lo-fi

Sorry guys, I've been really busy. Work has slowed quite a lot, but I still manage to fit in a few minutes here and there. With christmas, car projects, DIY, and a new job, I've had no time to do much. However, modeling is really close to being finished. I'm pretty happy with it now, the poly count is right on budget, and when I get a time window I'll get stuck into animation. Sorry about the delay, but it's by no means dead! Lo-Fi

Lol. I did think about that, but it seemed a bit more appropriate to go into the work in progress section on lock-on models. I'm also kinda trying to enourage more people to visit Knells site in the hope that it will spark even more interest in making lock-on models. There's a load of inspirational stuff there! Cheers to SKF for posting the link again, the thread over there has gained over 300 hits over christmas. Hope you all had a good one, and all the best for new years eve ;) Lo-Fi

LOL. Sounds quite tempting....

AAARRRGGGHHH Computers are driving me nuts. First 3ds gives me trouble, then my PC starts messing around, now my linux box is going bonkers, and to top it off hackers have been trying their best to get into it (unrelated to the problems it's currently having). Sorry for getting off topic, I felt like venting some frustration! Needless to say, all this stuff has made progress with the project impossible! Man, I need to do some flying. I'd play online and meet some of you guys in the air, but I'm a total Noooob in a plane, and think I'd embaress myself beyond belief.... lol

Well, I'm having a run of bad luck. Now my PC is broken as well! It's fine for a while then I get the dreaded "delayed write failed" message on one of my disks. Yey! I fix PCs for a living, but I hate fixing my own! /me sulks...

Yes, I get it as well.

Sorry I've been a little quiet - like Deadman says, I've been a bit busy. Between work, extra work, voluntary work, girlfirend, and mates I've had no time! Messing up my computer so max stopped working hasn't helped either. Don't worry, I've got no intention if cutting down to 25K. As things stand we're on target for hitting 50K smack on the nose. LODs will be implemented. The pilot will be fairly detailed, but I'm reluctant to spend too many polys for something that's not all that visible in game. I'm looking at a budget of about 2500 polys going into the pilot and seat, which equates to 5% of total, and I think is reasonable. Finally, thanks to everyone for all the encouraging comments. Much appreciated when it seems like an enormous task.

Ahhh. Cool!

Cheers StrikeMax. That's kinda what Deadman is working on, although he's completely new to Max and finding it a bit frustrating at times. Any chance we could have a look at yours please? Dice, cheers - what are you good with? I've done a ton of work already, but help will always be appreciated. :)

Brilliant, keep 'em coming guys! I'm nearly ready to do another full update. Just quickly: Fuselage is detailed, wings and engine nacelles have been integrated. Cockpit has been optimised and integrated (ejection seat still needs to be done). I think a few bits are actually wrong, so I'll set to work on that in due course. Ladder, gun fairing and nose wheel housing need to be addded. Next on the to-do list is the tail, which should be fairly simple in comparison to everything I've done so far. There's not much of the original mesh left now, but I'm happy with the look of it. Poly count without the undercarriage is just under 50K at the moment, with some optimisation still left to do. Pics to follow this evening if I get round to it.

Thanks guys, some good stuff there.

Anyone willing to take up the challenge of making the ejector seat in less than a 1000 polys, and adding a pilot? The current one is a wasteful 6000! It's a fiddly pain in the arse to model, and I've got my hands full just making the aircraft look presentable. It doesn't have a pilot either, so for the moment I'll make something very basic, and concentrate on the airframe.

Cheers :thumbup:

Update is now up at lockon-models. http://www.lockon-models.com/index.php?showtopic=154&st=0&gopid=682entry682

Disso - anything you can get your hands on :)

A few bits might be handy... Leading edge slats. I think i've got them right (weren't setup at all in the previous model), but I've only be working from two photos. Split ailerons. I've been working from a good set of photos, but more are always helpful. Landing gear. Preferably some shots in transition. A video would be really good. Any technical data on range of movement for the control surfaces. Some shots of the cockpit. The model gives me a good reference, but I'd like to be sure its right, as I have to re-do it anyway. 1/5 of all polys in the current model are in the cockpit! 6000 for the ejection seat, 5000 for general stuff, and even 1000 for the joystick. There's not even a pilot yet. I know it needs some level of detail, but polys could be far better spent on areas that are more visible. Deadman has given me a lot of invaluable material, but more is always welcome. I'll definately post an update in lock-on models this evening with some previews - it's going really well so far.

A quick update: I'll post further updates in a thread over at lockon-models because it seems a more appropriate place for this sort of thing. The original mesh is a mess, so I'm tidying as I go. I know it looks on from the previews, but there are some really crazy bits of modeling, and it's really hard to work with. At this rate there won't be much of the original left, but it's worth it. I have remodeled the engine nacelles. Less polys, better shape, and pylons are integral so the smoothing works properly. Decelerons (split ailerons) needed completely reworking. I looked at some pics of the real thing that Deadman kindly found for me. Now nearly finished, and working just like they should. The fuselage sadly needs to be completely redone, which will be my next undertaking. I considered leaving it as it is, but it seemed a shame. Thankfully the cockpit is largely ok, if possilby a little too heavy on the polys. the stick is nearly a 1000 on it's own!! Hardpoint pylons need some attention too, but I think that should be the last thing than needs major tweaking. Major poly savings to be made, though. I've set up pivots and joints correctly as I go, so animation is fairly trivial once I actually get round to it. Deadman has seen the results so far today, but I'll maybe post some previews later on.

Thank everyone involved when it's finished :) Arg 40 will be fine for turbines, cheers for that.

Careful, I might hold you to that. :megalol: I'll do my best! It's a lot of work, though, and it can be hard working on a mesh that someone else built, but I'm already a good way to getting the split ailerons how I want them. I've had to re-do some of the parts because I'm simply not happy with them, but progress is being made. http://www.varel.force9.co.uk/Lockon/A10.jpg There is something you could do that would be a terrific help.. I could do with as many pics of the A10 (or vids even better) as anyone can find that show the moving parts in action. Control surfaces, gear etc. The more info I have the better I can make it. I spent some time trauling image search results today, but I didn't find much, and my time might have been better spent actually doing some modeling in hindsight.

Ok, Pm'd you my address. I've definately got time free over the weekend :joystick: , so expect to see some results. To keep everyone up to date I've done some playing with the split ailerons which form the airbrakes. It looks like Lock On respects object attachments and motion inheritance, so these parts can be modeled to work in a realistic way. It will look sweet :)

Yep, I'm in. Strike - looks great. I had a fiddle around with the hardpoints last night - They had far too many polys for my tastes at about 1200 each!! Some of the detail was clearly made by boolean, and has messed up the mesh in places as well. After I fixed that and cleaned one of them up I can get it down to an easy 800 without losing any shaping or detail. I think it could be reduced a lot further if some of the smaller detail was done in mapping, but it depends what we're aiming for. What have you done so far? I was just playing around, so if I've duplicated some work it doesn't matter. It just helped me learn how it was put together. Any chance you can send me mesh you've worked on? If you're finshed with the control surfaces I can start some animating. The flaps cause me some concern - I don't think the meshes for the internal gubbins need to be quite that detailed, and I need a good look at the real ones working to make a really good job of animating it. Other than that it looks pretty straitforward.

Nice work :) Do you mind if I ask what method of modeling you're using? I'm intrigued to find out how someone else approaches the task of creating a complex one piece mesh. I'm guessing meshmooth, or patches maybe?

Anyone have a decent 3 view drawing of the 21/F13?

Indeed, a legendary aircraft. I'm not too clear on this, but are the flight dynamics for each plane hard coded? A harrier would be really nice, but I'm not sure how it would fit in, and I imagine the flight dynamics would take a lot of work to get right. Is there even any existing code for swing wing aircraft? The args list for the max exporter tools has an arg (No 7 I THINK) for wing sweep, but it does say at the top of the document that some of them are not used. I'd love to see dual cockpit planes that two people can fly. I used to play Longbow 2 a lot with my brother - the best thing about it was being able to play as pilot and gunner in the same aircraft. It really brought home the advantages a two man cockpit can give, and I'm disappointed that subsequent sims haven't added that feature. Ed - pleeeeeeaaaaaaase! lol! Seriously, though, the SU32/34 would be almost worthy of an expansion pack on its own imho. It would be hard to implement in single player i supppose, as the AI would have to do a lot of work, but as a multi player expansion it could add some serious scope. And once the code is there other two seaters could always follow...... Ah, it's good to dream. Sorry for getting off topic!

There is a post in the lockon-models forum about this that I've just replied to, basically saying that I'm pretty good with max (been using it since version 3) and I'm willing to help with the Mig to bring it up to standard for adding to the game. I've been playing with a few things myself, and I've got the hang of the Ed tools now. The Mig 21 isn't my favorite plane, but so many people seem to want to see this in the game it's hard not to take up the challenge! Stikemax, I see you've done some work already - how can I help?