Reply With QuoteYou really should be using mostly bitmap planes to model something like that.
So far, all I have been able to animate is the world. But I have not given up on the world's magic rings just yet ...
You really should be using mostly bitmap planes to model something like that.
Bitmap planes? You mean make the rings flat? I want them to have depth ... they are solid gold!
Oh, they have depth all right. Big, chunky, angular depth.
Considering the limitations of your target render platform (the Dark Engine), and your determination to use solids instead of flats, you'd be far better off modeling something more akin to Kepler's Platonic Solid solar system:
As a side effect, this would also be more apropos of the Thief universe.
I don't want a punch bowl! I want a magical animation.
Kepler made two prototypes in colored paper hoping to have it fabricated in silver. His original plan was that it would also function as a punchbowl dispensing assorted beverages.Exactly. Fully appropos of the Thief universe, which is big and clunky and angular. I do have plans for something with Archimedean solids later, but not now.Originally Posted by ZylonBane
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I've been unable to get more than two axles in a row to work, so I decided to go with something that looks much more like a "real" armillary sphere instead of my original concept. There are some Thief Universe inspired differences, of course. There still some work to do, but I think this is pretty much what it will end up looking like.
Last edited by LarryG; 22nd Mar 2009 at 21:05.
OK. Just for you!Oh, they have depth all right. Big, chunky, angular depth.
Considering the limitations of your target render platform (the Dark Engine), and your determination to use solids instead of flats, you'd be far better off modeling something more akin to Kepler's Platonic Solid solar system:
As a side effect, this would also be more apropos of the Thief universe.
Y'know, you don't have to include the bathtubs. The entire point of using the Platonic solids is to avoid having to model any curved surfaces.
That's punch bowls, pilgrim! I just copied (more or less) your/Kepler's illustration. If you didn't want the bowls, you should have picked a different picture.
There actually aren't any pictures without the bowls. Everything I could find was based on the Kepler's original illustration from Mysterium Cosmographicum.
Using the Kepler model, one could theoretically have every one of the Platonic solids independently spinning, without having to account for pesky visible axles.
The bowls are important to Kepler's model. "His 1596 book, Mysterium Cosmographicum, proposed the model ... in which one Platonic solid fits between each pair of planetary spheres." And "The outer sphere is that of Saturn; inside it is the sphere of Jupiter." (Johannes Kepler's Polyhedra). The spheres of inner planets, Mars, Earth, Venus, and Mercury are there too, but too small to see clearly in the illustration. (I satisfied myself with putting a sun image at the center in my model.)
Not only that, but "His original plan was that it would also function as a punchbowl dispensing assorted beverages" (ibid.) Hard to do that without the hemispheres! Gotta have them.
Last edited by LarryG; 25th Mar 2009 at 14:01.
I went on a torch hunt today and found one that Watcher did "that may resemble a torch you have run into in a different Thief game..." But it didn't 100% suit my needs as it was, so a little reverse engineering, a little new engineering, with a little retexturing, and I now have a my new torch. I even put a spark arresting mesh on it to make fire marshal ZB happy.
Oh, there are three objects: bracket only, torch only, bracket and torch. That opens up quite a few possibilities ...
Nice, Larry! I like that one.
I think I'll have a version with strings too. But I needed one that was "played by the wind."
I don't know why I keep coming back to instruments. I don't even play one!
Last edited by LarryG; 31st Mar 2009 at 01:40.
Larry, when are you going to release an objects pack?!
*on my knees begging*
I'll kiss your feet if I have to.
...I used to have some dignity, you know.
@LarryG
I like the Armillary in "Settler IV" Style, it looks very good!
I also like the waterplay from settler IV, maybe good for the garden of a mansion?
This is a good object for Thief 2.
It's been too long since we've had a good dromed-related post, so...
Lately I've been working on the simplification of circulation. It not only makes navigating the mission much easier, but it's great for the pathfinding database and the brush count. While maze-like environments may seem appealing from the "it makes my mission more interesting" perspective, (a primary concern whenever deleting several twists and turns: they were interesting!) once they are gone and replaced with something that requires 50% less AI patrol points for them to use, everyone feels better (me, the AI, and dromed). Of course, the problem then becomes long sight lines and scene complexity, but there's ways of dealing with that too. In the end, good gameplay scenarios involving the placement of shadows and floor surfaces in relation to guard movement patterns and loot location is more rewarding to the player than a few extra twists and turns in a corridor, inside which one cannot hide very well, the guards can only come and go through, and where loot placement is somewhat contrived.
Crap, I still sound like an architecture student.
That sounds like the right decision. Navigation (and sneaking) is much, much easier when it's your own mission and you know where everything is.
I'm hard at work getting this baby ready for the next round of beta testing:
Awesome, nicked!
Yes, R. Actually, often I get lost in this mission, so I know I need to do a ton of work to keep the player from getting totally mixed up and confused.
Looks interesting, nicked
Looks awesome Nicked! I loved "From Beneath the Sands", is this one going to be similar? (or at least similarly themed)
That second shot does indeed look awesome!
It's actually a sequel/remake of that mission (it's the same basic plot, but a whole new mission, sort of like Tomb Raider Anniversary or Evil Dead 2. There really should be a word for that. Hmm...)
It's so cool, nicked! I'm looking forward to seeing it!
Well. Hit the cell limit. Crap.
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