ZBrush is a must have modeling tool. And Pixologic now has a new [ZBrush Wiki]. The Wiki is an excellent learning tool.
Download OBJ to Ogre.Mesh converter script (Windows)
This is a little script I patched together to getting a faster pipeline going from OBJ to Ogre.Mesh files.
I’m modeling in Modo, and didn’t want to manually do all these export tasks for minor changes.
Read the readme. Run the install. Once installed right click any OBJ file and SendTo->convert_obj_to_mesh.cmd
Contest Month
Two contests have sprouted from GDC and GameDev.
GameDev has stated its [Four Elements Contest] of (Emotion, Economics, Emblem, and Europe) (June 3, 2006, at 1100 hours EST to November 30, 2006, at 2300 hours EST). Every participant gets a copy of [FastCap]
GDC started another [72 Hour Contest] (July 14th, 2006 to July 17, 2006).
Sector13 [Featured On GameDev.Net]
Check out [our featured article] on GameDev.net to find out all about Sector13. Feel free to [comment] on the story. Ryan cached our [gameplay video] at Google.
Elephants Dream
[Elephant Dream] is now available for download.
I elected to be a sponsor for the new short film “[Elephants Dream]” from Project Orange.
Hence I made it into the credits as a sponsor:
Snow in April
Oddly, it snowed again today.
Spore
[Spore] looks to be the next generation video game as shown at E3.
Nice Night for Some Air
Moth / Bee
I’m not sure, but they sure make bees bigger these days. This massive hairy insect was flying around a lamp post with its moth friends.
Fence Idea
I was thinking, if you must build a fence then you might as well build it will style.
Moon Shot
The sky looked particularly interesting last night.
Snowing Again
Bone Structure and Brain Function Still Evolving
“Mutation. It is the key to our evolution. It is how we have evolved from a single celled organism into the dominant species on the planet. This process is slow, normally taking thousands of years. But every few hundred millenia evolution leaps forward.” (Patrick Stewart, X-Men)
[Science: Human Genes Still Evolving] (Slashdot)
Managing Bones in Blender
Bones help a lot to indicate where to put things. Like big turret guns, engines, geometry, and landing bays. I was using edit mode to browse bones, when Blender has an easy outline mode.
Show the outliner.
Expand the tree to find the bones.
"Seeing Double" Contest
Gamedev.net is hosting a [new contest].
“Create a game prototype based around two simultaneous views of the game world. These could be as simple as two simultaneous camera angles (forwards and backwards, side and top, etc), or could look at presenting different families of information about the game world, such as an infra-red or x-ray view, visualisation of sound or smell, or even things entirely specific to a fictional game world. The views do not have to be equal sizes, but both views should be presented to the player at the same time throughout gameplay, and the game design should favour a player who will make use of both displays equally (so both views must be equally useful – a minimap in the corner of a regular game display is probably not sufficient). Views should be primarily graphical; text is permitted provided it is not over-used (i.e. a simple text listing of health and position of monsters in the level will not be acceptable).”
I have an idea about creating a Pacific Northwest Salmon demo. You are a fish and you need to spawn. You navigate rivers using star positions while also battling upstream current. And if you happen to make it upstream, it’s spawning time!
Expose for Firefox
The [Viamatic forXpose extension] is one of the best extensions for Firefox that I’ve seen so far. Open as many Firefox tabs as you want, and then press the F8 key. All your tabs will instantly arrange and you can select what you want to browse easily.
Here is a nice screenshot:
Snow with Clear Sky
Tonight it starts snowing and there are no clouds in the sky. Totally clear, lots of stars, really cold, and falling snow… How does that work? Has weather been upgraded recently?
Sector13 [Screenshot]
I added a nice lens flare effect on the back of certain engine types. Basically the alpha is based on the dot product between the engine mount vector and camera angle.
Sector13 [Screenshot]
This is the GCDF Capital Ship “Defiant”. I just added the collision logic where you can shoot off its turret weapons.
Snow for Valentine’s Day
Just when you think Winter is almost over:
Sector13 [Screenshot]
This is a capital ship in progress. Not its actual texture yet…
Import/Export Ogre Meshes
First of all you need a modeling tool and [Blender] is freely available.
You also may need the [Ogre conversion tools] (make sure these tools are in your path).
Blender uses these Python scripts to [Import] and [Export] Ogre meshes.
These scripts should be copied into the blender scripts directory.
You may need to install the latest [Python].
And you may have to install some of [Blender’s pre-compiled plugins].
Also you’ll notice when you export the skeleton that the axii are inverted. You can remedy the problem with this:
// Flip axii
Ogre::Vector3 tempPosition = Ogre::Vector3(bonePosition.z, -bonePosition.x, bonePosition.y);
Sector13 [Screenshot]
This weekend I’ve been working on Squad formation AI. I also recorded several game play videos and integrated a new GCDF ACMC into the game. That’s short-hand for “Atmosphere Capable Mini-Carrier” for the GCDF manufacture.
Animation
I went to Linae’s animation class tonight. They were doing fast 2d drawings of animation poses. So I tried to do the same using ZBrush ZSpheres.
Dr. DivX 2.0 beta 5 (01-11-2006)
A new beta of [Dr. Divx] is available. Dr. Divx is the application that I use to capture svideo and record Divx compressed videos.