Messages

151

Artwork / Re: Miscellaneous Models

« on: September 30, 2007, 08:22:32 pm »

You're right, my estimates were, uh, overestimated.

In that picture you gave, I used the size of the golf ball (about 42.7mm) to estimate the size of the 20mm round (170mm long). My estimates based on my model's dimensions gave a length of 225mm. I also did most of my calculations for a single-ring barrel, and I just doubled that (including the margins I gave for the center and outside, doh) for the dual-ring barrel. (I also overestimated the margin I need between rings, and for the outside.)

Revised estmates give about 800-900 cm diameter for a double-barrel, and half that for a single-barrel. That's definitely better than 1.4m.

My width isn't off by quite as large an error - the 20mm round looks like about 28.8 (let's call it 30) mm, and my estimates gave 35mm. Using those figures, and increasing the length of the barrel to an even 2.0m, one can fit about 6500 (6533 precisely). We can probably bump it up to 6540 to account for extra bullets in the conveyor belt, and make it a nice even number.

Of course, the weight of that many bullets isn't insignificant, but we can probably say that the late 21st century engines and materials are strong enough to account for that.

Edit: More work on the drum, this time with some rails to lead the ammo into/out of the drum.

152

Artwork / Re: Miscellaneous Models

« on: September 30, 2007, 08:15:27 am »

Huh, how the heck can an aircraft (even the tiny Stiletto) pack 10,000 rounds of ammo per gun?



Turns out the feed is linkless, so no belts or chains, haha. So I decided to go for an ammo 'barrel,' like on the GAU-8 used on the A-10.

I've measured out the dimensions, though. The dual-ring scheme I use means the barrel is about 1.4m in diameter, and can hold 5040 rounds with a depth of 1.8m. That's only half of the specified 10,000 rounds, though. (And it's still 5 times the 1174 rounds held by the A-10!). It seems way too big to fit even one on the Stiletto, much less a potential three. (Never mind doubling its length so it actually holds ten thousand rounds.)

If I just use the compact inner ring, then the radius is nearly halved to 0.72m, which makes for a more manageable load (but still silly on the Stiletto ) and the ammo storage is nearly quartered to 1440 rounds with a storage depth of 1.8m.

I could maybe work on both, which allows the player to choose the large capacity for medium/heavy hardpoints and 5x the staying power, or the smaller which improves airspeed, fuel economy, weight, and fits on smaller hardpoints.

Edit: Of course, the simplest option is just to show a single bullet to the player, and abstract away this stupid ammo storage .

153

Artwork / Re: Miscellaneous Models

« on: September 29, 2007, 07:32:04 pm »

The belt is exactly why I went for differing levels of detail. Personally, I think the second-last one (288 tris) looks like the best compromise between detail and polycount for a single round, but it's still much too high if you wanted a 3D model of a whole ammo belt in the game - the first or second models would be best for that.

(Of course, the render models are 10830 quads each, but it looks sweet, if I do say so myself. )

I tried out blender's Multires feature for the "different" models. It was handy in that I could develop one high-res model incrementally, and changes would propagate to all other levels of the model. I also used it so the UVMaps would match up in each different version - something I couldn't guarantee if I made separate resolutions of the mesh.

And here's a render of an HEI version. Orange-tipped, and with an extra red stripe, to denote it's higher explosiveness. Mwa ha ha. Or something.

I'll start working on an ammo belt.

Edit: Helps if I post the image:

154

Artwork / Re: Miscellaneous Models

« on: September 29, 2007, 08:37:56 am »

SHIVA Cannon API Rounds:




The first image is using different polygon levels and a 128x128px texture. You guys can pick which is best. I can also work on putting them into a chain if you want.

The second is a fancy render that I felt like doing.


The switch from API to HEI is as simple as recolouring those bands, haha

155

Artwork / Miscellaneous Models

« on: September 27, 2007, 08:20:36 pm »

I should probably help out more with the little stuff that needs doing.




Here's a fuel tank for the aircraft.

.blend: https://webdisk.ucalgary.ca/~djetowns/public_html/misc_files/UFO_AI/fuel_tank4.blend
.tga: https://webdisk.ucalgary.ca/~djetowns/public_html/misc_files/UFO_AI/FuelTank.tga

156

Feature Requests / A few things.

« on: September 27, 2007, 05:49:59 am »

These are all from the newly released 2.2 beta installer.

Maybe not quite so much a bug, but the priority of the game (as seen by windows task manager) is set to "High." On my machine (Windows XP Home SP2, AMD Turion 64M (1.58GHz), 1.12GB Ram) this causes the keyboard to be very slow and unresponsive. Even simple tasks such as entering names in text fields is difficult, and it makes the game nearly unplayable. (I still maintain a high framerate, 60fps, throughout)

Setting the thread priority to normal via Task Manager fixes the problem. Is it possible to change the game setting so it is 'normal' by default?


Other bugs:

In the 3D geoscape, the aircraft path trajectory line is drawn incorrectly when the aircraft is behind the horizon. Instead of the line reaching from the horizon to the target destination, it is drawn, through the globe, from the aircraft's position along the correct path, but stopping short of the destination. The length of the line corresponds with the destination's distance to the horizon.
I'm guessing this is the same algorithm that clips off the aircraft's trajectory line when its destination is behind the horizon.

When equipping a weapon in the base equipment screen, the bottom line of the weapon information text superimposes on the weapon firemode text - resulting in incomprehensible gibberish . The weapon statistics needs to be moved one line upward.

The sound of the shot/explosion that kills an alien is inaudible, but the scream sounds niicee.

The Stingray Interceptor (listed as Dragon interceptor. Nice name ) can be produced without requiring research. I haven't yet tested to see what happens when this craft is built or sent on missions.

Only the TR-20 Rocket Pod and Rockets can be produced, and they are listed as "base-defence weapons."

When equipping a craft with Polymer Armour, there is no 'warning' (aside from the text in the UFOPaedia) that it will take 24 hours to equip. Removing the armour immediately still takes 24 hours to strip off. Perhaps armour can be added/subtracted incrementally in a counter?

There are no night lights on the dark side of the 3D geoscape.

And under not-quite bugs/ suggestions:

In the aircraft equipment screen, if a model is not found then the previous model loaded is kept. Perhaps a generic "Model Not Found" model can be used?

The aircraft equipment screen is very counter-intuitive. A better method would be pop-up menus when a player clicks on the (+) add icon, which the player can then select.

The UFOPaedia interface is difficult to navigate: the buttons should be grouped in one corner of the screen, maybe two, and definitely not among all four corners.

The information dialog for building new base facilities occludes the bottom (and especially bottom-left) base facilities. Only because the screen is squished is it possible to mouse over the facilites to see what they are. The information box should be moved to take up space from the facilities list, leaving the base screen unobstructed (and unsquashed).

The extra menu for Healing/Implants on a soldier is superfluous - there should instead be buttons for each soldier in the main hospital screen (which looks nice . (Can the menu system handle this?)

The sounds for many human weapons are too high pitched and too quiet. They lack "oomph" essentially. That's not to knock Alex's work at all - he's done a good job . Still, a shotgun should sound like a shotgun .

Plasma explosions are no longer blue. It could have just been a trick of my eyes, but I was sure that they were slightly bluish before.


Anyway, it's still a great job all y'all have done. You've definitely inspired me to work harder on some more artwork (missing aircraft equipment, maybe), perhaps even daring to look into menu files.

157

Artwork / Re: More Hoverbot

« on: September 26, 2007, 07:31:44 pm »

Since the source files are going to be publicly available anyway, GPLv2 works I think.

Maybe I can go ahead and say that all future submissions by me to the UFO:AI project are released under the GPLv2 license, unless otherwise stated. That way there's less confusion?

158

Artwork / More Hoverbot

« on: September 26, 2007, 05:51:41 am »

I'm still trying to fix this thing up. I completely reworked the UVs and redid the textures (helped along by Blender's render baking, which let me carry over the base colours from before.)

First of all, there was STILL some really damn ugly distortion on the turbines, even though I completely reworked those UVs with that in mind! I think the only way for me to get some decent detail on those things is for it to have its own 512x512px texture. (I did the math. Right now it uses up enough pixels to have its own 256x256px texture, and it still isn't enough.)

So instead, I opted to try to make the turbines nearly completely seamless. Aside from one little part in a corner in the rear, it seemed to work. Personally, I like the result.

Because I reworked the UVs, there's much less wastage of texture space - as a result, there should be a little bit less jagginess, but I don't know if it's noticeable. If you can still see some, I doubt it's blender's fault - the resolution I get from the texture is just too low. Despite using 512x512, the geometry is complex and there's a surprisingly lot of surface area to pack away.

Anyway, here's pictures of the newest version: (clickable thumbnails)




And the downloads are here:
https://webdisk.ucalgary.ca/~djetowns/public_html/misc_files/UFO_AI/hoverbot/hoverbot_lightcannon_final_RC2.blend
https://webdisk.ucalgary.ca/~djetowns/public_html/misc_files/UFO_AI/hoverbot/hoverbot_lightcannon_7.tga
https://webdisk.ucalgary.ca/~djetowns/public_html/misc_files/UFO_AI/hoverbot/hoverbot.anm
https://webdisk.ucalgary.ca/~djetowns/public_html/misc_files/UFO_AI/hoverbot/hoverbot_lightcannon_7.xcf

It's still fully animated and ready to be put into the game - the .anm file is valid for the animations in the .blend. Everything that's not on layer 1 can be ignored when exporting, too, and the entire bot is one mesh.

Here's hoping that this thing is pretty much done! I've put waay too many hours into this project than is healthy .

159

Artwork / Re: Intro animation

« on: August 27, 2007, 12:06:57 am »

I kinda gave up trying to make the next part look pretty, I just can't do it decently.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v388/Psawhn/UFO-AI/ufo-ai_intro_a-2.swf

I kept the camera still, but then added an upwards pan as the screen faded to black. (It broke the smoke plume, though, haha )

160

Artwork / Re: Intro animation

« on: August 23, 2007, 08:16:10 am »

Actually, I mean drawing the Taman walking around, for the storyboard, is beyond my skills. Thanks for the compliments.

For the next shot in the storyboard, were you picturing a different camera angle, or just the camera fixed at that position behind the Taman?

161

Artwork / Re: Intro animation

« on: August 22, 2007, 10:14:05 pm »

Here's a very quick sketchup of the first part of Winter's script. Very quick and very sketchy, that is. As you can see, I don't have much in the way of art skills .

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v388/Psawhn/UFO-AI/ufo-ai_intro_a-1.swf

The second part (actually animating the Taman) is beyond my skills right now, haha.


Edit: One idea that's sort-of been going around my head are TV news on the attack of Mumbai. It would be dawn/dusk, with the city smoking and in ruins behind the reporter. Plus, the reporter would be speaking Marathi (an Indian language).

I have some Indian friends I could maybe pester to get some news recordings of . It might have to be Gujarati or Punjabi, though - depends who's willing to do it, haha.
(Or Chinese - I have some Cantonese-speaking friends, too.)

162

Artwork / Re: Saracen Renders

« on: August 21, 2007, 08:34:30 pm »

I don't think I quite know what you mean by that. I experimented with letting the heat effects go on long trails from the craft, but there was no visible difference that I could see on the sky.

However, it did seem to throw the contrails around a bit, and after some basic tweaking I got this:



Using the heat effects to distort the contrails makes it a bit better, thanks!

163

Artwork / Re: Intro animation

« on: August 21, 2007, 08:10:24 pm »

I think what would really be neat is if we could have a writer who could come up with a script for the intro (Hrm, I wonder who? ), and also have someone who can sketch up storyboards. (I do have a small graphics tablet, but my art skills aren't that great.)

Also, VLC seems to play the animation. I don't know if the artifacts also occur when played through the game, though.


Hrmm.... actually, does anyone of any good free networking drawing programs? I have an old version of opencanvas that sort-of works (as long as you don't need to save afterwards), but I was thinking of a vector-based drawing program with the potential for multiple layers.

164

Artwork / Re: Saracen Renders

« on: August 21, 2007, 05:53:52 am »

Thanks.

I should add that it is by no means finished. There's potential for a lot of greebling/texture work inside the bay areas, perhaps with optimized internal bays for the landing gear. Plus, I've realized that the rear wheel bogie assemblies are probably too heavy for a fighter, so I'll probably replace them. On top of that, I have possible plans for fleshing out the cockpit, too.

I've also tweaked the images slightly.



Here is an image looking up at a flight of Saracens, but I'm not too happy with it. It looks even more boring than being behind the roar of the engines in the first one.



I've tweaked the heat distortion from the engines a bit, they didn't look quite pronounced enough. (I like the heat effect in the first picture the best, though.)


Edit: I didn't quite like that look, the heat blur is too, uh... 'tiny.' I broadened it out some, I think:

165

Artwork / Saracen Renders

« on: August 10, 2007, 08:33:07 pm »

You can add the files to svn if you want.

It's taking forever for them to upload to my webdisk for some reason, though... when they're up they'll be in this directory:
https://webdisk.ucalgary.ca/~djetowns/public_html/misc_files/UFO_AI/saracen_render/