but now you have fixed that and made the trees a bit more dense.

Those are certainly some of the best trees for NWN1 I have seen.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Lord Sullivan]

               Looking Good, how do they look at a lower horizontal view?... can you show us another shot?

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Renzatic]

                Sure can.

Side Shot.

And for anyone who wants to see the individual parts...

Here you go.

The little model on the bottom left is the high poly branch I used for the base texture. I couldn't find anything good to use on CGTextures or Myang's or anywhere else, so I went ahead and whipped one up myself. I baked it out with shadows, the alpha, the AO, ect, and used that instead. Turned out alot better than what I thought it would.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Renzatic, 14 décembre 2010 - 08:17 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Calvinthesneak]

               Those are some sick trees man.  I worked in the forest industry for quite a number of years and I can say those are pretty natural looking trees, at least as much as possible as you can get without uniquely designing each one.  The taper is off a little, but it's not enough to be seriously noticible unless you nitpick.



I really wanna see some tiles from you now, the work looks very very good so far.