AH-64 Pack

[CameronMcDonald 146]

What if you came in wearing something other than a flight suit?

Abs

This.

[Macadam Cow 1]

:omg: I thought we were talking about Combat Helo I didn't know you actually planned invisible pilots for this addon.

Anyway, since the pilot is just static I wouldn't mind if you choose to get rid of him, I don't see how an invisible pilot could more immersion breaking than an static one.

The cockpit is gorgeous, keep up the good work :)

[Lt Gunner 10]

when you fly the UAV you dont see a pilot in it right, just a camera view. basically the modeled in body would just be a proxy similar to that. Besides i honestly hate it when an apache is being piloted by some guy dressed like a normal grunt or cut and paste SF guy, it just looks bad. the whole point of creating the body is for immersion and realism, so how can an argument be made in favor of allowing uniforms other than a flight suit to be shown via some kind of complex set texture script.

anyway, its just an idea and i know its stretching the boundaries...

[nodunit 397]

Ultimately there is no one perfect solution. To have the pilot be there but include the leaning feature would lead to some clipping, removing them would allow for moveable cyclic and collective as well as possibly branch out into other possibilities.

The problem with the modelled body is as Franze stated but moreso the fact that when it comes to organic modelling..it and I don't mesh well, I would have to ask for outside assistance.

The idea of texture swapping could work I suppose if you link the right uniform era to the correct era helicopter but the problem therein is the difference of equipment is not texture only but also a bit model based though to an extreme I suppose that could be worked out so that they are the same in 3D.

Granted it would be unrealistic to see someone not in uniform piloting such a bird, there is only so far we can force the players hand, I suppose we could try penalizing the player for not using the right unit by having IHADSS unavailable. Alternatively maybe we could lock it to other units but that may be too far, seems to bratty in the way "If you aren't going to play with my toy correctly then you don't get to play with it at all!"

Edited January 4, 2011 by NodUnit

[Lt Gunner 10]

Besides i honestly hate it when an apache is being piloted by some guy dressed like a normal grunt or cut and paste SF guy, it just looks bad. the whole point of creating the body is for immersion and realism, so how can an argument be made in favor of allowing uniforms other than a flight suit to be shown via some kind of complex set texture script.

re-read that... was in reply to abs comment, not a suggestion for it.

[abs 2]

My point is that I think it's getting really uneccisarily complicated. If there will be so much functionality that your player will get in the way of display/switches/whatever there's really just two choices that the game offers that are quick and easy:

- Create your own anim for the proxy, with all the appropriate body parts out of the way.

- or don't include the proper proxy and make it an invisible pilot as someone mentioned.

Making a ton of custom anims etc for each combination of action, while it would easily be incredibly fancy, would be pointless in a gameplay perspective, IMHO.

Still, keep doing what you're doing, as you're definitely doing it right. ;)

Abs

[Lt Gunner 10]

I also can totally agree with that... My suggestion was more of an idea of another way to skin the cat that you maybe handn't thought of. Albeit very complex, very difficult, and very time consuming... the latter of which problems most of the community and I would rather you not encounter. :P

When I posted my idea, a part of me would like to see it, maybe in a version 3.0 of the aircraft or something though. Something to work on after an initial release and a few bug fix updates. However I pretty much knew that there was no way I would see it in the initial release. still, I wanted to put it out there.

[nodunit 397]

With that reasoning I understand, after the process and everything is said and done, released and some bugs that we might encounter out of the way it could be a good time to expand.

[franze 196]

Gunner, what you're saying actually makes sense and it could work depending on the surplus of polygons available. It's something to look into even if limited (we'd have to turn it off if any unit except specially made pilots are in the aircraft). At this stage there's not much in game yet so it's difficult to say what's possible vs. what's doable.

[b00ce 160]

Or we could just not have a pilot in the cockpit LOD. Honestly, it's never bothered me in any flight sims ever and I'm sure it won't now in arma.

[nodunit 397]

This will be a 2 part post since both will pertain to different things. Firstly pardon the dead zone, I've been waaaaaaaay lazy about making the hand grips for the cpg and the delta's cyclic+collective.

But in the meantime of my boredom I worked on the exterior some more, reshaping some parts of the helicopter and modifying things, seen herethe most prominent being the radar with now thicker wiring as it should have along with some placement tweaks on it's parts.

For more and higher res- http://s229.photobucket.com/albums/ee200/NodUnit/Model%20work/AH-64D/Work%20In%20Progress/Apache%20Renders/

Edited January 14, 2011 by NodUnit

[nodunit 397]

And now for part 2, the cockpits. I've been extremely lazy about getting to the hand grips and delta's cyclic+collective, finally however they are done (at least realatively, they are all high poly meshes but I plan to bake them into normal maps)

The AH-64D will have all systems of the AH-64A and more, in place of caution/warning panels and master caution/warning panels both pilot and co pilot will get a SYS (system) page which displays all of the important systems in realtime, those of you who have used Franze' apache's in OFP will be familiar wtih this.

Another improvement is the TSD (Tactical Systems Display) which allows crew to see the map in realtime as well as their position upon it, it is possible that this may become more but that's a secret.

TSD- Tactical Systems Display. At basic this will give both crew members a view of the current map and their position to it, in a more advanced way...well....that's a secret.

FLT- Flight page, displays altitude, speed, wind speed (? ), digital horizon, compass and heading and possibly a waypoint distance display.

ADF- Automatic Direction Finder. At basic a top down view compass, in more complexity you can add waypoints via controls, once set the arrow will point to the next waypoint, distance is also displayed.

Just because the D has all of these things however does not necessarily make it less capable, in fact the less information and having all of the important air data infront of you at all times rather than needing to cycle through pages can be easier and quicker for engagements.

The radar will also be there for more than simply looks, without the radar the apache's will not have the tab target ability but rather visual on target laser or GPS guidance. (Franze is already using this system on one of his aircraft currently so it's green.)

Fire modes availbile will be Lock On After Launch in which you can launch the missile then laser the target, Lock on Before Launch which requires the target to be lased prior, this requires less distance than LOAL, and finally DIRect.

Well that's enough talk, time for more pictures, hope you aren't sick of them yet.

High res here- http://s229.photobucket.com/albums/ee200/NodUnit/Model%20work/AH-64D/Work%20In%20Progress/

Edited January 14, 2011 by NodUnit

[Pauldarrington 9]

Holy shit I'm astounded how in depth you have gone into detail it looks amazing and i cant wait to fly it, just a question will it fly the same to the bis apache or will you change it too a more realistic state to fly it

[nodunit 397]

02:00-04:30 is roundabouts what our test bed has been. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vELlxOV_PRI

It will definately move differently from the default, we've already and still are testing the flight on an older model ingame and thus far it's proven quite agile and responsive. In fact it will probably be a bit more difficult to get used to since the smallest input can effect your bird so it takes a gentle hand.

Edited January 14, 2011 by NodUnit

[Pauldarrington 9]

Excellent looking forward to mastering your beast If your looking for people to test I'm happy to help you

[jake8787 10]

This looks amazing. How long must you make us wait man!

[merlin 17]

I really admire the amount of depth you put into the cockpit, it reminds me of Franze's excellent f/a-18 for Arma 1.

[nodunit 397]

Excellent looking forward to mastering your beast If your looking for people to test I'm happy to help you

I'll keep you listed :) I'm sure we'll need a few people looking for a challenge to form a squad and test the birds full capabilities when the time comes.

This looks amazing. How long must you make us wait man!

Until it is done :D I feel your pain, I'm having to wait as well, in fact the MFD pages are a by product of that, wanting to get an idea of how it would look in game are a result of that eagerness, I'm surprised I haven't gone off the deep end and made an IHADSS display yet....now there's an idea..

I really admire the amount of depth you put into the cockpit, it reminds me of Franze's excellent f/a-18 for Arma 1.

Yeah I owe a lot to him on that, he's the one that originally got me so fascinated with the apache project from Flashpoint, then seeing his 3D cockpits become even more 3D... Since you are familiar with him you will be pleased to know that he will be working on this, so everything you may remember from the OFP units will be in here with what he knows of and can do with Arma2's upgrades.

Edited January 14, 2011 by NodUnit

[bwph4273 11]

just wanted to say wow the detail is amazing . just wondering how u got that amount of detail with out going over the poly/vert limit . so if u don't mind me asking what is the count on that beauty

[nodunit 397]

It's 3ds max not O2, not yet ready to be converted, much left to finish and clean up...though if you want to have a heart attack 990,000 tri's :D...BUT this is simply due to a number of things, the pilot and cpg view+ lod0 exterior+weapons factored into one, every change in color you see from the green on a panel to the letters is a polygon and it really ups the count greately.

Factored in also comes exterior paint (any change in black you see on the outside is colored model overlapping more model), the AH-64A, D and block 3 are all factored into count plus any duplicate parts they have floating around, and finally the handgrips, deltas cyclic and collective are all turbo smoothed and what I mean by that is.. imagine taking a model, then converting all quads into 4 more quads inside of it, now do that 2 more times and you have about the effect they all got.

Once everything is cleaned up and readied I'll post some polycounts and wireframes if requested.

To ease the minds of some out there, here are some examples of why the count is so high-

AH-64D hand grip W/o buttons 7,598 tri'sx2, AH-64A handgrip- 18,432 tri'sx2 AH-64D collective-w/o buttons+text= 14,552 tris' + text= 21,010. So you see how it easily bumps it up :) naturally what will actually be used will be faaaaar lower but it's more than likely that proxy will at some point play part in the exterior for LOD0, LOD2 would have the normal limit since you wouldn't see the details the pilot and CPG could when looking at third person.

Edited January 14, 2011 by NodUnit

[m1n1d0u 29]

oki so what's the word after amazing ? lol

[nodunit 397]

I think it goes good-great-awesome-terrific-amazing-stop teasing.

[m1n1d0u 29]

yeah that's right nodunit ! just a little question abrams project is stopped that's right ?

[Opticalsnare 12]

Its a shame we cant have has much detail as the DCS A-10 for functionality. Loving the screens so far, good work.

[nodunit 397]

yeah that's right nodunit ! just a little question abrams project is stopped that's right ?

Correct, stopped but not dead, I'll be using what I've learned from this project on the M1A1 when shelling out the interior, it's got the basis cut, just needs the equipment.

Its a shame we cant have has much detail as the DCS A-10 for functionality. Loving the screens so far, good work.

Hard to say to what degree of comparison it will have at this point, but for sure it will have far more than the default, many things will be tested to see what capabilities Franze can pull out of it and I'm sure the PR guys will too, they seem enthusiastic about the project as well.