Question about LOD's.

[Madjai]

I know what they are, what they are there for and such, im just wondering do you have to do EVERYTHING over again, like make the model (with less polys for each LOD), uvwmap, hierarchy, weights, etc etc. ?

 

is there some easy way of doing this?

[Nanodagiardino]

For sure you don't need to redo uvmaps, because if you try some lods in modview you will get all textures messed up, like eyes in the middle of the forehead. I assume you don't need to redo much, no one would do them otherwise! (wait, no one is doing them!= But i don't know, I'm not in modelling.

[Emon]

I'd imagine 3DSM has an option to reduce poly count of a model, since I believe MilkShape has that as well.

[Madjai]

yea it has an optimizer, and i think there are scripts out there that does it too.

 

so then all i have to do is give it an optimizer modifier, will everything else on the model still work?

[sithlord-II]

hi there, figured i would field this.

You need to basically redo the model however many times you want the LOD models.

Your original high poly model is LOD0 (LOD zero). For the next one, you reduce the poly count manually within 3d studio/GMAX/Whatever, and in doing so (reducing polycount) you will most likely modify the model so that the UV mappings will have to be fixed. You then rename the model parts from say, Head, to Head_1, etc - this is for LOD1. In this, as well, you will also need to copy all tags and rename them say, from bolt_r_hand to bold_r_hand_1, etc

 

and so on, and so forth. All parts will have to be rebound to the skeleton, and one thing to remember is that for each successive LOD model, each part of the model may not have more bones assigned to it than the one above it. (IE if your R_arm part uses Rhumerus, rhumerusx, rradius, rradiusx, then R_arm_1 may only use rhumerus, rhumerusx, rradius, and rradiusx as bones) It however may use only several of the bones in that setup, just so long as the LOD models don't use more bones than assigned.

if you don't understand this, well, assimilate gives you this error if you try to compile a model with this setup

[Klorel]

So basically.... LODs are a real pain in the ass. thats too bad, cause i'm sure they help speed up the game a lot- or atleast not slow it down.

[Madjai]

ugh thats lame, perhaps ill just have 2 LODs, the first one with the high poly count and a second one that looks like crap, because i really dont wanna spend my time on making the same model 3 more times over.

[sithlord-II]

for vader, i did 2 LOD models, and for most of the mesh i didn't redo the UVW maps. I spent more time focusing on the high-detail version (which is why the initially released version 1.0 had errors in the low detail models like the saber not sitting in hands, etc)

 

next model i make will have more detailed LOD versions

[dpittman42]

Sithlord, I understand how to do the LODs. But can I just create LOD0 and skip the rest for now?? Someone told me you need to have 2 LODS or assimilate won't take it. I just want to get my model ingame fast to test it out. Then I will go back and drop the polycount.

[oddjob: A-Team]

Assimilate will take your model with no LOD's, no problem. I currently have a problem with Max being able to run with that many poly's in a file. It makes my comp choke. HOPEFULLY I can get the rest of the LOD done in the next week and release my model.

[BobaFett7]

In my opinion, as long as your computer can handle the workload the LODs should be created. Why not have some real pride in your work and do the best job you can? Just think - if everybody created their custom models without LODs and you ran a game hosting primarily custom models, then your system performance

may noticeably suffer. Sure it's a little extra work. Sure it takes more time. But in the end I think it would be worth it.

Now all we've got to do is have the modelers not give as much power to the trolls on the site that demand immediate release of the unfinished models, ignore them for a while and spend the extra time and effort - it will pay off in the end.

[Klorel]

I agree with boba. people should take pride in thier models. but on the other hand, a lot of modelers simply dont have time to. its basically doing the hard part of modelling 3 times in a row. If it was easy, everyone would do it.

[Emon]

What you should do is make your model in MilkShape, make all the caps and stuff, take the tags from the existing models using the GLM importer, then export the thing to 3DSM, and export it to JO from there.

 

Why? Because MilkShape has a built in optimizer that reduces polygons, it's wonderful for LODs.

[Madjai]

so does 3dsmax, its also called "optimizer"

[oddjob: A-Team]

There is an even better one that keeps all the skinmesh stuff intact, and it's a free download plugin for Max and comes in 2,3, and 4 flavors.

 

Do a search for PolyChop. I don't have a link to the website.

[Emon]

Oookay, then Sithlord-ii was wrong...

[dpittman42]

Yes, Polychop works pretty well as long as you don't go too far.

 

Here is the home page to get it at:

http://www.melax.com/polychop/plugin/index.html