vasf_jeffs

Guy's I've searched quite a bit, done the tutorials and even gone back to the ofp stuff. Mondkalb's tutorial was great and allowed me to get a simple object into the game with the proper texture, maps, etc. What I'm running into is an utter lack of understanding how to get UVMaps put together for more "complex" objects. So after 5 hours of trial and error (and significant forum searches) I'm throwing myself at the mercy of you the experts. I"m working on a billboard (don't laugh it is complex enough for me). I have it broken up into the following named sections in lod 0: Support, Advertising, Pole, Catwalk and Ladder. I asked someone earlier on Skype about just uv mapping on rung of the ladder and his reply (yes do that) got me thinking. Should I be creating a separate UV map as i create each component in a model? Mondkalb's tutorial has you select the whole model first, then do the UV. When I attempt to unwrap more complex objects it doesn't seem to be the right answer as all of the faces aren't being shown. Alternatively can this be done as each object is made (i.e. ladder rung, ladder support, main support, etc)?? If I UV map an object and move it later is the map tied to the component independent of the location? Is it easier to do the UV maps in 3ds? Any advice on your workflow for uvmapping would be sincerely appreciated. Thanks, JeffS

Much appreciated. I'll give it a shot.

Bushlurker... are you using the pond to put water in the fountain or is there another water p3d somewhere?

Try the usgs seamless server. http://seamless.usgs.gov/ you can choose a rectangular download area that will gover the island.

Sounds like you are encountering issues with the "blue edge". If you aren't familiar with it... then that is probably your problem. Check out this link http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/Mondkalb's_Terrain_Tutorial#Blue_Edge_.E2.84.A2

There isn't really anything new here, but as I've just gotten back into fiddling with terrain I thought I'd share the steps I've used for getting it into visitor. You don't need L3DT, but I'd highly suggest it. If I'm doing something redundant please let me know so others won't have to suffer the same fate. Assuming you have your project folder, name space, tools installed, etc, etc and are looking for dem data... here's what I've done. 1. I downloaded the dem data from the seamless server (geotiff). 2. Searched all the forums, read a bunch of tutorials and lost some hair… 3. Downloaded / Installed Wilbur 4. Downloaded / Installed microdem (note I didn’t use it) 5. Downloaded / Installed 3DEM 6. Downloaded / Installed L3DT Getting the dem into game a. Open dem 3DEM 1. Optional? Operation -> Change Project -> Convert to UTM (I did this as the dem looks “stretched†after applying this it looks more “normalâ€. I’m not a GIS guy but I imagine there is a reason for this (curvature of the earth?) 2. Operation -> select smaller area -> Click and drag area (make sure it will be bigger than your actual map size) OR Calculate the size of the map based on meters and extract the exact size by altering the Northern or Southern Edge and the Western or Eastern Edge by subtracting (or adding the number of meters needed for the exact map size you will be using (i.e. 5120 , 10240, 20480. If you do this you can skip the crop in Wilbur. 3. File -> Save Terragen Terrain -> Entire Terrain B. Open Wilbur 1. File -> Open -> (choose Terragen Surface (*.ter) -> select file you saved from 3DEM. The file should load at this point. But it isn’t the right size for your map. 2. Choose select (the dashed box on the tool bar) -> style -> Fixed Size -> then enter in the map size (i.e. 512x512 or 1024x1024, etc) click on the map so the Area you want is in the selection box. 3. Surface -> crop to selection 4. Edit what you want here (i.e. water heights) or do it elsewhere. (I like L3DT) 5. Write Down MIN and MAX Height (Surface -> Find Min Max) 6. Save As PNG Surface C. Put the png in your working folder (name it terrain.png) and make sure the terrain.pbl contains the min and max info you wrote down earlier. D. Open visitor and terrain -> import from picture and select the terrain.pbl and it should import just fine. I have noted that if I open a file in wilbur after it has been edited the height fields get screwed up, so one I have the min and max I don’t put it back in Wilbur.

Lecholas, Did you get your custom roads working? If so mind sharing how? I am trying to get my own working.

I'm wrapping up a mission design and could really use a couple of voice actors/actresses if anyone is interested in helping out please PM me. Credit will be given to all those that help. Here are the voices I need: Female 1 - Preferably Heavy Russian or Czech accent Quite a few lines – she is the stand in commander for the resistance for a cut scene and reappears later on in the mission. Radio Operator 1 - US/English Accent (male or female) About 10 lines of text, this is the command radio element. Physiology Technician- US/English Accent Part of the flight crew. Will give briefing on the jump. Contact 1 - Czech or Russian Accent (male) A couple of lines. Can be done purely in Russian or English with Russian accent. Contact 2- Czech or Russian Accent (male) A couple of lines. Can be done purely in Russian or English with Russian accent. VIP – Male or Female Embassy Staff? Still working out story element.

Thanks for the reply. The issue was when I was binarizing apparently removing the "hook" was not optional :). Once again attention to detail could have saved me a ton of time.

I’ve had no problems to date getting my terrain from dem into L3DT and on to visitor 3. Looks great. I was able to get my sat and mask in as well. But when I go to binpbo and try to bring her in game I get all sorts of errors. White ground, crash to desktop, etc. Of course I spent a good part of the evening checking that everything was reflecting the right location i.e. namespace. I redid a couple of the tutorials (thanks sgt.ace and bushlurker) and think I’m screwing up the naming convention. So here’s the question… Do your folders look like: P: MYTAG\ Project1\ Project2\ Project3\ Or P: MYTAG_Project1\ MYTAG_Project2\ MYTAG_Project3\ Any suggestions appreciated.

Back in the day I actually had a macro go through and "manually" perform the placement of objects by copying and alt tabing to vistor each of the attributes. You're absolutely right that there are some much better tools than this, I am just finding out about them as I've not done this in years. It took me about an hour to set up but I was able to generate a forest with random tree sizes last night, but as the macro is running it meant I didn't have access to my pc for some time. Jeff

lecholas, Back in the ofp days I used a program called ezmacros to do what you are looking to do. Basically you set up an excel spreadsheet with the object names (paths), then a random direction RANDBETWEEN(0,360), random location within the specified area, and finally a random size (I believe I used something like RANDBETWEEN(.09,1.1) to give some variation. This will allow you to populate a large square area so you only have to go through add around the edges. The downside is that you will have to manually record the first macro which means alt tabing and using keystrokes to copy and past. Once it is done all you have to do is speed up the macro and go get a beer while hundreds of objects are placed. As I don't have the program anymore I'm going to purchase it again and give it a shot on my project today. If you are interested shoot me a pm and I'll let you know how it turned out. JeffS Oh... On topic. I began my first island since the OFP days. It is called Waldron and based off of the Waldron Island located in East Sound Washington. The Map is 10240 by 10240 but about half is ocean. It's been ages since I've done this and it seems to be more difficult than I remember so I don't expect anything in game for a few months. I'm using 1/3 sec dem data. The end goal is to have a dedicated training area (ranges, land nav course, etc).

My bad figured it out. Oddly enough after characters came an addon called "conex", it was mine and caused the error. Shame on me for adding a addon to the main folder. Live and learn...

Texas, I feel your pain... I'm running into some issues as well. However, the first tutorial for OFP with the crate does work in arma. Arma seems to be a bit more difficult than modding for ofp.

I've tried it four times now, It always gives me an error on characters/scripts... any idea why?