Latest Models in .Max Format?

[MrTwosheds]

Yes skin animations will add together. The skin modifier is fairly easy to use, just apply it to the mesh to be animated, add bones to its list, use nasty looking gizmo to envelope verts for each bone. You can multi-envelope verts, so 1 vert can be animated by more than just one bone.
once you have all the bones and verts enveloped, you run the script to create the envelopes text that you then paste into the xsi when you export it. The skin modifier needs to be active (not collapsed) for the script to work. You can make the animations after creating the envelope list. The envelope list only needs to be pasted into the Main "Skel" model. It will not be read from the others.

[DarkCobra262]

Thankyou fine sir

Are these the latest models from Modders Data? Or are they from the old XSI pack?

old XSI pack (1.0), I could do another pack that contains the latest from the modders data if you want...
http://www.moddb.com/members/cobra01/ad ... ock-models
EDIT - can get these in .obj or some other format for others to use if necessary.
EDIT2 - Uploading a pack of .3d models directly from 3d Exploration. Contains models from 1.3.
EDIT3 - this link might be better: http://www.moddb.com/members/cobra01/ad ... 3ds-format

[TheJamsh]

Yes skin animations will add together. The skin modifier is fairly easy to use, just apply it to the mesh to be animated, add bones to its list, use nasty looking gizmo to envelope verts for each bone. You can multi-envelope verts, so 1 vert can be animated by more than just one bone.
once you have all the bones and verts enveloped, you run the script to create the envelopes text that you then paste into the xsi when you export it. The skin modifier needs to be active (not collapsed) for the script to work. You can make the animations after creating the envelope list. The envelope list only needs to be pasted into the Main "Skel" model. It will not be read from the others.

Any chance you could do a quick tutorial for how to set up and animate a mesh using bones? I keep thinking I've done it, but it fails to work.

EDIT: Cancel that, Managed to get a simple bone animation to work just fine. Anybody figured out how to animate bones using an IK solver? I.E, to get bones influencing the movement of other bones further down the chain? I'm trying to animate an antenna that has around 5-6 bones, and make it stretch and relax.

EDIT: DOUBLE SCRATCH! I FIGURED IT OUT YAY! I'm going to post a tutorial on how to vert animate start to finish I think, soon as I test this in-game

[MrTwosheds]

Anybody figured out how to animate bones using an IK solver? I.E, to get bones influencing the movement of other bones further down the chain? I'm trying to animate an antenna that has around 5-6 bones, and make it stretch and relax.

By curious coincidence, I have a walker with flexible telescopic legs! under development...This stuff is still a bit of a mystery to me too.
Obviously BZ2 cannot actually use IK, So whatever you use it is only to help you create the animation in the first place. I tried splineIKsolver, which seemed to do what I wanted, but so far I haven't quite figured out how to make the effect go any further than the next bone. It also complicates the Animation controllers (must be tcb) At the moment I sort of decided It may not actually be very useful and am attempting to make a similar effect with ordinary pyramid objects instead of "bones" This means I will have to manually tweak each bone for every keyframe, but without figuring out how to make IKsolvers effect 9 bones, I might just as well do it that way.
There probably is a way, but as with most things in max it will lurking behind some irrelevant looking button with a description that gives no obvious clue to its real purpose.

[TheJamsh]

Anybody figured out how to animate bones using an IK solver? I.E, to get bones influencing the movement of other bones further down the chain? I'm trying to animate an antenna that has around 5-6 bones, and make it stretch and relax.

By curious coincidence, I have a walker with flexible telescopic legs! under development...This stuff is still a bit of a mystery to me too.
Obviously BZ2 cannot actually use IK, So whatever you use it is only to help you create the animation in the first place. I tried splineIKsolver, which seemed to do what I wanted, but so far I haven't quite figured out how to make the effect go any further than the next bone. It also complicates the Animation controllers (must be tcb) At the moment I sort of decided It may not actually be very useful and am attempting to make a similar effect with ordinary pyramid objects instead of "bones" This means I will have to manually tweak each bone for every keyframe, but without figuring out how to make IKsolvers effect 9 bones, I might just as well do it that way.
There probably is a way, but as with most things in max it will lurking behind some irrelevant looking button with a description that gives no obvious clue to its real purpose.

I'm going to post a tutorial in the next hour or two, I've figured out how to use an IK solver to animate my bones in a way which makes them stretch and flex as I drag the IK around, and you can then bake that animation into the bones as regular TCB animation, e.g. rotation and position. What you're left with is a fluid animation that makes the antenna on my craft flex and stretch as it goes, with about 6 bones.

Nielk1 currently has God status.

EDIT: viewtopic.php?f=16&p=23122#p23122

[Apollo]

I tested some of the 1.3 xsi models in Softimage 3D 3.9.2 and exporting to 3ds is far worse then doing it in 3DE 1.5.5. (truncates names and changes the quads to triangles)
Furthermore, importing the 3ds file to max and trying to save it in max format crashes every time.

As far as exporting xsi goes, it can keep the quads but i see on the ivsout00.xsi it hosed the animations. (exported in xsi 1.3 version, Tesselate off)

I wonder which xsi program was used for the 1.3 xsi models... anyone know?

[TheJamsh]

I tested some of the 1.3 xsi models in Softimage 3D 3.9.2 and exporting to 3ds is far worse then doing it in 3DE 1.5.5. (truncates names and changes the quads to triangles)
Furthermore, importing the 3ds file to max and trying to save it in max format crashes every time.

As far as exporting xsi goes, it can keep the quads but i see on the ivsout00.xsi it hosed the animations. (exported in xsi 1.3 version, Tesselate off)

I wonder which xsi program was used for the 1.3 xsi models... anyone know?

As far as I'm aware though, 3DS Max was used to make any edits to existing .xsi models.

Oh and by the way, I''ve now discovered it's NOT possible to use a loop animation if the craft has any others. The loop animation will override them. They won't add together with 'forward/neutral/reverse' animations either. This is what I expected to be honest.

[MrTwosheds]

The loop animator is really for things that don't already have animations, would have looked silly flapping back and forward while the ship was not moving.

[DarkCobra262]

I tested some of the 1.3 xsi models in Softimage 3D 3.9.2 and exporting to 3ds is far worse then doing it in 3DE 1.5.5. (truncates names and changes the quads to triangles)
Furthermore, importing the 3ds file to max and trying to save it in max format crashes every time.

As far as exporting xsi goes, it can keep the quads but i see on the ivsout00.xsi it hosed the animations. (exported in xsi 1.3 version, Tesselate off)

I wonder which xsi program was used for the 1.3 xsi models... anyone know?

I used 3d exploration (not sure which version) to save the 1.3 models as .3ds... I can open them in 3ds max 2010 just fine... and can save them as .max. I'm not sure why you're having problems (though, I guess I only tested with the ivtankm2 a.k.a. heavy sabre)

[Zax]

This is what I expected to be honest.

Don't you just hate it when you meet your expectations?

[MrTwosheds]

but i see on the ivsout00.xsi it hosed the animations

XSI animations cannot be imported in to max, the trick is to just import the bits you want to alter then export them and paste them back into the xsi with notepad, where the animations will still be intact. It wont work for skin animated models.
Or you could just paste the original animations into the new xsi you exported.

[Zax]

but i see on the ivsout00.xsi it hosed the animations

XSI animations cannot be imported in to max, the trick is to just import the bits you want to alter then export them and paste them back into the xsi with notepad, where the animations will still be intact. It wont work for skin animated models.
Or you could just paste the original animations into the new xsi you exported.

?

They import just fine, except it is all on the frames. Try checking the export animation box.

Curiously, you will notice every frame is keyframed coming on a straight import. If you delete all the frames or rename anything, make sure to rename it in text too.

[MrTwosheds]

It does? What are you importing with? I would expect everything to be 90 degrees out.

[Zax]

It does? What are you importing with? I would expect everything to be 90 degrees out.

It is, but the animations are playing as expected, albeit sideways. They will play properly even if you reorient it. 3de.

[MrTwosheds]

Well, I've never been one for fooling around with stock models much, so I guess I never tried hard enough, don't really see the point in dragging an animation through conversions when you can just copy and paste it from the original in about 5 seconds and be certain that it is unaltered.