I have a few general questions about modleing, if you could help please.

[gaggle]

Hey, it's great to see such curiosity in the gaming-specific area. I think many of your questions are too specific to be easily answered. Unless we have someone here that knows how, say, Flight Simulator actually handles its models, you're just going to have to guess. Maybe the moving dial-needles are pure programming, maybe they're modeled and/or even animated in MAX, or whatever really.. each game-engine is unique.. if you're going to model for that specific engine, then you find out by going through the games documentation.

Same goes for your Battlefield 1942 question, though I'd guestimate that they're generating the landscape from a height-map (ie. a grayscale texture that defines a certain height per pixel) or some similar techinque, the landscape is then likely textured using many smaller textures, blended together computationally to generate various levels of grass, dirt, etc. And the trees probably consists of, say, three or four tree-variations, used throughout the map (each tree is rotated uniquely so as not to look like it's neighbough, and possibly scaled as well). This way the engine only has to load in a few tree-models, meaning each tree only takes a minimal performance-hit memory-wise and such.
I don't know any of that, it would just make sense if that's the way they use it I think. It's essentially how everybody else does it :)

Your first question touches on modeling-neatness, which I for one thinks is an important aspect of lowpoly-modeling. You have two reasons right off the bat for why you'll generally want to take the high-route and close everything off neatly: 1) Less polys used. Not always true, but generally a neat mesh results in less polys is my experience. 2) visual artifacts. Precision in graphicscards aren't always super-terrific, so if you have polys, say, behind another poly (ie. polygons inside the model), they can end up showing through if it's far away. This has to do with the way graphics-cards do depth-sorting to figure out what poly is infront of another.


Oh and size-wise differs from engine to engine as well, you will have to make your models specifically to one engine.

[sakuramboo]

to answer your first question, that is done by the gaphic prossecor when playing the game. its mipmapping. and this helps to put a lower strain on your video card. what the card does is when there is an object or scene in the far background, itll actually display less pixals (like a mosaic look) but apply a blur to it so its still understandable by the player of what it is. if you have a powerful video card, you can access your mipmapping strength in your active desktop, settings, advanced , then direct 3d and open gl.

2. that is very bad. you want to have the lowest possible polygon cound in your model. the more polygons you have, the longer it takes your cpu to process the information. and even if you get the polys to be perfectly flush, you will still be able to see it at some angles. just delete the middle polys and connect them. itll make it look so much better.

3. when it comes to games, everything is done in the same program. if not, then itll be very very hard having to constantly importing and exporting all the work. all the components are made up separetly. then they bring in all the models. and like gaggle said, they will use 1 tree model, rotate it, scale it and do that for the whole map. on some games like medal of honors allied assult, on 1 map in perticular, there were many different tree models used, but i dont think the count was over 10 different tree models. that would just be too much for the CPU/GPU to handle.

4. if your used to the american measurement, then convert it to standard, if your used to metric, then convert it to metric. if your just making things for fun, or are into abstract stuff, then you wouldnt really want to change it, it gets a little anoying.

5. resolution of your texture should be 512x512 if you plan on doing models for video games. 64x64 is so tiny you wont be able to see anything. its like, you have a picture thats the size of your finger nail, and you want that picture to be placed on your houses roof. the picture will be stretched and look pixalated. from a distance it might look fine, but up close will look very bad.

6. rendering is when you have your created peice and convert it to a picture or video. (jpeg, tiff, avi, mov, ect). if your working on mods for video games, you dont have to render, just export it to the type of file that game uses. (3dsmax/gmax doesnt support all the file types, youd have to search the web for converters.) gmax does not have a renderer. and i dont think you can go to 3d party render programs if your useing gmax, (since gmax is free, that would put discreet out of buisness really fast).

7. most likely (this is a guess, but makes sense) the plane and cockpit are 2 seperate models. and i think that because if you were in 3d person view, the processor now and to handle the planes model as well as the cockpit model, even though its not seen. thats just my guess at it.

8. i really dont know about how they go about modeling the dials. when i model the gauges in a car, its all 3D because in reality it is 3D. but when it comes to games, id say that a seperate crew works on the lay out of the dial, and creates them in illustrator or photoshop, sends the pics to the programers and they tell the pics how to move when a button is pushed.

hope this helps you out. :-)

[Obear71]

Thanks for the replies guys, thats helps alot.

sakuramboo:

So if you cant render anything in Gmax i guss its not worth doing what i was going to do and that is make my first 3D animated short, becasue the only place it could be viewd in is Gmax, i couldnt convert it to AVI for the web?

I guss it really is just for Mods :)

But its a great free tool to learn with.

ONe other thing, im getting used to the interface in GMax now and i was thinking, is the 3D Studio max program the same?

Gmax is supposed to be its baby brother, so im hopeing that the way in which you modle and the interface designe is going to be the same in 3DSM but obviously with a lot more stuff.

If so that would be good as i wont have to relearn anything if i can get to buy 3DSM

[-=InQ=-]

2Obear71:

I found some answers to be incorrect, but I don't have time to read all of them, so I'll just give you mine.

1. yes, it's normal. You have to make the same model with different level of details and programmers will decide the distances when LODs will switch. There are ways of generating LOD models dynamicaly in real-time using the main model, but the result isn't satisfactory in most cases.

2. You must delete all the non-visible faces. Graphic engine won't count the invisible polygons, but they will take place in memory when the model will be loaded.

3. Usually there are specially designed level editors for making landscape. But most of models like Trees and buildings can be made in 3D MAX. Of course they are separate meshes.

about size. It depends on the exporter that will take your MAX model to game engine. you must read manual provided by the game developer to find out about measure specifications. For example in our game 1 generic unit in MAX is 1 metre in game. So, the chahacters lenght is 1.8-2 units etc.

I don't understand the question about textures. If you show your model from the large distance and it will look small, you can use small texture no matter how big model really is. But, if you're planning to show models close to camera, you must make larger tetures.

Can't tell you anything about Gmax, sorry. I think it cant' render the scene to avi file. Rendering is the process of calculating the geometry, light, shadows, textures etc. and making the bitmap image. You don't need to render your scenes made for real-time game because it will be rendered by the game engine and video card in real time.

In games like MS flight sim they have 2 separate models for cockpit and exterior. I think, you can find some infor about making models for out IL:2Sturmovik here: www.il2center.com

Good luck!

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