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Old 31st August 2008, 06:46 PM   #31
lisa
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Default Re: Having MAJOR issue getting things exported

Go into the TCE (F10 on the PC) and then grab the points and stretch them to fill the space. The "snap" buttons on the left hand side are also sometimes helpful for this.
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Old 1st September 2008, 02:12 AM   #32
Antario Denja
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Default Re: Having MAJOR issue getting things exported

Thanks for help Lisa.

So i get it right: it is of no importance WHERE i snap these points to as long as the gray areas are filled out.
I somehow got the idea, that these points represent positions of vertices of my object? With this idea in mind, snapping them just whereever i want would alter my object?
Am I wrong here?

Well, and yes, i did that before, filling out by just snapping points to the borders. The results (after importing them into SL) later where also goofed. But then i cant remember whether i did that with the "wrong" starting objects, ie the cube which is included for SL-Import. Tried it so many times i got mixed up at the moment.

Antario

Oh.. and just to show how good your program is (for a newbie like me to use, that is)
This is what i made yesterday (didnt want to import into SL, just tried to learn AC3D)
http://flickr.com/photos/29521483@N07/2816937002/

Last edited by Antario Denja; 1st September 2008 at 02:18 AM.
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Old 2nd September 2008, 07:11 PM   #33
lisa
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Default Re: Having MAJOR issue getting things exported

Nice speakers!

Kudos have to go to Andy for the awesome program though. To clear up any confusion, I don't work for Inivis, I'm just a dedicated fan.

The sculpty exporter is my fault, however, lol. I am, indeed, I swear, working on an update for it, it's just slow going, aargh.

As a better explanation of how the exporter works: (I have yet to find a very good way to explain this, so please bear with and feel free to ask questions!)

- The exporter uses your uv map to make a "skin" around your model.
- It then renders that "skin" to a high-resolution texture where each point on the skin is the x, y, z coordinate of the surface of your model under that point on the skin.
- It then samples a grid of points onto the generated texture and converts the x,y,z to 8-bit color values that Second Life can read. i.e. It samples the texels of your uv map to create the sculpt map.

Soooo... what that means in English. You have to have a map with no holes so the exporter can form the "skin" correctly. The exact position of the points doesn't matter per se, however, when it gets to the sampling step the greater number of texels assigned to a part of the map will result in a greater number of polygons in Second Life... so, manipulating the map can help if you have areas of more or less detail.
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Old 3rd September 2008, 05:02 AM   #34
Antario Denja
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Default Re: Having MAJOR issue getting things exported

Thanks for the answer. Kudos then to Andy for this wonderful program :-)

So... just to make it clear to myself: This (http://flickr.com/photos/29521483@N07/2811127667/) is what you refer to as UV-map. Although we see the texture editor. Am I right?

- First, I do have got the (verbal) impression, that whatever i build in AC3D, as long as I filled the gray areas the import into SL will work.
But life tells something else :-) And if it is needed to use specialy prepared cubes, sphere, etc. for the import, it cant be that easy.
- Second, obviously there are operations in AC3D which "destroy" this perfectness. I read in a post that i should use "Sculpty Extrude" rather then the "extrude-button" if i want to have good results after import into SL.
There are no-gos in AC3D which hinder the import?
Do you have any recommandation on that topic? (I love to use boolean operations). What are these no-gos? Do you have a general recommandation on what will propably stop an import into SL?
- And third, there are limitations on what SL can show which directly limits how compex I should be building in AC3D ((with the import into SL in focus). Do you have anything about this one?
(Like the speakers. No way to get that into SL)

Sorry, a lot of questions. But this discussion started in many postes here. I do have the problem that many posts end with: "Hey I got it, thanks lisa". But no explenation on HOW they got it
Maybe this helps others too and you will not have to answer the same question so often. If you like, I could compress what we discuss here into a brief overview on that topic, so you could refer to it anytime the same thing comes up again. When I understood it, that is :-)

Last edited by Antario Denja; 3rd September 2008 at 07:37 AM.
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Old 5th September 2008, 02:07 AM   #35
lisa
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Default Re: Having MAJOR issue getting things exported

No problem! Anything I can do to make it more clear helps everyone. If you'd like to make a summary, I think that would be terrific!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Antario Denja View Post
So... just to make it clear to myself: This (http://flickr.com/photos/29521483@N07/2811127667/) is what you refer to as UV-map. Although we see the texture editor. Am I right?
Correct.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Antario Denja View Post
- First, I do have got the (verbal) impression, that whatever i build in AC3D, as long as I filled the gray areas the import into SL will work.
But life tells something else :-) And if it is needed to use specialy prepared cubes, sphere, etc. for the import, it cant be that easy.
As long as the gray areas are filled--and they take up enough texels that the resolution doesn't get too low in SL--then yes, it will work.

There's no requirement to use the pre-prepared cubes, spheres, etc. I made those only because I knew a lot of people may not be very comfortable with texturing. (As it turns out, I'm discovering that many more people than I thought have *never textured at all*, so I'm working on some things to make this part easier in the next rev of the plugin.)

Now that said, as you have noticed in practicality some shapes work better than others. I started to write a big wordy explanation as to why, but then I decided a picture might explain it a whole lot better. You'll find a visual guide in the next post.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Antario Denja View Post
- Second, obviously there are operations in AC3D which "destroy" this perfectness. I read in a post that i should use "Sculpty Extrude" rather then the "extrude-button" if i want to have good results after import into SL.
There are no-gos in AC3D which hinder the import? Do you have any recommandation on that topic? (I love to use boolean operations). What are these no-gos? Do you have a general recommandation on what will propably stop an import into SL?
Operations that will almost certainly break the map:
- Extrude
- Boolean
- Greeble
- Make hole

Operations that may or may not depending on your geometry:
- Optimize

But, remember, you can still use "destructive" operations and re-map afterwards. I usually model first and then texture after myself--I rarely use the built-in shapes--but I know that I'm a little more comfortable with the TCE than most.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Antario Denja View Post
- And third, there are limitations on what SL can show which directly limits how compex I should be building in AC3D ((with the import into SL in focus). Do you have anything about this one?
(Like the speakers. No way to get that into SL)
General SL limits:

- Maximum 1024 vertices. You can have more in AC3D to help it sample smoother, but you won't get more vertices than that in SL no matter how many vertices are in your source model.

- Everything is derived from a sphere. (Or cylinder or torus, if you choose one of the other mapping modes in the SL client.) Imagine you had a ball of clay in a perfect sphere, and you mushed it to make a shape without tearing it apart or reforming the ball. If you try to make something by ripping apart or cutting holes into the ball it won't work. Anything you can make by deforming the ball will. (Incidentally, you probably can make your speakers this way if you make the grill a separate piece... the key is *contiguous shapes*.)

- SL uses only 8-bit precision for sculpt maps instead of the 32-bit that most modeling programs use. This can cause stair-stepping on some surfaces. Increasing the amount of texture space will add more polygons, and can sometimes correct or at least make the stepping less obvious.

I don't know if you've ever used any landscape programs like Terragen or Leveller, but sculpted prims work pretty much exactly the same way. Sculpt maps are just fancy displacement maps. The only difference is a) landscape programs displace a plane, and SL displaces a sphere and b) landscape programs displace only on one axis, and SL displaces on all three.
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Old 5th September 2008, 02:10 AM   #36
lisa
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Default Re: Having MAJOR issue getting things exported

Here is a short illustrated trouble-shooting guide. (If you find this helpful, feel free to share!)

EDIT: I just added another slide, and moved the images to their own thread... you'll find it here: http://www.inivis.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5025

Last edited by lisa; 5th September 2008 at 06:42 PM.
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