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Originally Posted by kapuhy
Good point. I guess I'd better contact manilov.ap too regarding his Whitley, Ventura and Beaufighter  |
Yes, that's a good idea. I doubt he will refuse permission to use his models, and on the contrary he will be pleased that someone appreciated them. Some in-game screenshots or video captures, showing his creations taking life, might provide extra motivation
Quote:
Originally Posted by kapuhy
Speaking of getting in touch - the fastest and most efficient way to bring missing units to SH5 would be to import some really awesome ships/planes that were modeled by other subsimmers for SH3 or SH4. These are created for similar engine and often way better models than stock SH5 ones
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That depends. Some custom 3D models made for SHIII/SHIV are up to the par with stock SH5 ones or even better. Some others are rather crude and/or they contain topological errors that might make their conversion to SH5/GR2 format more complicated than it is worth. Take the Wildcat model which was imported for OHII and which is now part of TWoS. I seem to remember that the original model was created for Flight Simulator and later imported into a SH .dat file using an hex editor (before a proper importer/exporter was available). The result is that it contains many duplicated faces, wrong normals and smoothing errors. You will notice them as soon as you export the model in S3d and you try to import it back in S3d or Gr2Editor
Quote:
Originally Posted by kapuhy
( I could import SH4 plane or ship in a week/two, and boy I'd gladly sink my teeth into some of models relased on Subsim in the past), and I think their authors would allow their use more often than not. The problem is getting in touch with people who often have not been active on Subsim for some time...
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My rule of thumb is:
- I Always try getting in touch with the original autor.
- If the author is no longer an active member and I can't find his private contacts, I check if the model was included in some mega-mod.
- If yes, I try getting in touch with the person in charge of the mega-mod, in the hope that he can give permissions in behalf of the model author, or that he can provide his private contacts.
- If that fails too, and if the author has not expressly forbidden further usage of his own work (which rarely happens), I might still use the model, by stating in release notes that I was not able to get written consent for its usage and by being ready to give it up if asked to do so in future.
- The point above might also apply to models ripped from other games, though I understand that in this case the matter is a bit more controversial.
- In any case, I always put extreme care in acknowledging other's work. Being an amateur 3d modeller/modder I know how much time and attention is required even by the tiniest mod. Full credits are the least reward we can tribute to people who decided to share the result of hours and days of hard work free of charge.