SyntaxBomb - Indie Coders

Now what in the world could Adam be up to now?  :o
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-10-at-07.54.34.png)

Surely he couldn't be writing a new low poly 3d render system based in 2d - that would be stoopid!  8)

Yes why should he? Except he wants to "model" the ships for his game there - else it would be a side project just distracting from the game he presented as "tasty as well" ;-)


bye
Ron

oooh, you're getting too good at this game :)

Yep. on all counts. I need to model the ships and also want to 'know' the exact stuff like normals, correct rotation, etc

Can't you model all your stuff in a common 3d tool (blender et al), export as ".x" or ".obj" and write a tool which "flattens" the data? In other words: convert the 3d mesh into whate-ever-yours-is-if-not-3D-data.

You do not reinvent the wheel each time - but at least you reinvent the spokes :-)


bye
Ron

QuoteCan't you model all your stuff in a common 3d tool (blender et al)

I could but I'd have to learn how to use Blender - and I HATE Blender. I've tried a few times to work with it and just hate the workflow.
I have used Maya - but it was just overkill. I used to use Max all the time, but there is no Max for mac and it's get very bloated as well - uber slow startup.

What I need is a very slim, fast low poly 3d editor. Rameses was great, but was 32 bit and Blitz (at the time) was full of bugs. Hence me holding off starting to 'do it right' until I had a good reason to :/

There's also an issue with actual 3d (openGL, DirectX etc): It does all the work - you don't have to think about stuff like depth buffering, normals, etc. What happens if you want or need to check that sort of data on models - GPU debugging is virtually impossible.

Got the normals working and also facing triangles  8)
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-10-at-11.20.09.png)

the green/red things are the face normals.
- green for facing the camera - we can render those
- red for facing away from the camera - don't need to show those - just show the wire instead

QuoteWhat I need is a very slim, fast low poly 3d editor.

Have you tried Cheetah3D (https://www.cheetah3d.com) - It's lightweight, fast work flow and has some nifty tools for modelling.

Maybe you will start to like Blender with its 2.80 release.

Just get used to the shortcuts:
g ... to grab/move selected "whatever" (vertices, clips in the video editor, widgets, ...)
r ... to rotate
s ... to scale
and x,y,z to constraint to an axis
f ... to fill a selection of vertices/edges to form a polygon
e ... to extrude your selection
(and way more stuff for advanced usage)

Dunno what conveniences you miss.


I understand that you want to learn something and that you want to know "why something does not work" and not to be in need to file an issue, to wait for a bugfix etc.
Yet you will loose a lot of lifetime to create a tool which has features most other tools already provide.
I mean ... at least try to code your stuff in a "library" way so all the "pseudo 3D"-functionality can be reused in other projects.


bye
Ron

it's now working with culling and basic triangle sorting - so proper solids can be displayed.

Cheetah looks quite nice.

Quote
Yet you will loose a lot of lifetime to create a tool which has features most other tools already provide.

Not really as I have all of the code from Rameses but now I know where the issues were and what I need to do correctly.

Quote
I mean ... at least try to code your stuff in a "library" way so all the "pseudo 3D"-functionality can be reused in other projects.

Yep - Rameses was just a 'can i' project. this time I know I will need to have everything in a library :)

and now with flat shading and a light!
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-11-at-11.57.37.png)

I think the easy thing to say is I have a very specific workflow in mind.
E.G.
Take a base shape - say a square, extrude it to form an open sided box. flip some normals, maybe move some vertexes around, etc
But...
this could be done in one of the views or even the 3d view

or

select a face and flip the face normal.
so pick a view, select the face and with a key or button flip the normals
then extrude the selected face along the normal

If you aren't following me - don't worry. it's a very specialised type of 3d modelling.

The other thing is to do with the texturing and shaders. Here I also want to do something different. All 3d packages use some form of UV unwrapping to a texture. My personal view is it is better to take an existing image and apply it. sort of atlasing like sprites. Again I think I know what I'm doing and I'm also aware that this isn't the way people think it should be done - buts that just me ;)

the selection and normal flipping in the 3d view is already done, I'm looking at the extruding bit now...

Blender: click on face, "w" ->select-> Flip normals, "Alt+E" ->select-> Extrude along normals.

Say when I have to give up convincing you :)


bye
Ron

possibly the year 7000?

Nothing in the world <Mwa Ha Ha> will convince me to use Blender. Tried it - hated it, tried it again hated it even more. Not gonna happen...  :P

yay extrude and extrude reduce:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-12-at-12.30.26.png)

and the same but with extrusion in instead of out:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-12-at-12.33.42.png)

I'll need to work up a modified version if you are extruding more than one face with connected lines. but it works really well as a test  :o

now that WAS hard...
But very satisfying
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-13-at-08.12.59.png)

extruding convex/concave shapes creating and removing new vertexes and keeping the extrusion intact!

and taking a very simple cube. I created this mess:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-14-at-07.56.06.png)

just extruding and modifying the resulting faces.

I know that Derron will jump in about Blender - but this slightly misses the point - I did this with my own code (pst there's no gl code in it either - this is all 2d)  ;D

I am a bit afraid that you loose your focus (game) or development flow by creating the tools.
Nonetheless I understand the interest in creating such stuff here and there.


bye
Ron

You say this is all 2D but am I missing the point here? haven't you just written a 3D engine? Pretty much the exact same way any other 3D engine handles polygons?

Your vertices still have 3 positions(x,y,z) and your triangles are still connected to 3 of these vertices just like normal 3D right?

Not trying to downplay what you have achieved here just trying to figure out whats going on

It's the same 3D as in "Alone in the Dark" (early 90s) or some SNES games (Star Fox). It does not utilize the 3D space offered by OpenGL, DX ... but should be able to render straight on a canvas.
So some kind of "software renderer" ?


bye
Ron

Simple terms yep. It's a 3D engine (but not using 3D hardware) that takes care of the actual 3D display - so it can be displayed on a simple 2d canvas.

The depth sorting clipping, etc, all have to be programmed - there is no gpu to do all that for you.

The more complex answer is this is the actual 3D editor system itself. Where you can create 3D models - in a particular way.
The above instances to do with extrusion, etc are not simple things to code from scratch - hence using a3d editor like blender is the way most people do it.

Really great stuff, very useful approach for projects that can't rely on using 3D hardware.
And a cool way to quickly model in-engine, that's a fantastic feature to have.

@Gabor - what would be a useful export format for you?

In this case I would say OBJ is simple to implement and has everything you need.

obj shouldn't be a problem. I've already got an imported, so I can use that as a base.

Got scale, move and rotate sorted as well as quad filliping (where you can change the ordering of triangles in a quad)
Now starting to move into the UI side of things:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-15-at-12.46.12.png)

You can see here the wireframe shape in the 3d view with the 3 vertex handles added. these will light up when you are over them and click/drag will perform the 'current' operation on the selected object faces.

With the previous incarnations of 3d editors I was doing a lot of odd calculations to convert back and from the gpu. Currently all of these are missing. No reverse Y, etc.

One thing I'm starting to notice is speed - it feels very fast! maybe a hybrid approach is a good concept?

lots of behind the scenes stuff. first test of adding UI bits into the mix - just a simple color palette:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-16-at-12.42.21.png)

I've also made the 'views' into separate code which means that are independent and can be scaled in size, hidden, etc. And also been bug hunting and fixing things

As this is really the second version of the 3d editor. it's now got the name Rameses II !
The UI will 'generally' resemble Rameses, but with a lot more functionality.
First up is the more customisable UI with separators allowing you to have different window sizes:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-17-at-08.44.50.png)

The top toolbar is now replaced with the vertical one - same as with my other editors - and also the left panel will follow more with the new editors

Ui is now starting to appear... And it's fully functional too  ;D
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-17-at-15.15.31.png)

I thought this might be interesting to see:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-18-at-08.26.27.png)

It's part of the UI that i've not ever used before - multiple pages. in this case one page is the toolbar and other main UI, the other page is the color selector and color buttons etc.

Here's the code:
AppView.AddPage( UIPage )
AppView.AddPage( ColorPage )

ColorPage.PageAlpha = 0.25
ColorPage.IsActive = false


it should be obvious what is going on? The color page and all it's controls have a base alpha value and all controls are then set to not respond to user input - in effect disabling them  :o

Pages can be accessed at any time, so things can be moved, made active etc with just a click or code - the UI will respond immediately.

okydoke...
the color selector/mixer has now been finished.
Here is a side by side comparison of the original Rameses version with the new one:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-22-at-06.17.48.png)

I know that Derron has always suggested that the flat buttons were possibly confusing so I've added a frame to buttons.

Just finished the modify and random code for the models - but it is all working very well :)

Nitpicking is all I can do for now to help you in your project:
- "tabber" ( |A|B|C| on top) "highlight" has his borders outside (decreasing width of "B" making it look more narrow than other buttons
- color-palette selection rect has outside borders too (making it look less clean because it now hides the separation borders). This _might_ work if the grid-line-width was the same than the highlight, now it is a mix which looks ...odd.
- color-palette has ... varying line width (might be a scaling thing) just check row1-2-splitter and row2-3-splitter
- color-palette starts left "earlier" than it ends on the right side (comparing purple header with the palette rects below) maybe give it some place to breathe on the left side ?
- you might play with "inset"-styles for the color-gradient-range-slider-things to somehow integrate them (or give them a simple "slight border")
- buttons with color rects in it: alignment is 1 pixel too far to the top
- without measuring but it looks as if the button labels are not vertically centered too (baseline) looks at least "visually" also a pixel too far down
- the "background foreground"-widget (white rect in the back and red in the foreground) exposes a skipped pixel in the top left of the red-colors "black outline"
- Icon in the top left ("open file") looks a bit flat - it needs some element to "pop out" more (like an [semi-transparent] outline or shadow - or darker colors)
- handles on the gradient selectors are a bit "too wide" - maybe add some kind of "needle" to the center (from top and bottom) so you know exactly what you are hitting?
- if the handle there uses its center to decide the color: how to select the most right or most left part of the slider? (see the "gray to red" widget)

Buttons look way better than in "Rameses (I)"

Do not feel offended by the nitpicking, as said it's all I can do for now (except you have some specific questions/discussion topics).




bye
Ron

Yep noted about the pixel differences - it's because of the scaling of the controls - they will shrink/grow to fit and minor errors appear.

This is the window at is smallest allowed resolution - you can see how things get crushed together:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-22-at-07.59.05.png)

The left grid and triangle thing are shader tests and not bitmaps!  :o

the bottom two rows are:
animation frame and help

Regarding "Shrink" and "grow":
Add an "abbreviatedText" field to each button. If the normal text does not fit anymore into the button _and_ there is a "abbreviatedText" set, then use this instead. If this is not the case, fall back to ellipsis (the ... character).
Also do never go below a minimum "content padding" value - so the button label must always end 1 pixel before the border. Else it will look "cut".
Use the "padding definition" to include the extra stuff like a button icon (or the button-color-rectangle-thing).

Use a clipping rectangle ("Viewport") for your shader test - to avoid things being rendered somewhere where you do not want it to do (above "Create / Edit").


@ scaling issues
The problem is a 1px grid spacing. If you here and there double it to 2px then this is (as said) double the original width. So with a bigger intial spacing the visual "discrepance" is less visible.
You could even use smaller rectangles at all (and draw "magnified version" on hover centered on top).


@ splitter bar of the 4-views-part
Is it intentional that the vertical one crosses the horizontal one with borders (instead of "no border" for the center).


so much for now :-)

bye
Ron

Got the lighting sorted and added a 3d base grid :)
plus all the color modifiers are now correct and functioning: (this shows vertex desaturate)
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-24-at-10.49.04.png)

and just playing around with the color tools:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-24-at-11.21.08.png)

I have a special favor for gray-red gradients. yummy yet-to-forge iron in a toon world.


bye
Ron

hehehe - good to know :)

latest news is basic texture mapping added:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-27-at-10.32.07.png)
It's certainly not perfect - but at this stage it's good enough. next step will be to translate this into a fontmap and use coordinates for the texture.

There is a definite aim to my madness and it's one step closer now :)

ooh, and the same using vertex colors:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-27-at-10.38.53.png)

Somehow it looks "bend". Just follow thst white stripe...and it does look rotated a bit when the "top right" triangle begins... As if both tris are not planar to each other.


Bye
Ron

yep - it's to do with affine texture mapping. extremely difficult to correct with software render without a lot of math. At some stage the rendering will be pushed over to the gpu and texture warping will be removed automatically

TaDa!  8)
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-28-at-07.19.31.png)

Got the texture system operational - yep it's a bit unlike anything else out there - no unwrapping, no multitextures etc. just a spritefont.

To texture its a simple 2 part process:
- select the faces you want
- pick the bit of the font you want and press 'apply' - the current view is the one based for the application.

Here's the 3d view being used:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-28-at-07.39.32.png)
the first image is the actual view the texture was applied, the second showing the object from a slightly different view showing the texture from a different view

Finished texture tab:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-28-at-12.44.42.png)

I've taken the color page, split it and added it to the texture page so it can be used there as well - this is in line with the way Rameses 1 did things

And here is a quick demo using 3 flat planes with different parts mapped and colored:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-28-at-12.44.52.png)

You could look at it another way:
different layers to a button - background - icon layer and foreground. all sandwiched together to create a 2d button in a 3d world.

Or possibly viewing separate game layers in 3d so you can see what is obscuring what, etc

or maybe separate parts of an animated character, that is created from an atlas font with the body parts?

working on the create panel now:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-29-at-07.42.02.png)
UI and logic sorted - just need to do the code itself now

to be honest - the UI is very responsive and feels much nicer to use than the original Rameses one. I've also activated clipping in tthe views so no more lines and bits covering the other windows.

There are instant icons at the top and the two sections to create objects and grids - these will show the created object in the current view - hence having a cancel and create button :)

ok, let's get into some modelling and coloring.

base objects are now present: cube, pyramid, etc. plus user controlled grid objects (up to 32x32).

Here is a simple 4x4 grid, with some triangle quads flipped, some vertex raised and lowered and some triangles extruded. All have then been colored either vertex or face
You get the top view so you can see the underlying grid and the 3d version. It's a sort of extreme example, but shows what can be done very quickly.
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-30-at-07.47.09.png)

@Qube

QuoteHave you tried Cheetah3D - It's lightweight, fast work flow and has some nifty tools for modelling.

Darn, have to get myself a Mac now?  ;)
(I hate Blender too)

Cheetah 3d does look a nice tool :)

Not much to say or show today. Working on the edit tab:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-31-at-14.24.11.png)

current available tools are:
- flip inside quad triangle orientation
- flip normals
- logically create a filled polygon given selected vertexes
- the same as above but with a center vertex

Finished the edit text control and begun to work on the object list with icons, etc :)

All in all it is coming along very well. simplifying some of the original concepts and really making everything work very fast and fluid.
I'm liking the overall look as well :)
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-31-at-14.33.04.png)

just something really quick and dirty (about a minute)   :o
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/screenshot-2019-05-31-at-14.41.01.png)

I like the graphics style there, I wonder why that was produced.   ;)

hehehehehehehe  :D

Quote from: Steve Elliott on May 31, 2019, 15:20:08
I like the graphics style there, I wonder why that was produced.   ;)

Viva Mortis in outer space? :)

iWasAdam hates Blender so much he writes his own modelling tool, love it :))

Quote
I like the graphics style there, I wonder why that was produced.   ;)

hehehehehehehe  :D

Viva Mortis in outer space? :)

Viva Mortis in outer space, nope.   ;D

QuoteIWasAdam hates Blender so much he writes his own modelling tool, love it

I'm a bit lucky on that front as I have done this sort of thing before:

2014 - cripes that was a long time ago (Rameses 1):
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2014/07/screen-shot-2012-10-18-at-08-19-48.png)

2008 - oh even longer ago and written on XP as well. Realtime animated graphics anyone?
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/ps5.gif)

ok, so what have I been up to today then????

(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-01-at-12.12.48.png)

- the texture tab becomes surface
- ive added a tab to surface so you can select which shaders operate on which triangle.
As you can see I've got 4 basic shaders and the cube shows 3 of them in operation:
top = basic texture - selected texture colored and alpha applied
front = texture stamp (facing to the left). this is the base color plus and texture stamped on top preserving the correct color of the texture
side = texture merge (facing to the right). this is the basic color with the texture colored and stamped

And another test of the shaders but showing the full surface tab:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-01-at-14.43.54.png)

Here's a thought for you:
A while back when working on BloodCrypt I developed a really odd way of dealing with multiple lights. In effect there weren't any lights at all, they were handled by the CPU, and a texture generated which handled many lights and basic shadows without any difference to the amount.

It would be possible to take (say the above output), feed it into the light systems and automatically have lighting created with shadows and illumination... Just a thought... but a very interesting one and one that would fit!

So in essence you plan to somehow cache light/shadow information?
Godot (surely Unity too) has some light probes you can add to a scene - they are used for the precalculation.


Bye
Ron

I'd like to use probes, but I'm not that good :(

It's the same lighting concept as used in BloodCrypt:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2018/03/screen-shot-2018-03-13-at-14-39-40.png)

The essence is you have have a flat (top down) plane.
You put in the blocks (generally these would be where the walls are)
Then you put in the lights - as many as you need/want.
And here is the secret sauce... You propagate the light through the 2d plane spreading the light as you go. a bit like spreading blobs of paint - first left then right then up then down... and repeat.

it's a sort of simplified LPV (Light Propagation Volume)

not sure what it is, but it was originally a size sided solid:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-05-at-12.53.18.png)

Textures are all 'off' but this was a quick knock-up to see what I could make - maybe it's the front of some space freighter?

Autonomous vacuum cleaner with jet propulsion.
You know you want one.

Really nice how fast you are progressing with this. Cool stuff.

<GASP>

Adam has been watching the Black Hole.

oooh, The Blackhole. One of my fav movies.

Quote from: iWasAdam on June 06, 2019, 06:49:55
oooh, The Blackhole. One of my fav movies.

Me too. So under-rated.

Brilliant score by John Barry. Check out his scores for StarCrash and Moonraker. They sort of form a space trllogy of scores

oky-doke... So what super interesting thing have I got for you today then?
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-07-at-07.16.27.png)

Well that looks a complete bust!  >:D

Some random colored and textured shape - It's just not that interesting!

But wait. What if I told you that this was textured from the 3d view only - and the texture coordinates were automatically corrected?

So you select a quad. generally line it us the general way you want the texture to fit the quad and press QFit. That fits the selected set of quad vertexes. making the texture fit correctly. This works in all views as well :)

Also added object combine where visible object can be collapsed into single objects. plus I've added the ability to pass the actual xyz coordinates into the vertex data. so the 2d triangles are now 3d aware (if anyone knows what that means - get in touch - lol).  Pssst... it means lighting can now be done in the shader along with a few other things - need to work on these first
Here's a shot of this in action with the position data being shown as colors in the shader. possibly only GaborD will know what I'm on about?
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-07-at-08.14.17.png)
it's small but really useful additons  8)

and now for something else that doesn't (at first glance) look very interesting...
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-09-at-12.31.20.png)

So what is going on here then?
Well, each triangle in a an object can have a different shader. The above shows 2 faces with the same shader being applied. but the colors are completely different!

I've added the ability to feed data into a shader at the triangle level. This is currently 4 bytes. 1 has been designated color and you can see the new micro color selector. You get 32 base colors to play with and then 6 shades per color.
In the above test, data 2 is being assigned to the alpha of the texture and the micro color to the color of the texture. thus allowing for very fine grading of color and alpha.
Data 1 could be assigned to other data such as selecting different tiles from another fontsprite perhaps...?

You are adding some really cool stuff. Really useful, can think of a lot of trickery to do with that functionality!

Interesting sliders.  Gave me ideas....which worked on first attempt.

@Matty - great to hear yu'e got something that works they way you expected :)

@ GaborD I'm up for any suggestions??

OK, todays update is something a bit more wierd...
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-10-at-15.05.27.png)

taking it from the left to the right...
first we can see there is a mono bitmap being applied.
And the object is a cube
Finally we can see the output: it is taking the mono bitmap plus the triangle normal and creating a bump map! This is NOT a Normal map, nut a bumo map!

Another shot showing it with a more gradient sort of input:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-10-at-15.12.53.png)

So... Why bump mapping and not Normal mapping?
Basically... I couldn't get the Normal mapping to operate correctly. the bump mapping gives a much nicer result and also leaves scope for creating maps with other data layered into the Green and blue channels at the same time...

quickly trying to replicate a real object:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-11-at-08.54.15.png)

the real thing on the left and the quick object created in about 2 minutes

it's sorta showing some promise :)

Coming along nicely Adam, good work.

Although the inner box should be white.   ;)

Bottom left corner shows some darker color - beveled corner or error in the lighting calculation?


bye
Ron

Nah, just me not being careful when coloring the vertexes...

This was a bit more trouble though:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-11-at-15.19.13.png)

colored cube nothin interesting....
But... Top and left side are 'stamps' from the fontsprite and colored using the micro color picker. Alpha is inherent to the image. But the interesting thing is both have a variable procedural noise bump map as well. So the surface has some instant texture without using any other resources.
The right side is just a straightforward bump map from the fontsprite

I really like the crispness.
Very cool layering btw, with the direct color controls it opens up a ton of possibilities.

Thanks for that one :)

I was looking into muti-texturing (very simple) and wanted to use some for of secondary UV system. This meant going into the sources and adding - but wait.... there is already coord0 and coord1 being used! So I quickly check to see if 'my' code was using coord1 - NOPE  ;D This meant just a quick rewrite of the base code so that it could be accessed and voila:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-13-at-10.49.07.png)

This is a single face with a base orange color and a texture applied merging the color. Then the 037 is a second texture (from the same fontsprite) being over-layed with a custom alpha applied. I've still got 2 data parameters and a color parameter let to play with for bump mapping, etc....

Here's the base vertex code for a single triangle showing the data format:
Method AddVertexNormal2( tx:Float,ty:Float,s0:Float,t0:Float, s1:float, t1:float, color:UInt, xp:float, yp:float, zp:float, nx:float, ny:float, nz:float )
_vp->position.x=_matrix.i.x * tx + _matrix.j.x * ty + _matrix.t.x
_vp->position.y=_matrix.i.y * tx + _matrix.j.y * ty + _matrix.t.y
_vp->texCoord0.x=s0
_vp->texCoord0.y=t0
_vp->texCoord1.x=s1
_vp->texCoord1.y=t1
_vp->color=color
'jladded
_vp->color2 = _pmcolor2
_vp->xyzPosition.x = xp
_vp->xyzPosition.y = yp
_vp->xyzPosition.z = zp
_vp->Normal.x = nx
_vp->Normal.y = ny
_vp->Normal.z = nz
_vp+=1
End

so each vertex has xyz position, 2x texture coords, 2 colors (these can be set outside of the shaders and data can be used instead of color), a secondary xyz position, and a normal vector

Maybe it's the engine pod of some long lost freighter...?  :o
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-15-at-12.58.42.png)

Either add self shadowing - or fade the texture of the exhaust darker.

Exception is of course if these are not exhausts but gates to a disco floor :-)

Edit: or just add the fuse-flames GaborD just posted these days. You know ... "just".

bye
Ron

Nice, and great for keeping the number of polys down.  But they do look wafer thin, and so not able to stand-up to any rocket flames.   ;)

yep, more like:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-16-at-06.48.51.png)

I should add that all these comments do have some internal results:
First they point out where potential interest in things is.
And when working on getting a reply - the code does something odd or unexpected and I can fix it :)

Yes, more like this ;-)

And yep, I think it is clear that what you present is representing on what you are currently focusing on.


bye
Ron

true, whilst it may seem I get 'bored' and move on. The reverse is actually more like it. I have come up against an issue that I know need addressing and will focus on it until I can sort it out. Then fold this back into the original idea...

There is usually some method in my madness :)

oooo, something exciting just happened.... :o
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-17-at-07.05.25.png)

Toon shading?


bye
Ron

Quote from: iWasAdam on June 17, 2019, 07:08:16
oooo, something exciting just happened.... :o
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-17-at-07.05.25.png)

Uuuuuu, i love art style.

Quote from: iWasAdam on June 17, 2019, 07:08:16
oooo, something exciting just happened.... :o
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-17-at-07.05.25.png)

That looks brilliantly cartoony. Love it ;D

Great art style, you should pursue this with regards to making a game.

Never understood why casings of pyramidal-formed objects need to be pyramidal too ;-)
Is it because of the forces in it requiring this shape? Cylinders for pressure elements: yes - but else it should be in practical cube boxes ;-)


I assume these crates and boxes are there for some freight-/mission screen or inventory display.

Do not forget about models for other tradeable stuff in your game.


bye
Ron

looks like I'm on the right track with this style.

Here's one of the final pieces:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-17-at-12.17.13.png)

It's not perfect, but it is operational and giving reasonable results :)

Next step will be to see what both look like together and start tweaking...
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-17-at-12.55.51.png)

maybe it's cargo, or a portable generator?  :P
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-17-at-15.13.36.png)

Maybe it's just a portable fridge for the pilot's beer :)


bye
Ron

I've seen something like that before... It's... It's... A LOOT CRATE!!!  :o :o :o

*Dabz runs for the hills*

Dabz

Quote from: Dabz on June 17, 2019, 16:16:50
I've seen something like that before... It's... It's... A LOOT CRATE!!!  :o :o :o

OMGZORS!!!!!!!!! Adam is making a game with micro-transactions?!?!!?!?!

/followsDabz

LOOT CRATE....  ;D

Nah. Definitely not a place I'm going. I think this will be the last pic for a bit as I need to work on file routines and other bits and pieces (everything you've seen has been lost to the time winds...)
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-18-at-12.14.30.png)

I know where I would like to go with this. I want to run around a spaceship - but that's just me ;)

Looks awesome. Love the style. Keep it coming!

Would love to see a game with this style.

Looking good Adam!  8)

This editor is looking real cool.
I like the visual style you have going on there with the 3D models.

I've been working with the final render code (where the occlusion and line rendering takes place. I'm toying with the basic concept of paint - surface finish and faux ssao.

Here's my take on them with settings turned right up. these will be controllable in the final version. Note these are flat shaded - no textures, no bumps, nothing added!
it's sort of messy, but has a definite style to it I think?
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-19-at-08.54.34.png)

ok, so what I've done is added a new tab: Render. this is where all the final render stuff lives. currently It I've added line:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-19-at-14.18.24.png)

And as you can see the lines go from black to white, have different triggers, widths and alpha controls. Next up will be paint and then ssao, and color controls. This chould give loads of options for the final look of any output :)

from clean to dirty  :D
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-20-at-06.39.46.png)

The new paint fx and occlusion are very configurable

Somehow the outlines of the "pyramid" make it look "blurry" on top (until you look long enough at it and focus on the lines). Might be because the grey is too bright for the background.
I would also suggest to add the dirt "spray effect" on a separate texture layer. Then blur the layer (gaussian or so). Afterwards add some spray dust particles again (on top).
Else you end up having kind of sharp and too crisp dust/dirt corners/sides next to smooth shading gradients.

Also remember: dust and dirt are not just black ;-)


bye
Ron

it's just a quick demo - nothing solid :)

I'm gonna take some time and see if I can untangle Marks implementation of 3d. Once I've found the key I will transfer the 3d render stuff over to the actual GPU which will speed things up and mean I wont need to do sorting :) yay!!!!

ok, found out how to remove mojo3d from a module and be able to dissect it as standard code.

Here's my observations so far...
Current download version is V1.1.18 and the base I am using is V1.1.06 (this is what MX2 is built from)
Quick test of mojo3d demos. and found that there is something 'odd' going on with the later release. same basic file/demo gives the following:
MX2: loads, pause for a second, demo runs 60fps stable
monkey2 latest version: loads, waits for a loooooong time (thought it had crashed!), demo then runs at 30-39fps!

looking into the code (for some ideas about instancing) I found out that this is not being used, rather build a buffer and send it as a single entity. Sprites are done the same - interesting

If anyone is curious as to why I am delving into Marks code. simple answer "shadows" - and no sorting

OK. Here's my first attempt:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-21-at-15.26.07.png)

What you are seeing is four colored cubes (red/green/blue/red). These are then going into the 3d pipeline with deferred rendering showing the buffers in  quarter stripes:
first is the final version with shadows. second is pure color, third Normals and finally the depth buffer.

Everythig is slowly being tested and transferred over from the 2d render into the 3d render systems. Interesting times

You have a great skill of learning things fast :o - Is there like a class we can take or something? ;D

So after you tried to do everything in 2D you now use the 3d functionality doing much of the stuff for you? You could have done that right at the beginning (and learn your texturing stuff right in 3D) ?


bye
Ron

No classes i'm afraid - possible rewire of brain a bit?

@Derron Simple answer is no. Longer answer is:
- I needed to rewrite the entire 3d editor code from 32 to 64 bit and from Blitz to MX2.
- This meant looking at the original 3d code and finding the best way to approach it
- This also means having a way to draw and edit in 2d viewports (top, side, etc). So to edit a 3d model you need direct access to the complete 3d data, and understand how it operates. Loads of really nasty dirty stuff that anyone using a nice 3d editor wont have to think about. But I'm writing the editor so I NEED to both understand it and how it all fits together. That's the easy bit.
- next is the software render, again not trivial but not too difficult at a basic level. Where things get nasty is stuff to do with pixel rendering vs triangle rendering. if you are doing at the pixel level then you can implement thing like depth buffers and use them to auto-sort/clip pixels for you. the trade off os speed. Hence using the base shader access fro 2d. But... You loose the 3d sorting and affine image/texture correction which the 3d GPU stuff gives for free
- Now the important bit. Marks way of giving access to OpenGL recently stopped working, so I couldn't use my own GL code. Which means attempting to figure out how and why mojo3d works. But... Mojo3d doesn't do what I want it to do. It's not open... da de da
so....

I need to take mojo3d apart, find out how it does things, and see if it is possible to rewrite the code to support what I want it to do.

Which means I will need a way to get the 3d models in a format I know and understand (write a new 3d editor) and take apart mojo3d, to see how it works and then patch it to make it work the way I want and feed all this back into the 3d editor for the 3d display.

It's not a simple case of "couldn't you just..., etc". It's not just the texturing I am doing, I am writing new 3d code, new editor code, the whole she-bang!

I work in a particular way. because that is the way I have to work. My brain isn't wired quite the same as (dare I say it) 'normal' people. I can focus down on tiny things and take apart code, but only in a particular way.

Sure you need to know about 3D data and how it works - yet you could have saved a lot of time just starting with 3D and do your stuff there.

With BlitzMax (or another language) you could have a raw opengl-canvas at which you could do your 3d stuff then ... so you wouldn't have needed to move from "Blitz to MX2".


bye
Ron

Blizmax is 32bit and to be honest has some very odd bugs in it. I know there is ng but it's such a pig to get operational and i'm Not particularly fussed with it.
I am sure I could 'eventually' find a language, etc. But why? MX2 is very stable and I am supremely happy with my ide - much more than with other systems- apart from visual studio.

To be honest with you Derron, i'm Not sure you really appreciate how difficult dealing with a GPU is? Off the shelf systems such as unity hide everything from you. Let's have a raw OpenGL is simple to say, not quite as simple to do. Hence taking something that works, then take it apart and see how it ticks and see where you can make changes.

I'm certainly no advocating any language or solution, just what I am doing - good or bad? You decide...

If I wanted perfect output and instant results i'd Use unity or some other complex engine, but would I be happy or productive?

Quote from: iWasAdam on June 22, 2019, 08:23:02
No classes i'm afraid - possible rewire of brain a bit?

OK, re-wired! *buzz* done!

I'm going to put my money where my mouth is here in regard to Derron's previous statements.

The last pic was of the deferred render pipeline. This was using the base pbr material that Mark uses throughout in mojo3d. To get a new material system operational you need to do the following:
1. understand how opengl works in regard to vertex and index buffers.
2. understand what a deferred render pipeline is - in essence you render different things like color and normals to separate bitmaps and these are combined into a final render fo more processing. it allows fx like god ray, blurs, etc
3. understand how data is fed into shaders and how to do it properly - this is called binding and comes both from the buffers and also data which you decide needs to be with the shader.

Now the previous pic showed base white cubes. The color of the cubes comes from the way Mark wrote the pbr shader system. I don't want to use that way of doing things. I want the color to be per vertex. so I need to understand how to create a new vertex buffer - or modify Marks code to allow for that and also to make sure the shaders know I have made additions and to correctly read them in.

I did this:
- mojo/graphics/vector3d: added color1 and color2, and updated the pitch references, update the GLAttributes ref so that both color1 and color2 are currently being send
(the shader code had already been modified to allow this sort of thing because I needed to do the same with the 2d vertex code)
- Added a new core function ICol( r,g,b,a) to return the correct UInt to feed into color1 and color2. this can be used anywhere for other stuff too
- mojo3d/graphics/meshprims: added vp[0].color1 = ICol( 255, 0, 0, 0 ) to the vertex code of CreateBox so it could be tested
- mojo3d/graphics/pbrmaterial: augmented code to allow a custom glsl shader to be used instead of Marks original one
- new test pbr glsl shader to test if the new color data has been correctly injected into the vertex buffer

And the result is this:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-22-at-10.32.01.png)

You can see on the far left is the final render with shadows on the colored cube. The middle shows the color of the cube with the correct vertex colors coming directly from the new vertex code.

I'm sort of quite happy with the result as it shows I can actually do what I want to do with the code then start to play with other stuff. And I havent broken Marks stuff either.

One thing to note is the latest versions of Mojo3d have some serious performance issues. The version I am building from has none!

As long as you are able to fix stuff on your own ... go on with whatever you do. Just hope you do not run into a deadend (with your fork which is just [for now] used by yourself).

While I am fascinated of your interest in learning new stuff it always feels a bit like reinventing the wheels while you could put your motivation, energy and skill into creating games or tools. Really hope you finish your game somewhen in the future.


bye
Ron

ok, lets do a quick clean :) Not insulted btw - hehehe

Here's the latest tasty experiment:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-23-at-12.26.56.png)

It looks like if left and right cube are intersecting with the ground plane.

What are the thicker lines on the qubes?
qube 1: left, top left, right back
qube 2: same
ground plane: thick line on the left and right is cut (behind the cubes)

...are these some kind of shading, errors, markers, ... ?



bye
Ron

and now with some occlusion (fake edge shadows) and outlining
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-24-at-07.10.35.png)

(and yes, the cubes are sitting below the flat plane surface!!!)

I am sure that this will all break once texturing, etc are added, nut for now It's not too bad with a constant FPS that isn't hammering the GPU (I've noticed that Unity games seem to hammer the GPU)

He he, I really like the overall look you have going on here as it looks 3D yet doesn't have the characteristics of how the lighting would be in a typical 3D scene, even with a "toon" shader.

Quote(I've noticed that Unity games seem to hammer the GPU)

Yup, out of the box default renderer has a lot of stuff going on but you can switch to the light weight render pipeline which is more GPU friendly.

yep. I do seem taken with the 'toon' look.  :P

Much too clean though... What we need is some dirt in things  ::)
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-26-at-08.51.59.png)

Grunk is my word of the day. I'm thinking Judge Dredd, 2000AD and Total Recall...

Found out how to render direct from 3d to canvas, so I can push things directly into the editor now :)

and now...
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-27-at-10.37.45.png)

This is in the pure 3d render and not the software one.
What are we looking at?
the base grid is a custom shader for rendering grids... But the orangey thing is a 3d shader. There are no textures being used, it is operating in 3d so can be used as a base for other 3d procedural stuff. But here it will show the initial object positions.

The 3d renderer is not being slowly converted over into the editor, so you will have both software and realtime display.

Looking further. It seems that all software houses use some form of custom engine/editor combination for their final construction with games. So it looks like I am sort of heading in the right direction here?

a tale of four cubes...  ;D
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-28-at-10.30.02.png)
live editing of the final output systems - nailed it!

and finally a proper shot of the editor with integrated 3d activated. The 3d view now includes lights and shadows plus the other nice stuff like occlusion, etc.
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-28-at-11.07.08.png)

in the pane "{Right][wire]" there are triangles right on the lines of the model - what are they for? in the "[Front][wire]" pane they are in the center of the triangles (so to mark you are in "face"-mode rather than lines or vertices).

(excuse the "{" in {Right] but else BBcode will format the text)

bye
Ron

the triangles mark the center of a triangle.
Think of it as a forth vertex. you can select the triangle and it will select all the triangle vertexes.
In wireframe view this is where the triangle normal is shown:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-28-at-12.15.07.png)
Back facing triangles are culled, so it is easy to select. (you can select in any view - except the realtime 3d view - the software 3d view has no issues)

Here's the same but in solid view with the trianlges:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-28-at-12.15.27.png)

It means you can maximise the window (any window, even the 3d views) and continue working, selecting and editing objects.

Here's the 3d view being used in wireframe mode to select and move vertexes
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-28-at-12.19.36.png)  :D

ohhh... testing...
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-28-at-15.03.12.png)

Looking well swishy, nice one :)

Really nice art style.   8)

I know about the triangles... Yet the right pane has some oddly placed triangles ( two on the line).

Bye
Ron

oh Derron  :P

OK, now this IS tasty...
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-29-at-07.50.09.png)

At first look there is nothing interesting, or is there?
Maybe possibly a 2 sided 3d sprite (transparent object) casting the correct shadows with the transparency intact? Well I think it's tasty anyhoo  8)

One of your pixels is wrong ;D

Yeah that totally distracted me too.
:P

Quote from: iWasAdam on June 29, 2019, 07:55:38
oh Derron  :P

Wasn't this a valid question I asked for the triangles? I thought it might be some other marker of whose function I am still not sure about. Or that the display-function of the triangles calculates stuff incorrectly.


bye
Ron

slowly bringing in bump mapping - this is absolutely NOT right, but is starting to give some interesting results:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-29-at-12.43.54.png)

The thing I like here is the way the mapping has picked up some light giving a nicer look. I've also added some noise into the scene.

Nothing fancy, but it's starting to 'look' the way I want :)

and from the grey of before to the full color of today, complete with dual textures, bump mapping and colored decal:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-29-at-14.17.03.png)

first loaded object  :D
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-03-at-12.10.04.png)
No texture or color info yet, just the mesh itself

And... The final with correct color and texture UV:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-03-at-14.25.52.png)

The feet of the chair have outlines on their corners - so far so good.
The outlines of the "cover" (seat area) melt together: visible on the bottom right of the first wooden plank. also the wooden planks "bottom" seems to have only a very thin outline (barely visible) while some outlines are ... double as wide as the others.


Personal opinion: I do not like the outlines of the shadow. It somehow looks too "harsh". I understand outlines in clouds ("3d objects") but would you outline fog in the streets?
I think for a "toony look" you need to have some kind of "draw strokes" (to toon-shade them). As said this is only a personal opinion.


bye
Ron

agreed about the lined shadows - but nothing I can do about that currently - but it is something I would like to address

draw strokes is a very different thing - not quite as simple. but would be nice :)

Just added some Vignetting to the output:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-04-at-14.39.19.png)

can be big or small and with alpha... so is very configurable :)

I was watching something about access cards and thought "hmmmm". so decided to see what I can come up with in 10 minutes:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-05-at-07.00.11.png)
All post effects are off, so no outlines, etc ;)

What was really interesting was using fontsprite to create new graphics and switching over, loading the new graphics, more editing, repeat. Both apps fit together seamlessly.
One thing that occurred to me was possibly extending the material properties. The core material is a pbr one and isn't using any of the features that this has, so it is possible this could be added in some way. I'll need to think on it further and do loads of test first though. but it's a thought?

preparation for pbr - activate the environment cube map for the GL view (with some flat shading):
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-05-at-10.41.39.png)

And a quick contrast with a june 11 version (photo on the left, software render on the right:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/screenshot-2019-06-11-at-08.54.15.png)

and todays version (gl render with post):
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-05-at-11.04.59.png)

why is the shadow "jaggy" ?
can't you fake soft shadows (blurred shape/contour) ?


bye
Ron

yep - it's something that has been bothering me too. Lets just say that It's now in my view and I'm looking closely at the code...

ok, here's the first go with the jaggies:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-05-at-11.04.59.png)

and now the modified version with temporal blur applied (plus the post so it is using the same sort of setting as the first one):
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-05-at-15.17.49.png)

It's not perfect, but I think it looks a whole lot better now :)
Plus it has a sort of occlusion effect that adds some very subtle shadows where objects meet - You can't quite see it here, but it is present

Think what you mean is "contact shadows".

Bye
Ron

possibly - it becomes difficult to find the correct terms when you are making it up as you go along... :)

latest pic:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-05-at-18.54.09.png)

This is much more interesting as the cube is white and the base is grey.
But wait - that's not a white box? Yep - it's taking the base environment colors from the supplied background and using them with the lighting to give a variant of global illumination. When you spin the cube around, the lighting does change on the surfaces - this is the first step in activating the pbr :)

There's (almost) a photographic thing going on - completely unintentional...

That was a nice trip...
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-06-at-08.33.36.png)

And something went wrong with the metal parameter... Guess who's keeping it in :)
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-06-at-15.28.17.png)

Quote from: iWasAdam on July 06, 2019, 15:29:56
And something went wrong with the metal parameter... Guess who's keeping it in :)

Yeah, something went wrong there but in a very cool way. I'd definitely keep that error as an alternate feature ;D

Thanks Qube - definitely being kept in :)

OK and now for the great reveal...  :o
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-07-at-12.28.05.png)

This is the full Editor now with loading and saving. There is a single bitmap (the same one being used throughout this thread which is 256x256 pixels) and just a single material - the pbr is per material, and there can be many if wanted/needed.

The actual end result is made from 6 separate meshes:
- the angled back piece with the light vertical
- the brown upright buttress
- the green crate
- 2 red railings
- the floor
these are all combined into a single mesh preserving all settings/color/material allocation, etc. and the result being shown with post effects and shadows in OpenGL

This ends the proof of concept, base code and developments  ;D

And here's the full editor with the software render window being used and the same file reloaded:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-07-at-12.42.00.png)

It shows the new PBR tab, the single bitmap plus the sorting errors the software renderer suffers from

SHAME ON YOU !!!11eleven!
No real railings but faked ones -> billboards.

This is no 50s SciFi-Flick, this is gonna be the next xCom meets Trading Game meeting Faster Than Light!


Hope you now start coding on your planet game again. 'Nough of excoursion into "building my own 3d toolset) :-)


bye
Ron

Yep, time to get back to the original game you were doing, Adam. Progress was looking great on that until you, erm, branched out :)

Branched out!  ;D
I wanted to create the entire universe... and the ships and the interiors...  :))
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-08-at-08.38.24.png)

single loaded object instanced 6 times, no post, no pbr. Very little cpu hit, static 60fps!!!! YAY!!!!!

with post on and default settings:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-08-at-08.46.48.png)

fullscreen 1920x1200 static 60fps - looks lush!

Hmmm. maybe extend the center part, put generator/engine/tanks in the middle...?

Looking great, nice work indeed :)

minor adjustments being made. added ability to set color per model when drawn:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-10-at-08.20.14.png)
plus lots of minor things being tidied up and editor improvements. Also sorta looking into how best to deal with collisions and entity movement with a map - interesting stuff...

playing around. thought I'd go for a dirty tiled subway look:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-12-at-15.27.18.png)

Here's a 123 showing how a model is constructed and looks in wire, flat shade, etc with the final opengl
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/untitled-1.png)

you must be a board wargamer as well as smart programmer!!

I've not actually played any board wargames stuff - but I do have a lot of the material and a great deal of respect for the concepts - so I can see where you ate coming from :)

You know - if you write here in the forums you cannot code on your game - so stop writing ;-)


Seriously: Continue with your game but do not try to create an overly huge and complex (gameplay wise) game ... baby steps so we can at least see the light at the end of the "finish the game" tunnel.
Think with your current efforts gameplay will already differ a lot from the initial "send stuff from planet A to planet B and everything is done automatically" idea there is almost nothing left ;-)



bye
Ron

True, but there are soo many more boxes to test out....
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-14-at-14.41.29.png)

Just look at all those new shiny foil overlays reflecting  8)

And still all using a single (small) bitmap for everything! hehehhehehe....

working on internal game systems and scaling:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-17-at-08.45.33.png)

I think I've got the basic structure now sorted and clear in my head. I've been doodling with sliding collision and other stuff so it should all start to fit together... But well have to see on that one. I have an aim, but can I actually get there?

> I have an aim, but can I actually get there?


Looking at the blue-red stairs I would say...nope, not reachable ;-)


Bye
Ron

Adam was originally creating a follow up to Genus Prime. Now it appears he's moved on to writing a follow up to Rockman called Boxman :-)

Quote
Adam was originally creating a follow up to Genus Prime.

Yes, but he's having far too much fun with art tech lol.   :)

Side project ;D

Oh it's all waiting for me to catch up to it :)

I thought I'd activate the scratch parameters (for adding surface distortions, etc) and here's a quick test: I call it "solar panels"
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-18-at-12.23.52.png)

It shows the pbr in operation with scratches, multiple over-layered textures and bump mapping. It's all being handled with the same single bitmap as all other renders. The color is coming direct from the vertex information.

There is the ability to mix 2 bpr materials together - it's a bit hinky at the moment - but i'll get there eventually...

Here's the same shape with the exact same textures, but different settings:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-18-at-12.39.44.png)

Im not quite sure... But it looks like a RCOP Freighter coming in to land...  :o
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-18-at-15.42.27.png)

(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-18-at-15.45.41.png)

Looking really sweet, nice one :) - You'll soon be pumping out games now ;D

Do not forget about "team colors". So the red-band on the freighter would be player/race specific.


bye
Ron

Fleshed it out a bit and added a few more details:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-19-at-08.33.03.png)

I've got an idea for the interior and the general operation, plus possible derivations, military etc

and a more cartoony look from the back/underside:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-19-at-08.41.00.png)

And now. ITS....  ;D
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/3d.gif)

OK, it's not Monty Python. But it is the very first steps. 2 sections of map loaded with internal sliding collision in full working operation.
The red uprights are boundary grid markers, so I can get the scaling of everything correct.

If you look very close, you can see the position change from standing to crouching!

@ iWasFrankenstein
looking good.


bye
Ron

Wow, like the gfx style, reminds me of the "Daft Punk - Interstella"  movie or "Once Upon a Time... Space" cartoon series.
Well done.

trying my best :)

how about a RCOP service bot?
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-21-at-12.54.14.png)

What did you censor on his "eye" ?

Think you should consider to _not_ use "black" as a color - except you have "pbr" enabled (shinyness, glossiness, reflection ...).


bye
Ron

Looks great as usual, I really like this style.

lol - thanks GaborD - definitely high praise  :D

I thought I'de play around with the final render settings:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/screenshot-2019-07-30-at-05.58.08.png)

So we've got lots of noise, outlines and edge detection, color mods and mono fading, plus some vignetting...

I've been busy trying to work out how to do sliding collision that can be done visually in the 3d editor, saved with the model and just imported. bit of a task but getting there :)

Now that is very nice.  8)

Love the style of these graphics, great work!

Scorpio coming in to land...  :o
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/screenshot-2019-10-19-at-08.31.17.png)

That a Blake's Seven reference, there?

(https://imgur.com/odogefel.png)

8 vertices instead of 6 would have made a shot in this perspective look less "wrong" :)


bye
Ron

and 'Orbiter"
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/screenshot-2019-10-19-at-12.40.55.png)

noticed your project yesterday, good to see you working on a 3d game again :)

we don't know what it is, but it's coming in fast and looks hostile!
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/screenshot-2019-10-24-at-12.05.44.png)

Claw X0b - Fuse exhaust blocking drone used by various space station securities to block ships from leaving without paying "taxes".


bye
Ron

Wowww!!!, i recent know about this projects..
is amazing!!! i love the style! congrats!!!

i enjoy see this topic from the fist post!!

there is a homepage?, instagram or something to follow the project?
regards!

Thanks Santiago. There is no other page apart from this one.

Here's an interesting update to the editor:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/screenshot-2019-10-29-at-14.21.46.png)

It's taking the exiting file browser developed for FontSprite and converting it to fully support live 3d viewing of files - the tiny 3d image rotates to show the full 3d shape. Both .mx23d and the old .3do formats are fully supported.

and a tiny bit more:
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/screenshot-2019-10-30-at-07.26.18.png)
this time showing the recent files with full (rotating) 3d support :)

potential holographic display?  :o
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/screenshot-2019-10-30-at-08.59.32.png)

Wouldn't a holographic display hide covered parts - it would be like a semitransparent variant of the normal render (maybe single color).

For now it looks as if you render each polygon with some semitransparency - and then render other semitransparent polygons on top - so colors "add" (see the "fighter" which gets more and more bright).

In explosion drawings (CAD) this is correct for "components" - yours is done on polygon (or triangle) base instead of components.

Dunno if the normal player even cares of this difference - just wanted to give you something to tinker with :)


bye
Ron

alpha with blendmode add, easy  ;D

now try something more original : progressive decreasing alpha from the inside of the shape to the outside of the shape (inside would be opaque, outside would be transparent), should look weird (maybe nice ?)

well the new blender is really great in my opinion., I've had the other ones too and the new one is awesome

Quotewell the new blender is really great in my opinion.

didn't get the topic?
No blender used here - all custom programming.  8)

@RemiD. yep this was just simple no shader programming, opaque inside can be simply done :)

Been doing some housework with Rameses. firstly to get it fully operational with Wonkey - now all sorted :)

But also been doing some other work with importers - got the STL and OBJ working and just finished the PicoCad format \o/

PicoCad model import with integrated bitmap importer - just load it and it's all there from the .txt file.
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2021/09/screenshot-2021-09-25-at-15.07.51.png)

and a closer view showing a more complex model - plus the 2d sorting errors showing that this is all 2d and gpu fangled stuff going on - hence the keyboard being slices and a few (looks like they are but they aren't) missing polygons...
(https://vjointeractive.files.wordpress.com/2021/09/screenshot-2021-09-25-at-15.11.17.png)

Looks great!
Seriously good stuff. Love how clearly the editor is set up. People with 3D experience can likely jump right in without lengthy tuts.

thanks - it's currently 'closed' but with this addition and some tidying up I will finally release it soonish :)

Very impressive, great work. You can stop showing us all up now  :))

hehehe 2 years of tinkering later...  8)

Awesome! Where do you get those gorgeous models?

the last 2 models (bonsai and computer lab) are picoCad models that I downloaded from itch.io for testing.

This is seriously interesting.
You always make some amazing stuff

Let me know if you want access and want to chat about anything :)