posted 12-19- 09:33 AM               

Or should I start a new tutorial site from scratch in addition to the old one? One bad thing about my current site is that you learn stupid things at the begining from when I did not know any better. I think there is still allot of key info hidden in there, in fact I have to refer to the site often - but I think a new site is in order.

Hippie, are you going to have any time to support the aspect of your OL tools that supports full aircraft editing in AC3D? I would like to build the tutorial around that method, it looks great! Also I think I got Bryan to update the DOF thing so OPS will be compatible. Are there any other known incompatabilities with OPS?

posted 12-19- 11:31 AM               

I think the issues I was trying to raise are ones you have come across too. A new set of tutorials would be great, once these bugs are ironed out. OL has benefits, but in a lot of cases, the benefits are being submerged by the hassles!

If it's OPS screwing what OL does, then I should be able to work-around to get my stuff done. Not so good to build a plane from scratch though. You would have to work out the FM and DM etc. before you built the model, or else do all the DM and FM stuff in the OL file itself. Not impossible, and perhaps the best approach to take right now. I'll do some testing tonight, and see how I get on!

I'll gladly lend a hand with the tutorial too, if you need a tester or a typist / proof-reader!

I know how useful the last set of tutorials were, and what a benefit they still are!

posted 12-20- 09:30 PM            

I usually test my stuff on the original Fw190 that shipped with
FS. If you don't mix and match with OPS, the Fw190 seems to
survive the SMD -> AC3D OL import -> AC3D OL export -> OLC process with
the control surface DOFs still working correctly.

The current implemetation of DOFs as prop lists was the only way
I seemed to be able to get things anywhere near working properly.
I meant to revisit the issue some time and try and get DOFs working
as normal DOF records.
It is quite possible my handling of DOFs and proplist breaks down
for more complex models like the bombers or just breaks for anything
that has been ever editied by OPS. I just can't use OPS on my system
because it doesn't ever run very long without crashing with some sort
of video driver bug.

Blender plugins are a good idea, but I would need to buy the blender books
and learn Python and I'm not feeling that motivated.
There isn't any reason someone couldn't write plugins for 3D studio Max
either, Max has pretty comprehensive SDK.

But all this stuff is a LOT of work .

posted 12-21- 04:41 AM               

If SV is on the case with AC3D plugins, and you are happy to let him have the source code to play with, there is hope for a fix.

I have given SV some test data I ran up with the B17, and I have a few ideas what may cause the problem.

Each part with a DOF has a centre in OPS, and in game. AC3D has a centre for the model. If you lose the co-ordinates relationships in translation, that could account for the problem.

I know OPS has problems with DOF's in the proplist, but that isn't the problem I have at the moment. If it was, simply re-creating the DOF in OPS would work. Re-type the data exactly as it was before.

This DOESN'T work. The co-ordiantes in the re-built plane are not the same as they were before. Everything has moved.

This happens in the AC3D plugin. SMD / OLC and nothing goes wrong. It's only when you import into AC3D, and re-build what you export.

posted 12-21- 04:48 AM               

SV...

I think an update of your existing tutorial would be a very worthwhile exercise. Nearly all the information is still relevant, and the fact that your knowledge grew as you wrote it helps a beginner no-end. Sure, some of the stuff is not needed, but then it was done when this was all still pretty new.

What would really help the builder would be to re-write it so it flows better, and to put it into a more logical order. Reference sections on LOD data (flags, materials etc) and split it into basic sections on model part building, texturing, import export techniques, DOF's and gunlists etc.

You can put in a section on OL tools in import/export, but leave out any stuff that doesn't work at the moment. An update to this section can follow when the problems are fixed.

Also, I think the tutorial should be downloadable in one lump, as well as on the site. That way, if you can compile it as a 'help' file, you can look it up anytime!

posted 12-21- 06:07 AM            

OPS groups things together differently than
the OL import / OL export plugins which is why putting
the old DOF coordinates back in with OPS doesn't work. Bryan uses translates records and matrix records,
I only use matrix records, which is probably why
he got DOFs records working, but I could never figure it out .

posted 12-21- 07:16 AM               

If it helps Hippie, I have found that you do need the translate record to get 'real' dofs working correctly. And it needs to be in a particular format i.e.

Matrix
--Group
----Translate
------Group
--------Model

Translates must be handled differently for some reason, if I make a translate only matrix and replace the translate record it doesnt work the same, even though its still the same transformation.

That getting the parts to line up and DOFs to keep working was one big trial and error excerise early on in OPS (in fact if MH hadn't let the bit out about the stack manipulation thing I might still be at it )
so this could all be just my version of it, although it turned out that the matrix stuff (as well as the rest) loads the same as SDOE.

posted 12-21- 10:09 AM               

I am not worthy!

can I ask, though, if I took out all the DOF records from the parts I need to work on ( just the wings at the moment ) and then imported into AC3D, made my changes, exported again, could I copy the original DOF data back in in OPS and have it work.

Or, would I have to edit the OL file to paste in the DOF data from the original OL prior to import into AC3D. If this is workable, it will sort out my problem for now.

I won't pretend to understand what you are discussing. When it comes to programming, there are plankton with a better grasp of it than I...but any advice on a workaround would be appreciated. Otherwise, it's rip out the DOF data from the properties, and start again. New dof...line it up aaaaarrrgh

posted 12-21- 11:02 AM               

If you want to re-write them SV (which would be great since I want to start learning Open Plane), I can go through the tutorials and add a bunch of crosslinks to create references for different sections. Also- I have the full blown acrobat, so I could create a Downloadable pdf file when they're done

posted 12-21- 01:47 PM               

But I think we see here that we are at a cross roads in terms of how work will move ahead in the future.

Thanks Hippie, of course I never expect you to "commit" to any such thing, I was more just curious if you were actively working on them.

I really want to get into the AC3D plug-in business, but as Bryan knows - I am a major hack right now. If I could get certain questions answered as I go, I might be able to get up to speed.

Thanks to Hippie for including his source, I have the best learning tool. Most of it is greek to me, but I am making progress. I will look into it more and see if I might have what it takes to make any progress.