Topic: Low Polygonal Escort Class  (Read 6262 times)

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Offline Tus-XC

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Re: Low Polygonal Escort Class
« Reply #20 on: February 24, 2009, 01:56:31 am »
*points to post earlier* based on bit o research (ie testing) SFC  - while being able to handle 24 bit files it won't display 24 bit files, but 8 bit.   Its better for you to do the conversion to 8bit and use proper dithering than to let the engine do it and have your textures look... meh
That's not required. All SFC games can display 24 bit colors in game without any quality reduction, at least on my laptop.

If you have problems having SFC displaying 24 bit textures, it might be caused by your hardware or video drivers. BUT I am very sure that 24 bit textures have NO color dithering or gradient look for all 4 SFC games.

The only problem is that 24 bit textures take more space and resource, while the quality improvement is sometimes not very notable.

If that was indeed the case then a render from max w/o any special lighting rigs, antialiasing etc should look exactly the same as the sfc engines output (which it doesn't fyi).  You probably noticed at some point that when viewed in mod viewer you get a warning text file named "above8bit textures".  So I did a little bit of expierment when i ran into problems w/ my backdrops (which had lots of graidents on them) based upon the idea (from that warning) that the textures were being reduced.  So here is what i did, and you can do it to.  Open up your model in mod viewer, preferably a fed w/ a good sized saucer w/ at least 1024x1024 saucer textures only (ie saucer takes up most of the space), or if you have a high quality nebula texture that will work even better (just map it to a plane).  Now open up a copy of the high quality texture in a paint program (i use photoshop cs 3).  Compare.  You should notice that there seems to be lesse color depth (ie some colors are not the same).  Further you should see soem gradients, though harder to pic out on solid (ie one color textures) multi color textures (or those that utilze chormatic noise or mutilple colors for aztecing) should have obvious graidents going on.  This is more noticible if you have areas that have gradients but is still visible in most cases.  Now reduce your copy of the high quality textures (preferably in a good paint program such as photo shop) to 8bit with no ditheirng.  Now they should look very similar (there are some differences, prolly due to different methods of reducing).  Before you ask, i reduced a copy of the texture, not the one being displayed on the model (though that doesn't matter until you reload the model anyways)

based up that I found the only to ensure that i have full control on how the textures appear in game was to do the reductions myself and play w/ the dithering until it looked right. 

O and its not my system.  2x 8800 gtx in sli with latest graphic drivers at the time of testing (about a year ago, only w/ sfc OP)
« Last Edit: February 24, 2009, 02:07:03 am by Tus »
Rob

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Offline Tus-XC

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Re: Low Polygonal Escort Class
« Reply #21 on: February 24, 2009, 02:08:37 am »
btw, model looks great, but i seem to be picking out a smoothing error right behind the nacelles, but i'm sure ya noticed that already ;)
Rob

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Offline Rod ONeal

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Re: Low Polygonal Escort Class
« Reply #22 on: February 24, 2009, 03:15:03 am »
Thanks, at the minute i only plan on creating DS9 to go with it, as a low poly package, but to be honest im using this low poly stuff to learn more really..   but im having allot of fun with this so we shall see, but the release of this will have the shuttle and a DS9 too, runabout? possibly..   not sure yet. :)

I have worked out normal mapping  8)

this is a render of the ship, and the normal map, no more bump mapping  :police:

ahhh if onlly sfc supported it, but i will still bake the textures for an sfc release.



She's looking like the best  500 poly Defiant I've ever seen. Man I wish SFC4 could get going and we could have a more advanced rendering engine. :(

Just curious, how you make your normal maps?
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Offline Dizzy

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Re: Low Polygonal Escort Class
« Reply #23 on: February 24, 2009, 10:48:37 pm »
Pretty damned awesome. Amazing for only 500 polys. Other modelers should take notice. ;) Hey, I hear its not sfcOP compatible?

Offline GotAFarmYet?

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Re: Low Polygonal Escort Class
« Reply #24 on: February 24, 2009, 11:51:30 pm »
What Tus is talking about is true in SFC 1, and maybe 2 never tested it there. Not Sure if OP has that problem either, but SFC 3 might not as the basic engine was replaced for that game.

Because they are both converted to JPG they pixelate, so it is hard to tell from a render compared to the model. Mostly you see it in metallic patterns but not so much across the entire ship.

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Offline JB_Wonderboy

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Re: Low Polygonal Escort Class
« Reply #25 on: February 25, 2009, 04:18:18 am »
Thanks for all your comments. should be finishing off the textures this eveing.

TUS - thanks, yeah i noticed that, need to weld a vert i think.

ROD Oneal - I use a photoshop plugin created by nvidia, its very easy to use..  you draw your bump map, then add the filter with the nvidia plugin, it even allows you to test it with 3d lighting and stuff, very nifty.

http://developer.nvidia.com/object/photoshop_dds_plugins.html

Thanks for all the information, was not aware of sfc4??

Offline Rod ONeal

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Re: Low Polygonal Escort Class
« Reply #26 on: February 25, 2009, 04:21:51 am »
I've seen the plugin, but never tried it.  I'll have to check it out. Thanks, and keep up the good work.
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