Jorak Uln

On 6/11/2020 at 10:50 AM, Kexikus said:

I just cannot stop myself from tweaking stuff. 

I know that feeling all too well. ^^

The new SB looking much more refined, i especially like how the Taris clouds turned out.  Kashyyyk looks spot on, except for the the dustrays:  Is it possible to blur them out  to mask the single rays a bit,  like shown here?

Anyway, i always enjoy your artwork!

On 6/4/2020 at 3:58 PM, DarthParametric said:

Looking good. Nice work.

How do you think you are placed to make ground textures? The Dantooine shot shows how dire some of the vanilla textures are.

If you dont mind the textures being from another author,  i just finished Dantooine in UHQ  while keeping things close to vanilla, tell me if you want to check it out.

@DarthParametric:  Great job to get rid of those  arches for a cleaner view. Much needed!

About the wall mount i agree with SH.  A shield shape - anything that roughly resembles the creatures body silhouette would be perfect:

Besides, when scrolling back in this thread i saw those Masks you did previously - they look just stunning as always but could use some texturing. If you like, i'd love to make some textures/animations for them.

Hi, 

To all your talented scripters out there - i'll need some help for setting up a reshade:

I know, that "reshade" in conjunction with Kotor has the alarm bells ringing since "ridiculously colorful", "overly bright" with tons of depth of field comes to the mind.

I do not intend to do anything like this - but unlike messing with the vanilla lightmaps, reshade has an immense advantage - simulating dark areas like caves with bright spots such as the Dantooine Crystal Cave works wonders without any artifacts.  And no Performance hit at all. 

The only downside is, the cave Preset would not work well on the locations outside.

At this point i need your help - basically i only intend to use 1 reshade preset with shaders enabled for those caves & 1 reshade preset with no shaders enabled for the rest of the game. 

Now my request - could you guys setup a script that enables the shaders only for the Dantooine/Korriban Cave & the Taris Sewers?
I really hope we could make this possible!

6 hours ago, DarthParametric said:

Just so you know, Odyssey's normal map implementation is piss weak. There's generally little reason to bother with using them in KOTOR. You won't get the sort of results you'd expect from pretty much any other engine from the last two decades. In my experience, the only time you get any really noticeable result is when used in combination with a cubemap mixed at 100%. Which is probably fine if you are making a Terminator total conversion and need a lot of chrome, but otherwise a waste of time.

Yeah, the effect is quite subtle, but its still a cool thing to have especially when getting fine structures on walls/floors etc. visible that wouldnt be possible otherwise...

One thing i noticed - somehow, the texture rename doesnt seem to work with  1.0.104B. At least after renaming/saving as binary mdl the walls are still using the vanilla nomenclature.

2 hours ago, DarthParametric said:

https://deadlystream.com/topic/5735-mdledit-bug-reporting-thread/?do=findComment&comment=73932

the 1.0.104B version worked! Thanks a lot! Hope its stable/realiable enough though, since i'll have to edit a ton of files & rename textures for better performance as well....

Somehow  didnt find the 1.0.104 version, only the 1.03 from bead-v, so i tried with this one: 

I dropped  the m28aa_01a.mdl & m28aa_01a.mdx from Kotor Tool into Override, loaded the m28aa_01a.mdl into MDLedit and ticked  the box for LMA_floor01s. 

Then i saved the file as "binary" and overwrote the existing MDL in Override Folder.  But now that happens: 

(the bumpmap is not visible and somehow all those tex went invisible...)

22 minutes ago, ebmar said:

For the diffuse/LMA_ floor01s.TXI, you can leave out both envmaptexture and wateralpha [unless you needed that, but I don't see why], and use only these two --

bumpyshinytexture CM_asith
bumpmaptexture LMA_floor01sB

as well as the normal-map/LMA_ floor01sB.TXI, just leave it like this --

isbumpmap 1
bumpmapscaling 2

See if that changes anything. Though more importantly is how you setup the normal-map. You'd be better export it as 24/32bpp uncompressed-TPC format using tga2tpc, that's the only way the game would read it - far as I can recall.

Edit: I haven't really practiced using the uncompressed version, so I'm not quite sure about it working or not. That information I got from the tool's page. In the past I was using mostly 24bpp/DXT1 -- it works, but the result could have been better when using the uncompressed one I'd gather.

The problem doesnt seem to be the bumpmap itself - > for example textures which model has a bumpmp assigned in vanilla already , work fine (also with the bumpshiny etc commands in the txi)

e.g. LMA_floor03BMP works with the custom map:

The issue seems to be textures, which dont have a vanilla bumpmap assigned by default like LMA_floor01s. 

@DarthParametricmentioned here that the model needs to be edited for the game to recognise the bumpmap in this case. But ive never used MDLedit v 1.0.9 Beta before, so i dont know how to do this..

Hi, 

need a bit help here - basically im trying to  assign a custom bumpmap to the game, but it doesnt apply to the texture:

for example, when i add the  needed txi files to Manaan Hraekert rift groundtexture LMA_ floor01s the bumpmap is not recognised (floor tex = transparent for now to see the bumpmap clearly)

So ive downloaded MDLedit v 1.0.9 Beta to edit the model, but ive zero experience with it. 

the tga & txi structure in override looks like this:

LMA_ floor01s.tga

LMA_ floor01s.txi (

envmaptexture 
wateralpha 
bumpyshinytexture CM_asith
bumpmaptexture LMA_floor01sB )

LMA_ floor01sB.tga

LMA_ floor01sB.txi (

envmaptexture 
wateralpha 

isbumpmap 1
bumpmapscaling 2

)

Im glad for any help you could give me on this!

2 minutes ago, DarthParametric said:

Aurora (and Eclipse, as I recall) both had limits on the maximum number of dynamic lights a given map/level would support. If you are getting differences within a single level, it could either be due to the limit only applying to some specific radius of the camera, or a room-based limit. There's a reason Bioware didn't stick lights in their glow batons.

Actually im getting differences also at very small Levels like the Ebon Hawk where i have that glow at one spot and almost in the exact same position (like 1 step to the side) theres no light at all. Since the Hawk is such a tiny hub is it for sure the max lights limit is reached? As suggested before, could it be some issue with the lightmaps? 

@DarthParametric:  Do you know by chance what causes the lighting bug described earlier?

(Ambient light is not always displayed on the same texture)

2 hours ago, Crazy34 said:

 

@Jorak Uln I attached pictures of the double blade with the new model. Would you consider it solved?

Yes absolutely. Great work so far with the model, its definitely much better than vanilla, i know that the planes are still a bit visible, but thats due to the engines limitation. 

Btw, i tried out your testfile, and thats what i found out: 

I noticed that you use dont use a separate set of textures for the dark purple "core" model but the normal purple Lightsaber + the purple core model. (That way both lightsabers use the same textures). I think, its better if you dont use shared textures, but give the dark core ls their own set of textures.

Now, i tried to recreate some SWTOR sabers, and so far it works great for the bright colored sabers (below just some quick takes on the sabers)

Green empeth SWTOR:

https://swtorista.com/crystals/green-empeth

front view in Kotor always seems to be brighter:

Those bright LS are covered well now. 

However, the dark colors are still not working yet - > Kotor planes seem to display dark colors transparent: 

simple dark core sabers are possible thanks to your core model, but when creating more special sabers like this one here- the red &  dark areas are displayed semi-transparent:

Would it be possible to somehow create that dark frame around the core (or even the whole blade being a flat plane that moves when you turn the camera)?

2 hours ago, Crazy34 said:

So I have a question to you all. In the fourth and fith picture you see the motion blur trails used by the vanila game. I didn't find a way to replicate the effect for the dark core blades, since the planes use the blades texture and blending mods. The question is shall I keep them? The movies have motion blur but carried out much better. If my research was not wrong, SWTOR does not have motion blur. Pls correct me if I am wrong.

Do you have a file with those black core sabers to test it out ingame? That would make it easier to see if/how much motion blur is needed. 

About SWTOR - i think they do use motion blur, at least for the special sabers (personally, i think its way too much, Kotor blur amount is much better)

37 minutes ago, Crazy34 said:

You give me some task I have to say ; ). No but your right I should try to fix it.

My solution is to use he 3d core plus a 3d most inner glow and then the planes around for the full glow. That should fix your problem (I hope and I have to test it, when doubleblade testing is on.)

The pictures below show the 3d progress. First the not yet animated 3d glow. THe second shows the new 3d core and glow actived. For comparison I put the original blade and texture in the picture such that you can compare them directly.

So on the to do list is left:

- animate the 3d glow

- Make up my mind about the size of the 3d core and glow.

- Improve the glow planes (not shown in the pictures below)

- Texture the glow (here I really need help from you Guys. Help me DS community your are our only hope!)

- Add flicker animation to 3d core and glow

- find some good looking hilts with permission to use them to give you a reason to use the blades

If ou wish for something specific this should fix etc. please tell me and I will see how we can achieve the goals with this.

Stay safe!

the spiky LS tip is typical for SWTOR - very cool stuff. 

14 hours ago, Crazy34 said:

What do you guys think about it? 3d or 2d? I have the 3d thing ready.

I think the most important part of the mod is to fix this right:

So, - at least in my mind- you definitely should go for 3d - on the long run it would be the best choice, since it not only fixes this bug, but makes other things possible like darker (black) cores like in SWTOR etc.  

Quote

@KexikusDxun has some light rain in vanilla already and that's of course still present.

Eh, i meant:  animated rain in your custom skybox...

20 minutes ago, Crazy34 said:

Thanks for the reply and the screenshots. Mhm in v2 I gave the green blade 0.01 1.0 0.01 so red and blue should be present even very small. If you increase it to 0.1 it did not help I already tried after you suggest it (thanks for the tip I appreciate it.)

Can I ask you to reproduce your screen shots and try to get close to the wall but at the same panel as the first screenshot. It might not be the distance to wall but the specific part of the wall texture that change the glow. For me when i walked over a monotonic ground texture on dan for example on some spots the glow was really intense and on over it was normal. But this was on the same texture with the same distance to the ground. Only thing I can think of is the lightmap of the module itself but I have no expertise in Lightmaps at all.

Yes, youre right - tested it again, and it doesnt seem to be the texture colors that are not reflective but sth. else, probably the lightmaps...

same texture, slightly different location:

about the settings - i dont know, but you could try to set the priority to max (dont know if 1 or 10 for example is the maximum)

further, you might test set ambient =1 and disable dynamic type=0 

but im just guessing here..

cant see it clearly on the screen, but do you have rainfall included? Now, animated rain would be awesome😀

2 hours ago, Crazy34 said:

@Jorak Uln I started this project to bridge time until you finish your movie texture pack which is awesome.

I tested your findings myself and I get similar results. I don't know what the problem is. At some spot on Malachor for instance I don't get ambient light at all. My guess is that it has to do with the lightmap and that the lights only amplified and colors the original light in the lightmap?  Atleast for the module area I have no clue how what works. The player models seem to be consistent.

I wonder how many different lightsabers in the same scene work and one still gets all the different colors. I attached a v2 with the lightsabers blue red green yellow. I would appreciate if anyone could test it and give me feedback on how the light interacts if multiple lightsabers are involved. As Jorak Uln pointed out we should also test it with different texture packs. Any feedback would help me alot.

Thank you very much and stay safe!

Test Ambient Light Lightsaber v2.rar 49.98 kB · 3 downloads

Thanks! Its good to see that you actively doing things to improve this game- its often those subtle additions that have such a great impact to the game - i totally believe that its possible to shrug off the "rust" of this old engine to the point you cant believe the difference...

About the mod: another thing i noticed -

1) when youre getting too close to a wall, then the shine is off:

on:

off (look at the bottom dark wall texture)

2) regarding your Malachor texture:  it seems on textures which dont contain any similar color (in this case green) -> no shimmer is visible. (probably you could try sth. like r 0.1 g 1.0 b 0.1 to see if it has any effect )

3) sometimes  i noticed that the shimmer is not constantly shown, e.g. when running 

3 hours ago, Crazy34 said:

Are you happy with the light brightness and the range? I had to balance the optic in daylight spots like dantooine and onderon against the harbinger and Malachor. I played around with the color for a bit and the color you have on the test saber is r 1.0 g 0.0 b 0.0 . More saturated colors tend to look better. 

I guess next step is to try to replace the damn blade itself.

first of all, congratz to the fantastic mod, didnt knew it was possible btw! In polished state it will be a must have addition to the game!

Tested your blade tex, it looks very good in dark areas, but in daylight it somehow reacts with different intensity to the textures - apparently at those tex with more red color the blade shimmer ist most intense, and on white surfaces you dont see the shine that much though: 

is there any way to correct it? (probably mix other colors to it, so that the shine still appears red, but reacts to any kind of environment?)

That said, amazing work so far, keep it up!

5 hours ago, Zhaboka said:

Very nice. Can always get behind a sun-peeking-out-from-behind-clouds! And Onderon looks like Space Jerusalem, which is awesome haha.

Thanks! Still wish i could get those Onderon clouds more  in this direction however:

some new skyboxes for Onderon & Dantooine: 

On 4/14/2020 at 1:23 PM, superSzym said:

I personally don't like the pink-silver color choice. It feels kind of unsuitable and I believe Onderon should look more like in SWTOR and TCW, with that distinct beige-blue-gold scheme.

if you take a look at the pictures above the pink variant, they are already done in the  beige-blue-gold color scheme; the pink pillars are  optional - as a reminder of the original.  I tried different variants for those, and while dark beige fits the scene better, its probably not enough to create a contrast to those dominant pastell colors.

However, since i'll make the sky in pastell red/blue as well,  the question remains, what would be the best color for the  pillars to setup this contrast and also fit to those blue roofs? 

On 4/12/2020 at 7:41 PM, Zhaboka said:

GORGEOUS. And yes, ice walls, please!

Those ice walls will be included, definitely.

------------

You guys certainly remember that ugly, flat  Onderon Backdrop here:

As you immediately see, its 2D which really breaks the immersion here, and the only way to make it 3D would be to place a real 3D model which probably has the Skybox getting in the way.

The solution? 

Goes really quick with VUE, just rendered the scene in 8K and downscaled it to 2K to avoid artifacts when making the background transparent (ignore the Sky for now):

For purists, here a red variant:

31 minutes ago, Squall Lionhart said:

I can see it actually looking better than usual. I feel the environment should affect some of the walls and other devices used, such as the Jedi Academy or some of the Mandalorian Caches on Dxun. (Hell, even the Ravager should have it.) Very nice work as always my friend! 

And theres all too clear evidence of that environment impact too when you take a look at the textures in Kotor Tool. The technology simply wasnt ready back then to display it.    

Btw, are you still working with Vue? Sensational piece of tech indeed! And easy to use - this time tried sth. different for the Outside:

6 hours ago, Sam Fisher said:

I think you've absolutely nailed the look and feel of Star Wars, yes I don't care for the flag or your replacement of the fish, but by and large your work's phenomenal. The inside of the Telos "Academy" although it oozes a look and feel all it's own- reminds me a lot of the interior of Bespin in the area Luke fights Vader, the lights on that pillar off to the right of Atris' room in particular. 

Thanks. That's what I meant about variety actually, to have a wide range of climatic zones & architectonic variety at your disposal - to actually feel the location you're in through the environment itself and not just the game's storytelling. And that's also one of the elements that makes the movies fascinating in their own way.