Quark Model Display
NerdIII
Join Date: 2003-04-05 Member: 15230Members
Join Date: 2003-04-05 Member: 15230Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Is anyone missing it?</div> The good old QuArK level editor can display all sorts of models it seems, but someone stopped coding when he was at the Half-Life model code. Then Hammer brought up that feature and models were more often used to detail a map. In QuArK it is a lot of trial and error to get a chair in the right position, but I have never seen someone complain about that in discussions about what editor is best.
The impelemtation of Half-Life models into QuArK is not just a display issue though. QuArK has a built in format for everything and the current format for models is a bit old. So smooth shading, chrome effects and such are not supported. But this intermediate format is needed because QuArK is also a model editor and file converter. Here is an example of how a skulk spiking up a roach could look like in QuArK.
So far I just found out the basic stuff about HL models. Just enough to get them displayed with textures saved in a bitmap.
Comments? Suggestions?
The impelemtation of Half-Life models into QuArK is not just a display issue though. QuArK has a built in format for everything and the current format for models is a bit old. So smooth shading, chrome effects and such are not supported. But this intermediate format is needed because QuArK is also a model editor and file converter. Here is an example of how a skulk spiking up a roach could look like in QuArK.
So far I just found out the basic stuff about HL models. Just enough to get them displayed with textures saved in a bitmap.
Comments? Suggestions?
Comments
Where are all the QuArKers? Wolv? Cash Car Star? pielemuis? RhoadsToNowhere? Droggog? All the others?
Hey I love you all. I do this just for the NS community! Just like Wolv who converts the FDG files.
If you all come here and say that model display is appreciated I may also add the chrome effects.
hmm..
FREE COOKIES!!!
<img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/style_images/2/icon9.gif' border='0' alt='user posted image'>
*waitsforpeoplewhocantresistcookies*
<img src='http://www.martinsburg.com/wv.recipes/cookie.jpg' border='0' alt='user posted image'><img src='http://www.doitwithdairy.com/images/cookie.jpg' border='0' alt='user posted image'><img src='http://www.lepra.org.uk/cookie.gif' border='0' alt='user posted image'>
<img src='http://www.saysosites.com/cookie-blank-black.gif' border='0' alt='user posted image'><img src='http://www.island-of-freedom.com/satire/cookie.jpg' border='0' alt='user posted image'>
1) persistent display. Right now point entites are only visible when you click on them. Even just having the bounding boxes stay would be useful.
actually that's it for now. Let me know if there's anything useful I can do with my lack of programming skills. At some point we should organize a collaborative quark based joint-map.
Where are all the QuArKers? Wolv? Cash Car Star? pielemuis? RhoadsToNowhere? Droggog? All the others? <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Wow! I'm surprised anybody remembers my name around here, I have like zero NS maps to show for myself. Anyway, model and point-entity display would definately be a great step-up for QuArK, and probably not that difficult (at least on the point-entity thing) for someone half-decent at coding with knowledge of QuArK. I, however, am a coding moron. I had one friend that was thinking about taking a look at it once (just the code in general, not anything specific), but the fact that he'd have to learn python meant it never happened.
Anyway, are you saying you were able to code in model display in QuArK? Absolutely awesome. I'd loke to get my hands on that add-on or however you have it set up once you have it working properly (no crashes). I may be alone, but I couldn't be buggered whether or not the models display as chromed, smoothshaded, whatever, so long as I could see em.
Point entities are currently just an overlay icon, so showing all point entities would mess up the display. Hammer does a much better job there, but their coders get paid for it <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif'><!--endemo-->
Bounding boxes? Yes, that might be good. At least if no model is present the display could fall back to bounding boxes.
Unfortunatly this project goes beyond what could be done with an add on. (And for the sake of speed it shouldn't be written in Python script anyway.) So you'll have to wait for a release of version 6.4 or 6.5 (haven't discussed that with the other devs yet).
Hey, it is kinda cool to be a dev. You always get all the goodies first <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
The above pics ARE a prototype display. If you would use it now the models would just be rotated 90? and set off the ground a few units. Also I haven't made the model import safe yet. A corrupt model file could crash the editor.
Model export and editing are not existent at the moment and... I haven't coded the texture import yet. For the pics above I just put a 'test.bmp' in the model folder and told QuArK to use this image as texture <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif'><!--endemo-->
Smooth shading is, unfortunatly, not supported by QuArK's display code atm as well as the 'triangle strips' and 'triangle fans' modern hardware and OpenGL/Direct3D uses to speed up the precalculation of adjacent triangles.
And tell every coders you know that QuArK is a cool editor that needs more people with spare time to push it further! I never heard of Python before I needed it for QuArK and I found it quite similar to Java, just a bit faster to write and execute. And there is usually someone in the quark-python yahoo-group who can assist with problems. Hell there is even a guy at the age of 58(?) who just learned the basics about Python.
Someone who writes Python scripts for QuArK would be very helpfull. Well, look at it. It is the most extensible editor in existance and there is not even a script to generate random rocks <!--emo&:0--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wow.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wow.gif'><!--endemo-->
Ok, enough advertise. I'll keep you up to date, maybe the model display will already be in the next snapshot of the QuArK 6.4 Alpha.
*bump*
P.S.: Cash Car Star, I found your name in Wolv's (now unstickied) thread about the new NS.qrk files and remembered that you have recently presented a map here...right?
So.... you're suggesting I help out by learning python and coding random rocks? (j/k) I am thinking about picking up on programming again (been so long it's pretty much from scratch) so we'll see how far that goes.
Huh? Have you read the first post? It can display/edit Quake1, Quake2, Quake3 models and maybe more, but I don't know .. don't have all the games <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
Well, Reese, if you could code in Python you could script your very own editor tools. Anything you like from finding certain textures, sorting brushes or entities to creating cool architecture with the click of the mouse. (Python is the fastest interpreted language btw.)
Good luck with it ! (I started by modifiing the n-prism script.)