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-   -   [DFBHD] I fixed the bcolt45.mdt and my mood is soaring! (https://novahq.net/forum/showthread.php?t=51241)

Baldo_the_Don 08-02-2020 02:33 AM

I fixed the bcolt45.mdt and my mood is soaring!
 
1 Attachment(s)
Anyone that loves DFBHD(TS) and has paid attention has noticed that the Colt .45 looks weird. Holding the weapon outside on a bright map, where it should be shiny, it's shaded, and where it should be shaded, it shines.

This is because the bump/normal/height map was done poorly. Google "Bump Mapping" if you like, I can't really explain it beyond this: bump maps make flat polygons look not flat, as in "bumpy." It's a neat trick.

Basically, I tore the bcolt45.dds apart, but that didn't help.

The bcolt45.mdt made me curious though. I changed the .mdt extension to .tga. That worked to get the file open. It was a blotchy, psychedelic-colored impression of some bits of the .45 with an alpha channel making most of it transparent, and the visible bits more or less transparent. Looked like nonsense.

I never cut to the chase, but I'm gonna do that now and say to those who might understand: Invert all the colors. Swap the green and blue channels. Reapply the alpha. Save as a .tga. Change the extension to .mdt. Boom.

Alternatively: See the attached bcolt45-MDT.zip

Baldo_the_Don 08-03-2020 02:29 PM

So it seems that the colt_3rd.3di for the .45 also uses the bcolt45.dds and bcolt45.mdt like the colt_1st.3di, but it interprets the bump map data in the opposite way, meaning that with the original bcolt45.mdt, the side of the third person model facing toward the light source shines, but the side of the first person model facing away from the light source shines, and now my edited bcolt45.mdt just switched that around.

You know... I don't want to shock anyone reading this right now, but... I'm beginning to suspect... that this game has quality assurance issues!

Guest001 08-04-2020 09:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Baldo_the_Don (Post 394994)
So it seems that the colt_3rd.3di for the .45 also uses the bcolt45.dds and bcolt45.mdt like the colt_1st.3di, but it interprets the bump map data in the opposite way, meaning that with the original bcolt45.mdt, the side of the third person model facing toward the light source shines, but the side of the first person model facing away from the light source shines, and now my edited bcolt45.mdt just switched that around.

You know... I don't want to shock anyone reading this right now, but... I'm beginning to suspect... that this game has quality assurance issues!

The opposite shine (specular - reflection etc) can be caused by the copying or extraction process, which can reverse the way the model wraps the textures.

Most times to fix reverse transposing you can copy/extract the model over again to reverse it.

How it happened could be that NL decided to do an alteration at the last minute and extracted the gun from the build then repacked it causing this anomaly.

Guest001 08-08-2020 09:02 PM

Maybe I should give an example?

I'll use FBX for this example.

The company may build and sources models and so may end up with various format types.

The game engine will probably require a proprietary file format or method of encryption applied.

So say the Dev imports Model.FBX to Model.Format
The Dev then exports Model.Format back to Model.FBX for further edits or examination by third parties.

If the same Model.FBX is re-imported back to Model.Format it will be as you described - I know this because it happen in my current project.

BTW you get the same sort of effect if you reverse certain textures - especially normals or height maps.

In one experiment I turned a golf ball from dimples to pimples. :gj:

Baldo_the_Don 08-09-2020 06:39 AM

At this moment, at my current level of engagement, if there was an edit I could make in the colt45_3rd.3di with a hex editor requiring a reasonable amount of effort to make the bcolt45.mdt I bungled up function in third-person, I'd go for it. I'm satisfied enough to have the first-person view looking good to ignore the third-person mess.

For the sake of one's mental health, one has to accept a percentage of uncrossed tangoes and undotted indias in this game and its mods, and until some as of yet undiscovered mod-messiah arrives in our Novaworld and finally centers the sniper crosshair, an egregious flaw well beyond my meager skills that nobody I've ever heard of either speaks of or attempts to fix, I feel no qualms about leaving the third-person .45 looking weird.

Alternately, the bullet source glitch, colloquially known as the left-lean glitch, I believe is hopeless. So why sweat the small stuff?

Guest001 08-09-2020 06:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Baldo_the_Don (Post 395028)
At this moment, at my current level of engagement, if there was an edit I could make in the colt45_3rd.3di with a hex editor requiring a reasonable amount of effort to make the bcolt45.mdt I bungled up function in third-person, I'd go for it. I'm satisfied enough to have the first-person view looking good to ignore the third-person mess.

For the sake of one's mental health, one has to accept a percentage of uncrossed tangoes and undotted indias in this game and its mods, and until some as of yet undiscovered mod-messiah arrives in our Novaworld and finally centers the sniper crosshair, an egregious flaw well beyond my meager skills that nobody I've ever heard of either speaks of or attempts to fix, I feel no qualms about leaving the third-person .45 looking weird.

Alternately, the bullet source glitch, colloquially known as the left-lean glitch, I believe is hopeless. So why sweat the small stuff?

Compromises are OK if there's something else to make up for it all, fortunately NL games do have plenty of excellent things going on.

I myself may not be so lucky with a tracer glitch in my source code that can't be rectified yet. :thud:

:gj:

Baldo_the_Don 06-21-2021 08:03 PM

1 Attachment(s)
Attaching .zip containing an edited bcolt45.dds with green dots on the sights, and texture for the hammer. Including an update on the bcolt45.mdt, where I added bump mapping to the hammer. I love it, frankly. The shine on the hammer looks off, but since the original doesn't shine at all, I'm chalking it up as a win. I added knurling on the hammer's thumbpad and detailing that kinda looks like wear on the hammer's strike face.

It was not easy figuring out what parts of the .dds actually skin the sights and hammer. I suspect the bcolt45.dds was turned in to the QA tester just after lunch on a Thursday before a long weekend, was shoved as is into the .pff, and forgotten, never to be thought of again after the drinking started at home an hour later.

But I think I unraveled it fairly well.



Edit: realized I misread what I was seeing in game and redid the .45's hammer knurling and bumpmap.

Oscarmike247 06-07-2022 01:13 PM

I'm not too familiar working with normals in OED/Nova games. I baked a normal in 3ds max and applied it to the material in SOED. But the preview image just looks like a flat blue normal image and doesn't seem to have an effect in the game. Am I missing something?

Baldo_the_Don 06-08-2022 02:42 AM

Oh, Mike, I wish I could explain myself, but, man, I have only the vaguest idea of what's going on with the .45 bumpmap, and I understand there's something called OED and SOED that involves wireframes, textures, and how they connect, but I've had no exposure or experience with these technologies, or 3Ds Max at all.

I was winging it on this project, I approached it from the side, and my notes are a mess. Nobody hates it as much as I do when I repair something by accident and unrepeatably. Guest001 had a much better grip on this situation, but he's off on a stompabout in the outback to secure an answer to mankind's inequities, and will likely never return.

Oscarmike247 06-09-2022 06:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Baldo_the_Don (Post 404807)
Oh, Mike, I wish I could explain myself, but, man, I have only the vaguest idea of what's going on with the .45 bumpmap, and I understand there's something called OED and SOED that involves wireframes, textures, and how they connect, but I've had no exposure or experience with these technologies, or 3Ds Max at all.

I was winging it on this project, I approached it from the side, and my notes are a mess. Nobody hates it as much as I do when I repair something by accident and unrepeatably. Guest001 had a much better grip on this situation, but he's off on a stompabout in the outback to secure an answer to mankind's inequities, and will likely never return.

Ah ok. I know a thing or two about max and the oed if you ever need some help.

Ill keep messing with normals. It seems to somehow use the alpha channel of the normal map. I tried reducing the normal to 50% opacity and it actually shows up in game. But it still doesn't seem to act like a regular normal map. Idk, if i figure it out ill share some info on it. Probably just doing something wrong.


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