Alpha Issues

[ceedj]

EDIT: Please the the last post for progress with Blender...thanks!

 

I'm having a bit of trouble adding an alpha to my "Jessica" model. As you can see, the bags are gone. Mostly...

 

 

Notice the little white line along right side...

 

 

Here's another look, doing the Dance Dance Revolution...

 

 

My problem is it looks like it only needs to be moved over a half pixel. Except on every program I've used (Photoshop, Paint Shop Pro, Corel), I can't move it by half pixels. Thus, the white line. I'm sure it's the black box I used to cover up the bags, but if I take over a full pixel, she gets a small transparent line in the middle of her face.

 

Any thoughts or suggestions?

 

Thanks.

Edited August 27, 2005 by ceedj

[dertyjerzian]

hmmm ceedj... That was a good idea to handle that ]Alternatively, have you thought of manually removing the bags from the model? And backing up the original? Then she still hold the bags/not hold the bags for different shots.

[ceedj]

 

hmmm ceedj... That was a good idea to handle that ]Alternatively, have you thought of manually removing the bags from the model? And backing up the original? Then she still hold the bags/not hold the bags for different shots.

Why mess with the modeling? The alpha works fine, I just need to nudge it over. Or something. Besides, even if I did edit the model, the problem remains the same: the white from the alpha will still show.

 

Skin editing, model editing, BAH. My head's getting to full for all of this too...

 

But thanks.

Edited August 26, 2005 by ceedj

[dertyjerzian]

If you delete the faces of the bag she carries and export the model, that line will be gone. An alpha will also no longer be needed. The bag would be gone completly.

 

If you try "nudging" the alpha, nudge it in sections to see where that line in the face comes from

[ceedj]

If you delete the faces of the bag she carries and export the model, that line will be gone. An alpha will also no longer be needed. The bag would be gone completly.

 

If you try "nudging" the alpha, nudge it in sections to see where that line in the face comes from

Ugh...I REALLY don't want to deal with modelling too.

 

It's funny, but last night, Jacob tried walking me through a way through memory hacking to make the player character invisible. I spent two hours trying to get it to work with no results. To be fair, I'm sure Jacob's code would have worked; I just couldn't figure out HOW to get it working. 15 minutes with Photoshop and BOOM. Invisible player.

 

The point I'm trying to make is that all this learning of new aspects of modding he game is really slowing me down in terms of writing, filming, editing, etc. In some ways I wish I'd never gotten into it. If I had known how much work this would turn out to be, I might not have started PEDS at all. Although the switch from SCM coding to C++ SCM coding was a good one.

 

And I DID try nudging my black section of alpha. For about six hours. The problem is as I stated in the first post: none of my image programs let me adjust by half pixels.

 

What if I resized the image from 128 x 256 to 256 x 512? Do you think that might give me the adjustment I need? I'm just a little leary of resampling the skin like that; I don't want it to look WORSE.

 

Sigh. The perils of filmaking.

[dertyjerzian]

Ah, was thinking one pixel, not 1/2 pixel when I replied Sorry.

 

Ceedj, you are usually in IRC, yes? Send me a PM here or there and I will send my eMail address to you, if you send me the jessica model, I can edit the bags out for you. This way, when thte bags are needed, you can switch bck, but when she's just chillin and not shopping, you can use the new model. I'm just going to delete the faces that make the bags, really an easy edit, but I totally understand what you mean about learning more and more. no matter whart I do, I cannot edit my stripped main.scm to include all of SA's features for a new map yet not include a bunch of stuff that is SA related. Missions, etc. Need to get a functional script with all externals, but no missions, no special spawn next to a bike, etc. Just like the stripped script but pool tables, sprunk, etc should work. And I'm ulling my hair out over it:P it's cause I model. Never coded ever before. So I understand, I'll help you if you decide to go with multiple models.

 

 

Sounds like you need a team

 

Would be awesome if you got a team together. Could model "interiors" for interiorless areas and bring even more life to the peds than already. Like I said before I loved that "why are we here?" episode, and I hope you make more! Stick with it, I certainly appreciate your efforts enough to help when there's time. Also, I was hoping to eventually ask you for help with cut scenes

Edited August 26, 2005 by dertyjerzian

[ceedj]

Yes, any help you wish to volunteer would be wonderful! I'd love to help with cutscenes, although I've never done any San An coding, so my experience is limited to III/VC.

 

I speak at you more about it on IRC.

 

Thanks again!

[Opius]

Making the pixels inbetween what you want visible and not a grey colour is the best you'll get to being able to nudge half-pixels.

[ceedj]

Thanks for the tip Opius, but I still couln't get it to work. So I'm going against what I said and start messing with the modelling.

 

I noticed a neat little import/export script for Blender. I said to myself, "Self, I've GOT Blender, let's play!" So I was able to edit the .dff and got rid of the bags! The model did indeed show up in the game, except poor Jessica is stiff as a board. So I read up some more and found ModellingMan's awesome tut on editing the player model, and I'm using it to figure out how to get some bones on her. I guess this will be my project for today.

 

First try with bones and messing with Weight Paint. Not QUITE what I am looking for...

 

Here's a better try without ANY painting done. I guess the weight painting is for custom models. But there are still some issues with the head. This looks like the same problem I am having with the CMC Master Chief model; I'm going to take a look at that after I finish this project.

 

Now, that's more like it. But still some minor issues. Did she get stung by a big ole bee?

 

EDIT: I'm having some fairly good results with a few minor problems.

 

1) First off, I'm not replacing with a custom model, but I have an in game ped model that I have adjusted (removed the bag faces). I append the TommySkeleton (I wish someone had a female ped skeleton I could use). Anyway, I don't want the model to be larger, so I don't adjust the model to fit the skeleton; rather, I adjust the skeleton to fit the model, so I can have two Jessicas: one with the bags and one without (I've already sucessfully replaced the old woman shopper with the bagged Jessica model, so at least that worked out well).

 

My question: While I can move and adjust the bones to fit the model well, some of them are too large. The only way I can seem to resize them is by moving the joints around. Is there a way I can adjust the size of each part of the skeleton? Right now I'm just having minor issues with larger upper arms and a smaller chest. (I can just hear the conversation with Robyn about this: "MAKE IT BIGGER!" )

 

Model comparison 1 and 2 (front):

 

 

Model comparison 3 and 4 (back):

 

 

2) Is there anyway I can save my alterted Skeleton so I don't have to readjust it everytime I have to reload the script? That's kind of annoying. EDIT: Solved this; I just "Appended" the modified TommySkeleton from my last saved file.

 

Thanks for any insight, and thanks to ModellingMan for the tut and Hollower for the great plugin!

Edited August 28, 2005 by ceedj

[justa_newbie]

ceedj...another option might have been to flip

all the normals of the bags, you are thereby

"editing" the model, but not making any real

changes except turning the exterior "shell" of

the bags inside out and stopping them from

being rendered.

 

note: haven't tested it, but in theory it should werk.

 

 

justa_newbie

[dertyjerzian]

yesss it worked(removing polys of bags)?!? was it the model I sent?!? What had to be done?!?

[ceedj]

yesss it worked(removing polys of bags)?!? was it the model I sent?!? What had to be done?!?

No, this was me editing the original dff... I'm still having some issues with the shoulders and chest though...