is it simple to adjust ship models?

what i mean is, can you easily move things that are missplaced?

i wanted to fix a ship that i noticed had all its support cables out of place. i dont mean rerigging the whole ship but some off the cables goes into the deck and some go to the cleats or even in one case the cable goes through the hull outside the ship lol.

here are some pictures showing what im talking about.

http://gallery.filefront.com/keakar/162434/


if someone is willing to take the time to teach me how to do it, i would like to learn how to fix things like this.

[Nisgeis]

The way you'd move them depends on how they are set up in the game. If the wire model is seperate, or attached to a mast that is in the wrong place, then it can be easily moved in S3D. If the mast is OK, but the end of the wires are wrong, then you'd need to export them, reposition them in a 3D program and then re-import them. The wires are two planes at right angles and should only need to have the vertexes at the end moved.

well that ship is the NKMCS_Zinbu and many of its cables are off but i tried to move the zinbu cables with s3d but couldnt figure out how to do it.

the NPL_Horai just has both support cables missing on one side and i was going to try to fix that one too.

i never used a 3D program so i guess i would have to figure out how to do it first.

what is an easy 3D program to use for people who arent very smart?

[Nisgeis]

They all pretty much do the same things on a basic level, but some specialise in certain areas. I have heard some good things about Wings 3D, but then people seem to switch to another 3D program after a while of using that. I've never used it myself, so I don't know how good it is. Then there is blender, which is open source and free (not sure if Wings 3D is free or not). Blender is very powerful and a lot of people use it and there is a lot of help available for it. Then there's 3DS Max, which is available as a trial for a month, but then it locks you out and it is very expensive to buy. Max has some very good tutorials, which you can work through and get a good grounding in 3D.

I think there's milk shape too, but that's not free either, but it's much less than Max.

Perhaps you could take a look at blender to start with?

Originally Posted by Nisgeis

They all pretty much do the same things on a basic level, but some specialise in certain areas. I have heard some good things about Wings 3D, but then people seem to switch to another 3D program after a while of using that. I've never used it myself, so I don't know how good it is. Then there is blender, which is open source and free (not sure if Wings 3D is free or not). Blender is very powerful and a lot of people use it and there is a lot of help available for it. Then there's 3DS Max, which is available as a trial for a month, but then it locks you out and it is very expensive to buy. Max has some very good tutorials, which you can work through and get a good grounding in 3D.

I think there's milk shape too, but that's not free either, but it's much less than Max.

Perhaps you could take a look at blender to start with?

yes i think blender is in my price range (im on a very small fixed budget) and it sounds like i could get help with it.

im assuming the 3ds max tuts are close to the way blender works too or are they all very different?

[peabody]

Originally Posted by WEBSTER

yes i think blender is in my price range (im on a very small fixed budget) and it sounds like i could get help with it.

im assuming the 3ds max tuts are close to the way blender works too or are they all very different?

From playing around with Blender a little bit I have found the biggest problem to be that they change the interface with each release. So you try to do a tutorial and can't find the button, or menu selection mentioned because they changed it. But there are tons of tutorials for it, some better than other or course.

Peabody

[quote=peabody]

Originally Posted by WEBSTER

I have found the biggest problem to be that they change the interface with each release. So you try to do a tutorial and can't find the button, or menu selection mentioned because they changed it. But there are tons of tutorials for it, some better than other or course.

Peabody

so should i find a good tutorial then find the version it matches up to it or just get the latest version?

[tater]

Many of the masts are reused. Horai can be fixed I think, without leaving S3D, just need to find the same mast with the wires elsewhere...

Originally Posted by tater

Many of the masts are reused. Horai can be fixed I think, without leaving S3D, just need to find the same mast with the wires elsewhere...

well almost all the other ships are ok that i can see

so what am i looking to do in s3d to replace the bad set with a good one?

would i be copying another mast and pasting it over the bad set (can you even do that?) or just linking the id from a good one to be used instead?

[peabody]

[quote=WEBSTER]

Originally Posted by peabody

so should i find a good tutorial then find the version it matches up to it or just get the latest version?

I would get the newest version. Once you get your feet wet and start learning the program, you can start to figure out from the release notes what was changed so you can find it. But when you first start it make it hard when they say select this button and it isn't there.

Peabody

[Nisgeis]

Originally Posted by WEBSTER

would i be copying another mast and pasting it over the bad set (can you even do that?) or just linking the id from a good one to be used instead?

You can copy the object node, just make sure you don't accidentally re-use the same Node ID, or you will get crashes due to conflicting IDs. If you can, re-use the original 3D model's ID.

And as for 3D programs being the same, they are and they aren't The basic processes you use to model are pretty much the same, but each program looks terribly different. So you have a two fold job, to learn what to do and where that option is. So, I'd learn one and use that until you start to run into limitations, but that probably won't happen, unless you are doing really high end stuff for movies :-).

Originally Posted by Nisgeis

You can copy the object node, just make sure you don't accidentally re-use the same Node ID, or you will get crashes due to conflicting IDs. If you can, re-use the original 3D model's ID.

And as for 3D programs being the same, they are and they aren't The basic processes you use to model are pretty much the same, but each program looks terribly different. So you have a two fold job, to learn what to do and where that option is. So, I'd learn one and use that until you start to run into limitations, but that probably won't happen, unless you are doing really high end stuff for movies :-).

well my problem is even with simple directions and instructions im good at doing things wrong lol.

if i have a 50 / 50 chance of getting it right i do it wrong 99% of the time

[tater]

Look at the ships with similar masts—note that Horai uses a type that is used elsewhere, it's simply raked a little (rotated).

Some ships have the same masts, but the cables are separate objects. Some ships have single cables that you could copy and past into the dat with S3D. Doesn't have to be the "right" cable, just a single cable of the right length range (if some gets buried in the hull, who cares, so you have some slop.

[Anvart]

http://www.turbosquid.com/gmax
Free, old and now not supported by Autodesk ...
Needs plug-ins ...

[Nisgeis]

I really wouldn't recommend using GMax.