mds Export Guide

[pants]

It is with great pleasure that i post this message. My .mds Export Guide is complete and ready to be viewed.

http://www.mothermushroom.com/images/miscFiles/mdsExport.html

[demonspawn]

Thanks pants

Now which do I use Max or Maya…
How about both

Map on

[Hewster]

Good man Pants…

Just getting it now

Hewster

got it>>>>

well it loads, and works ok on my physique model
but i’m a bit concerned that it does’t have 4274 frames.
I’ve read your readme.txt… I wonder…
did you manage to import all the mds animations
ok ?
It took me ages to work out how to do it
you can’t just select ‘all’ when importing the
original mds, cos some of the animations are doubled up.

I can upload my max file with all the animations (4274 frames)if this is the problem ? (22.5 Mb zipped !)

or could I have your markered model, so I can play with it ?

Also, just read in your guide that the weapon2
tag is not used…
ummm, I think (pretty sure actually) it is used
when you have 2 weapons, ie duel colts

cheers for sharing your hard work,
Hewster

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Hewster on 2002-08-31 07:57 ]</font>

[pants]

that would make sense about weapon2. can you have akimbo weapons in multiplayer tho? nevertheless, i will update my guide tomorrow.

as far as the animations, they’re all there. it is indeed quite puzzling that i only got 3280 frames. but, i went through the animation.cfg and doublechecked everything (and rewrote the parts where the times didn’t match). it’s all there. :???: i dunno.

i’ll try to get to the markered file tomorrow.

ack, i just reread your post (i’m very tired). i did select “all” when i imported the mds animations. can you post how you imported it all, or can you upload it somewhere (the 22 meg file) as i think it would benefit us all to have all the animations. i am still puzzled tho how i managed to have all the animations present.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: pants on 2002-08-31 09:24 ]</font>

[Hewster]

Akimbo isn’t in the standard MP ,
but I’ve written it into the mod I’m workin on
and I’m sure others are too.

I’ll upload that file today, so it should be ready for you after
you’ve had a kip

I’ll e-mail you with the address, as I’m not
sure about my bandwidth limits if lots of peeps
start downloading it.

As for importing the animations with the mds
importer, it was awhile ago now, and can’t
remember exactly how i did it, but you’ll
notice in the original wolfanim.cfg
that there are several death_machinegun_1
entries. and some jumps(gaps) in the frames.
ie.wounded_idle_1 starts at 173 and has
144
frames, which means it finishes at 317, but the
next frame referenced is revive at 320… 2 frames missing !

Hewster

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Hewster on 2002-08-31 10:07 ]</font>

[fretn]

On 2002-08-31 10:06, Hewster wrote:

I’ll e-mail you with the address, as I’m not
sure about my bandwidth limits if lots of peeps
start downloading it.
<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Hewster on 2002-08-31 10:07 ]</font>

make an account on planetwolfenstein, you’ve got unlimited disk space and unlimited bandwidth

btw: Thank u very much for work u are doing !

[Hewster]

ok,

I would use planetwolf, but I don’t like their contract:

9. You will be committed exclusively to the GameSpy Network.

oh no I won’t !

you can grab the file here:
http://www.the-wildwest.co.uk/pants/body_all_03.zip

btw, the web is underconstruction at the mo

Hewster

[Ghast]

Of course if you have 3dmax you’ll want to use it, but is there any chance gmax could also be used eventially? Or milkshape?

[pants]

hewster: i dled the file 2wice and no luck both times. said the .zip was corrupt. I’m not going to have a chance to get to the markered rig file tonight, hopefully tomorrow. :sad: what mod are you working on by the way?

ghast: i’ve never used milkshape and my experience with gMax is install/uninstall. perhaps someone else knows more about this and can help. sorry.

[Hewster]

Pants,

I don’t know why you’re getting a corrupt zip :sad:
I dl’d it myself to check straight after I
upped it and it was ok, and again just now
and it was ok too !
Could someone else form over the pond try
for me ?

The mod I’m workin is to be called The WildWest.
Just a two man team, me and a friend called
BoltyBoy, who is the mapper.
I’ve been reluctant to advertise until the
web-site is done. (should be next week sometime)

Ghast,
I got a Gmax version of this file too, as
this is what I use for my game modelling
I only get limited access to max on a friends work
machine, for which I’m very greatful, but
May be one day when my talents are noticed,
I will have a job that pays well enough to
enable me to buy Max all for myself

However Gmax hasn’t got Character Studio,
and it seems this is crutial for creating
mds files :sad:
I find Gmax does everything else i need for
game modelling though, its the best free
3D app in the world

If you would like to have the gmax version
I can upload it for you ?

Cheers

Hewster

[Ghast]

I don’t need it right now, but thanks, just knowing its available helps a lot. I have access to all sorts of software programs at the college but getting the ITs to install a downloaded plugin is a tough sell, so I really love it when great stuff comes out of garage type design teams with enormous talent but little money! Thanks again!

[DiaZ]

Well I am not sure if it’s due to the lack of frames, but I’ve made a test .MDS, it was processed without any warnings whatsoever; tags are in place, model is chopped into the required parts (I’ve attached the hands to the body mesh) but the final file size is much smaller than the default models, and when I replace them, Wolf crashes. Is there any polygon limit? The test model is absolutely unoptimized and has more than 3,000 polygons including head.

Btw, would this work for single player models as well? The mod I’m working on is single player… (still, the model crashes both single and multi Wolfenstein)

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: DiaZ on 2002-09-01 19:47 ]</font>

[fretn]

For reference, the body of the Allies model is 1268 polygons.

I think you have to much polygons on you model.

fretn

[DiaZ]

Still, it should be no reason for a crash… the Heinrich model is almost 4000 polygons…

[fretn]

oops

fretn

[Hewster]

DiaZ,

Are you following Pants’ tutorial ?
Have you setup a biped physique model ?
don’t use the file I have posted to export
as a mds, it won’t work, I’ve put it there
for Pants, or anyone else who can convert
the animation to a biped physique model.
As it contains all the standard animations
at the right frames

Pants’ version does work its just he’s had to
re-write the wolfanim.cfg file to adjust for
the lack of frames in his original model.

Hewster

[DiaZ]

I’ve physiqued the model and followed Pants’ tutorial, but the game keeps crashing when it is suppossed to be loading the model. Since I don’t even get an error I can’t find out what’s going on. I’m relatively new to modeling (this test model i’m making is the 3rd model i’ve ever made, I’m primarily a map maker) I guess I’ve done something wrong. I’m thinking about uploading the .max file somewhere so someone with more experience than me can have a look. Once I know what’s going wrong I’ll be able to replace all of RTCW’S nazis with my stuff :]

Something he doesn’t explain in his tutorial is how is the model suppossed to be physiqued - I used rigid vertex assignment, with no blending between links and no envelopes. Might be this?

By the way, I didn’t export any heads at all at the moment, am I forced to do so or can I just use RTCW’s default heads?

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: DiaZ on 2002-09-03 01:06 ]</font>

[Hewster]

DiaZ,

I’m affraid my experiance with Character
Studio currently stands at about 4 hours :sad:
and I can’t say weather what i did would have
worked in-game or not, cos i didn’t get that far, although I did have some success when i first
tried converting a boned skinned file.

And now it looks like I won’t be learning any
more until I can afford my own copy of max :sad:

I do know that the model doesn’t need a head,
as this is a md3 that is attached in game,
which you can change.
have you tried importing the mds back into
max ? there is a mds import plugin avalible
at this site:
http://mojo.gmaxsupport.com/
Its a gmax plugin, but it also works in max.
this may give you some insight into why its
crashing wolfy.

Perhaps Pants can help, he seems to know what
hes doing with max.

Its crazy, I can make my player models, bone
them, skin them and animate them in Gmax,
but can’t convert to a mds, maybe someone
will make a converter for gmax ?

Hewster

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Hewster on 2002-09-03 02:56 ]</font>

[DiaZ]

The import script doesn’t work, the utility just won’t show up ( and I have Max 4.2 )

[pants]

wow, go away for the weekend and like 907518237459081243759712348954123 posts happen. i will try and hit all the ones i can help on.

going way back to Hewster. here is a mocapRigged bones file. i would have uploaded the one with RtCW animations, but ya, that was 82 megs, so i just put this one up (an old cartoony walkcycle). Hopefully you can see how the file was rigged so that you can create the .csm with all the frames. If you do create it, can you please upload it. there are still a lot of steps to get it working right.
mocapRig.zip (~25 k)

i don’t think Character studio is essential for creating the files, it just helps. You could do it with bones, but you can’t load the file up like you can with biped. However (and this might really help you out), there is a t-pose at frame 1067 (at least with the botched shortened animations that i have) that you could possibly build your model around and work off of that. Hopefully this will help as it certainly helped me getting all of this off the ground. Is there an .skl exporter for gMax?

Diaz, i have no clue why it’s crashing. If you do upload the file, i could certainly take a look at it and try to help out. Feel free to e-mail (don’t worry about filesize) it to me if you can’t find a place to upload. As far as i know, there is no specific way that you have to physique your model. I used envelopes to rough it all out, then i went back per vertex that needed to be adjusted (inner legs and such). As hewster mentioned, you don’t need to export a head or anything, i included that solely so if you wanted to, you would have some reference as how to do it. As for installing the .mds importer (hopefully this doesn’t sound like i am talking down to you as i don’t know your experience with 3DS. i didn’t know anything about scripts until like a month ago, so please don’t be insulted if i say something obvious). Put the MDSImporter.mzp into your [3d studio max dir]/scripts/startup folder. When you load max the next time, go to the Utilities tab, click MaxScript (you might have to click more to get to this), then click on the roll-out and MDS Importer should be there. here’s a picture…

i do hope that was everyone/everything.