jr_walker

Hello folks, I would like to retexture some existing vegetation as part of an add-on (do not want to “replace†original textures). I thought this process would work: 1) depbo the source 2) copy the .p3d and related “data†files to the appropriate locations in my project folder 3) modify the ca, mc, non, etc files in my project\data folder as desired 4) hex-edit the paths in the .p3d 5) bianarize my project 6) reference the new bianarized model though Vistor But, I can’t get the model to bianarize (no errors, log file is created, nothing written to it and bianarize never finishes). Can someone confirm if the process listed is correct? Perhaps suggest a fix/correct approach? Thanks, Walker

WOW thanks for the quick reply PVP. Will try it now! ---------- Post added at 10:37 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:56 AM ---------- Hi there, Still no luck. I thought instead of moving the files manually, I’d try Mikero’s moveobject, but apparently I don’t know how to use that either. Following the example: “Rename Examples MoveObject MyOldP3d MyGreatAddon\somewhere\data MyNewAddon\Henry\Marbles\wherever\you\want Moveobject will rename the p3d to old.p3d IF changes are made, and replace (in effect) the existing one, with the changed. An 'old' p3d, if it exists, is removed unconditionally. this to indicate an 'error', or 'no change' if such conditions occur. “ I get this: O:\tools\mo210>moveobject P:\ca\plants2\bush\b_salix2s.p3d P:\ca\plants2\bush\ P:\jrw\jrw_retex\ moveobject Version 2.10, Dll 3.50 b_salix2s.p3d ====================*P:\ca\plants2\bush\b_salix2s.p3d=== b_salix2s.p3d:ODOL48 (arma2c) nLods=9 Hunting P:\ca\plants2\bush\..... 0 replacements Creating output No Error(s) Checking output..... ODOL48 (arma2c) nLods=9 No Error(s) no changes done And no files are moved. Suggestions?

Hi Benton, I am also interested in experimenting with multimaterials. In this discussion (http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/Multimaterial) there is a reference to a 3dMax script: VM_MultiShader.mcr but I have not been able to locate a download for the script. Any ideas?

Hi SmokeDog, I haven't looked at Sgt Ace's config, but I believe the segull position consists of {X offset in meters, altitude in meters, Y offset in meters}. I use seagullPos[] = {2500,150.0,2500}; in my 5km test map and it puts me in the center of the map when the editor starts. I haven't put much time into the grid yet so no ideas for you there.

Hi Spet, (Before you try this, you should probably make a copy of your P: drive) Based on your statement that you’re having the same error, I assume you have both Arma II and Operation Arrowhead installed. If so, you should have the following file (I don’t know where your game is installed so I’ve left the drive letter out of the path): Bohemia Interactive\Expansion\Dta\bin.pbo Find that file (bin.pbo) and use mikero’s DePbo (or similar) to de-pbo the bin.pbo file. This will result in a folder in your Bohemia Interactive\Expansion\Dta directory called “binâ€. Inside that bin folder is another folder also called “binâ€. Copy the Bohemia Interactive\Expansion\Dta\bin\bin folder and paste it into your P: drive (replace the existing bin folder). This is what I did and I’ve had no further issues.

Well Lugnut...in the vein of realism, I would adjust your reference to read "the Blue Meanies against the Yellow Submariners" :P

Hi Blood, I started my first mapping effort last fall. A 40km by 40km island. Your questions about segment size, water etc. are questions asked by many when they first begin (I was no exception). My strong advice (and this comes from my own personal experience) is to create a small sample project first. I ended up doing that after weeks of frustration and very slow progress. A 5km x5km loads in Buldozer in just a few minutes and takes less than 10 minutes to bianarize on my machine. My 40km map takes 10 minutes to load in Buldozer and nearly an hour to bianarize. When you're starting out, you really want to be able to see the results quickly. I recommend getting comfortable with the basics by working on a small project and once you've come to know some of the processes and quirks of the tools, start on your real project. Second thing I found is that the folks here are teriffic: skilled, patient, helpful and friendly. Its always good to try the forum search first, but if you need more information, go ahead and post up. If you need to know about processes, tools or aspects related to terrain, look and post in the terrain forum. Try the modeling forum if you're creating your own objects. Flowing water (water on a angle) is not presently supported. I did see an older thread where someone had modeled flowing water, but the thread ended without a tutorial or release. So, it may be possible. There are threads related to segment size, how it is calculated (related to map size and grid size) and used. My understanding is that there are a maximum of four different terrain texures allowed in any given segment (wierdness results if you excede that). LOL, just realized balckmamba has recommended similar... Good Luck

Congrats on your release Tup! Looks terrific in the videos. Here's a mention of Haadur. 40X40km. The land mass is based on DEMs, vegetation and geology of the Mojave Desert in North America, but the infrastructure and economy will be based on Iran. Thanks to all who have provided guidance, assistance and motivation on this effort. Sat map (20480k – obviously reduced here): I’ve been learning on a segment sized portion of the larger map (the island at the bottom center of the Sat map, about 5K). Here are some shots: I think I’m finally satisfied with the sand texture and creosote bushes and hope to get some new photos for refined rocky ground texture this weekend. When I’m satisfied with the ground texture, I’ll move on to a “hard slope†texture, modeling some “rabbit brush†and some representative rocks. Then I’ll finally be able to get off this island and start on the mainland!

Hi DarkXess, I had a similar experience. Here was my post (sorry don't know how to link directly to a post): ------------- Hi Folks, I just followed the guide using: ARMA2P 1.11 (and OA [buldozer] 1.57.076815) My project opens just fine in Visitor, but when I launch buldozer I get: No entry 'bin\config.cpp/CfgInGameUI/MPTable.shadow'. When I click OK to the first error, I get: Shaders not valid (mismatch of exe and Data?) and buldozer never launches. I checked bin\config.cpp and found CfgInGameUI/MPTable. In fact there was no .shadow element. I added shadow = 0; This resulted in a new error, something about shakecam not found. So, I reverted the config.cpp file to the original error. Any ideas? EDIT: (FIXED - from the Arma 2 Terrain Totuorial) Hint: If you are using arma2.exe from your present game version then you need to replace the bin folder in p:/ with the extracted bin.pbo from your present game version too, otherwise there is a mismatch of shaders. Note: In my case I had to use the BIN from my \Bohiemia Interactive\Expansion directory. Thanks, JR

Hi Folks, I just followed the guide using: ARMA2P 1.11 (and OA [buldozer] 1.57.076815) My project opens just fine in Visitor, but when I launch buldozer I get: No entry 'bin\config.cpp/CfgInGameUI/MPTable.shadow'. When I click OK to the first error, I get: Shaders not valid (mismatch of exe and Data?) and buldozer never launches. I checked bin\config.cpp and found CfgInGameUI/MPTable. In fact there was no .shadow element. I added shadow = 0; This resulted in a new error, something about shakecam not found. So, I reverted the config.cpp file to the original error. Any ideas? EDIT: (FIXED - from the Arma 2 Terrain Totuorial) Hint: If you are using arma2.exe from your present game version then you need to replace the bin folder in p:/ with the extracted bin.pbo from your present game version too, otherwise there is a mismatch of shaders. Note: In my case I had to use the BIN from my \Bohiemia Interactive\Expansion directory. Thanks, JR

My experiments have not yet resulted in elimination of the border blending. In fact, although it appeared in Buldozer that part of the blended border was eliminated in some circumstances, the border appeared in its full glory after bianarzation. However, I do think I have a better understanding of the maplegend (may or may not be correct): According to the texturing link Bushlurker provided above, the understanding I have now is that: a texture is associated with an RGB color in the legend (doesn’t matter what the color is as long as the color references only a single texture; however, a single texture can be referenced to other colors in the legend – an important fact relative to the way I now believe seamless blending is supposed to work). A given texture can seamlessly blend with the texture to its immediate right or left as defined in the legend, but not necessarily to others. If a given texture is intended to blend with more than the textures on its immediate right or left, the texture legend reference is defined again: If I understand correctly, based on the example legend above, the texture “Beach Tran†will blend well with “R_Common†and “Grass†and will also blend well with “D_Common†and "Beach" (because "Beach Tran" was defined a second time) but will not blend well with “Rocksâ€. In the Layers.cfg file the textures in this example would be defined: R_Common[]={{0,255,255}}; Beach_Tran []={{0,255,131},{207,11,0}}; //note two color references for the Beach_Tran texture Grass[]={{0,255,0}}; Rocks[]={{121,255,0}}; D_Common[]={{255,255,0}}; Beach[]={{7,3,0}}; And the same colors as those defined in the Layers.cfg file are used in the mask_ico to represent the associated texture. I continue determine a solution for the texture blend issue. I will post up if any progress is made.

Hi Folks, It’s been awhile since I last bothered you for help; undoubtedly high-time I do so again. :p Can anyone share techniques that would eliminate or reduce the texture blending border as shown below between the blue lines (approximately 1m wide)? I’ve reviewed a few maps and found some to have this (Takistan is an example) and others not. Since the map is mostly desert there isn’t a lot of clutter to disguise the transition. From 100m away or from the air, it looks like my hills are suffering a bad case of the measels or wringworm (inset). As always, thanks for any advice you might share, Walker

Hello Old Bear and Mr. Lurker! Thanks for your responses and thanks for your experimentation Bushlurker. I tried each of your suggestions: First, I changed my basic, four texture Mask to be Red [255,0,0], Blue [0,255,0], Green [0,0,255] and Black [0,0,0]. If I didn’t know better, I would say the result was more pronounced blending. Then, thought I would be clever and change the black mask to be Red but [254, 0, 0] instead of [255,0,0]. Complete failure; didn’t even load the “black†texture (loaded the “red†texture in its place). I’d been having difficulty with NOPX textures so I modified the rvmat to use NOHQ instead with the simple Red, Blue, Green, Black mask. It made a difference (below) but didn’t really “fix†the issue as you can see (maybe this is a clue to someone who understands this stuff better than I). I looked at the color values of the sat mask, but I don’t see an obvious correlation/difference between the area that worked as expected and the area with the blend border (I may study this more). Tonight I will try “official†Takistani textures, but based on Buslurker’s experiments, I don’t have high hopes. If necessary, I’ll then try modifying the rvmat further, but I’m thinking there isn’t too much to modify in the rvmat. Was planning on posting when I had completed all this or found a solution, but decided to give a progress report in response to the follow-up in the thread. Thanks much for the continued consideration…very appreciated. Update: After re-reading (and re-reading) the WIKI link Bushlurker provided, I think I've got it...and, if so, now understand why the map legend is important. I'm in the middle of buldozing my "orginal" textures experiment, but I'll try out the new idea after (or perhaps tomorrow evening) and respond back.

Thanks for the response Tup. I have only 4 colors (see mask below). I am confident the mask contains only the 4 colors and no bleeding (I checked that using Photoshop). I thought that perhaps if the textures were similar in color, etc. that the blending effect would be less, but the screen shot (inset) shows that even two identical textures (one has clutter and one does not) have the blend border. (Just for information, on the mask the un-cluttered texture is represented in gray and the identical, but cluttered, texture is represented in dark blue.)

Hi Folks, First object; a few problems/questions. I made three rock models and all are acting similarly. If I approach the object from one direction, the object is solid as per my .bisurf, but when approached from an alternate direction, the object is not solid. I have rebuilt my Geometry and Roadway LODs several times (following Mondkalb’s addon tutorial). I’ve seen some posts regarding weights. My object has a mass of 6000, but I do not know where to set weights. Also, bullet holes do not appear regardless of which part of the object is shot although I have a FireGeometry LOD. My bpo log has this entry for each of the components for each of the objects: Strange convex component p:\jrw\jrw_misc\jrw_rock1.p3d in component01:geometry However, the textures appear correctly in game. Any suggestions on how I can set weights for my objects? Any suggestions on how I can identify and fix “Strange convex components� Thanks very much, Walker

Thanks Myke, Very detailed, very clear. You helped me to make rocks. I guess that means You Rock! Thanks again!

Hi Bryce, I use www.babel3d.com Upload your file, select obj as the output format and then Import the obj file into O2.

Hi DampetDK, I too had significant slowdown after re-direction to arma2oa.exe. For my purposes, I rolled back to “normal†buldozer hoping BIS will release a new tool in the future at which time I will include OA objects. If your map is already reliant on OA objects, perhaps you do not have that option. But I do not think your experience is unique and I have not seen any “solutions†posted. My times went from maybe less than two minutes to more than 20 minutes. After reverting to “normal†buldozer, my times are back to two minutes…

Thanks for the feedback! I had already reached the point of doing just as was suggested, that is clicking a bunch and choosing the “better fit†ones. Since I have been spending my time trying to make progress on the island rather than playing in-game, the act of all those coordinated clicks provided some of that trigger-pulling satisfaction…it’s the simple things, you know. I agree with your position on the R2 rocks, Bushlurker…I live in an environment of rocks and pointy ones are rare. I have contented myself with the boulder variations at 100-200% of size. I also completely agree that the rock (or any other object) needs to fit the landscape. My approach has been to try to create ground textures that fit with the objects (more on that in moment). I plan on making custom objects; rocks and plants to begin with (I took a bunch of “texture†photos last week), but I haven’t figured out the how on making non-island pbos…yet. I apprecitate the tip about mikebarts efforts, I'll take a look. I have no idea how any islands were completed prior to World Tools….I suspect I’ll need maybe 100K rocks and 80K plants (plus clutter) for 40km2 of landmass…I heard talk of a single forest comprised of 800K trees! One at a time?…Even if they are just rapid, unchecked, random clicks...No way! I am going to make a post to the mapmaker noobs regarding all the things I’ve learned over the last several weeks. For example all that time I spent trying to get the 1m/pixel resolution sat_lco, only to discover it must be blurred in order to look decent at ground level; oh, I tried making textures to accentuate the true land cover only to learn that my understanding of “segment†was MUCH smaller than what apparently comprises a segment in terms of maximum textures in a “segmentâ€. So I am going to make a small “test†island (I can hear you say “Duhâ€) to learn: texture technique and develop (at least many of) the textures I want, how to make non-island pbos so I'll have the objects I want, fool with the sat_lco to find the best balance between distance and close-up view, how to make decent beaches and other shorelines, the capabilities/limits of the available tools and try to gain some good understanding and confidence with configs…and do so without having to wait an entire evening to see the results of each experiment. Some posts indicated a 40km island was too big a first effort…I still don’t think that is the case…but I think first effort must be defined as the first effort once you know technically what you’re doing! Take care, thanks again for the tips.

Hopfully I am missing something. It seems objects can only be rotated on their Y-axis in buldozer. I can see how this makes sense for almost any object...except rocks. The area I am working on requires rocks rather than trees or plants and there are few rock models available. It would add significantly to the authenticity of the landscape if the rocks did not all have the same skyline profile. I've tried adjusting the rotation though the "Nature Objects..." menu; I don't that works as I hoped AND when I make changes there when buldozer is running, it seems buldozer must re-process the entire island. Any tips would be appreciated.

After a number of attempts in trying to access Arrowhead objects by following the various suggestions posted, I was finally able to do so...the configs Mr. Bushlurker posted made the difference. I have not had crashing in V3, but I find the "new" buldozer to be extremely slow; if it took minutes to process object changes in the past, it now takes hours... does anyone else experience this? Thanks, Walker

Hello, If I attempt to enable clutter, ARMA CO crashes when I try to open my island. The error in the .rpt file is: Warning Message: Cannot open object ca\plants2\clutter\ca\plants2\clutter\c_stubble.p3d One thread I reviewed indicated that I would need the appropriate .pbo in my @namespace Addon directory. I’ve tried various combinations of that with the same result. The tutorial threads don’t mention any such requirement. I get no errors in the .log file when the island is binanarized. Below shows my directory structure and config files. Any idea what I am doing wrong or not doing? Thanks

Thanks all, Better now, but not into the woods yet, so to speak. I did look at the pictures Old Bear posted in dougboy’s thread, and believe, at least compared to the extent of the pictures posted, that my directories were structured the same. I do have a back up of the project and have I reinstalled the tools and project several times, each time following Sgt. Ace’s tutorial. And as I read the setup section one more time, it looks like I’ve installed it incorrectly at least the last few times… :-[ I realize this is not my first post and far from my last posts for assistance. But please know I do Google, search the forums, study extracted .pbos and experiment (because I learn that way) before posting here. (You should see how many things I’ve figured out on my own ;-> ) If you search for ‘clutter’ or ‘unable to open object ca\’ you really don’t get many hits. The errors are gone now and no more crash, yet no clutter…but I'm confident the problem lies in my surfaces config (which was probably the initial problem I had before I started reinstalling and moving things around). I’ll get sorted…(or be back with more questions). Take care all! ALL SORTED: Weeds, bushes, dead stuff...blowing in the wind. Outstanding!

A gentleman and a scholar as always Bushlurker. Thanks. Rest asured that when I have any knowledge to give back to the community, I certainly will. I haven't done much with the Armory, but was able to determine my problem was that the following was missing (yet necessary) from my island class in cfgWorlds: safePositionAnchor[] = {2720,2462}; //2720 and 2462 are my values, yours will likely be different safePositionRadius = 2000; //2000 is the radius that works for me, yours will likely be different

Don't know if this belongs here or configs forum, but I think here. Hey all, I didn’t want to inherit from Utes so my config looks in-part like this: class DefaultWorld{}; class CAWorld : DefaultWorld { class Grid{}; class DefaultClutter; class EnvSounds; }; class Haadur: CAWorld But now when I start the Armory I get dumped into the sea, instantly respawn on land (usually as civilian woman in a dress) and then am usually insulted with a challenge that “Troops need to be transported…†The log shows this error: Error in expression <"FLY"] ; } else { LIB_curObj = _class createVehicle _posTryout; }; LIB_dynObjs> Error position: <createVehicle _posTryout; }; LIB_dynObjs> Error 0 elements provided, 3 expected File ca\missions\armory\data\scripts\functions\respawn.sqf, line 113 Error in expression <_charType = _class; }; }; _unit = _grp createUnit [_charType, _posTryout, [], 0> Error position: <createUnit [_charType, _posTryout, [], 0> Error 0 elements provided, 3 expected File ca\missions\armory\data\scripts\functions\respawn.sqf, line 47 It acts like I'm missing my seagullpos but I've got this in my config as well: centerPosition[] = {20480,20480,300}; seagullPos[] = {2720,2462,300}; ilsPosition[] = {5250.5,10993.5}; ilsDirection[] = {-0.7071,0.08,-0.7071}; ilsTaxiOff[] = {5554.5,11297.5,6035,11778,6055.5,11785.5,6075,11780,6117.5,11737.5,6124.5,11716,6113,11700,5851,11438.5}; ilsTaxiIn[] = {5851,11438.5,5342.5,10929.5,5322.5,10925.5,5306.5,10936.5,5269,10974,5261,10991,5264.5,11007.5,5278,11021.5}; I've made no changes to any scripts, just removed the Utes inheritance from the sample configs I've been studying. Must I inherit from Utes? Or can anyone explain how I might fix this? Sincere Thanks as always