ADMIRAL189'S CORNER - INCOMING SHIP MODELS

[RustyGunner]

JFCshioss + Marroux,

I re-downloaded the Patuxtent and looked at it again as I had two version of a collision model in the folder.  Looking at the Patuxtent model in ModelViewer 2 shows the collision model looks ok but I too have the same problem.  Note: the collision model has been moved over to see how it lines up with the Patuxtent model.   Looks like the Admiral will need to sort this issue out.  

RustyGunner

 

 

Edited June 8, 2022 by RustyGunner
Incorrect collision model used for first report.

[toan]

Hi Rusty, here is an AI helicopter that just landed on the deck of the USNS Patuxent. So, for some unknown reason, I don't have the problem you mentioned Fly low... Superb HH-60H Seahawk helicopter by rato65, by the way, that you can find here :

Edited June 8, 2022 by toan

[Marroux]

12 hours ago, toan said:

Hi Rusty, here is an AI helicopter that just landed on the deck of the USNS Patuxent.

Aloha,

AI units do not always behave like player units.

[toan]

Hi Marroux, indeed, AI does sometimes behave unexpectedly, be it for planes, ships, helos....

[Bones1775]

@Admiral189 i noticed there are several versions of LOD and collision file in the san antonio. are they all needed or are they optional versions for testing. also the US flag is upside down.

[lord-gore]

did you download the update that's in the list of Admirals mod's that should fix all that if i recall correctly 

[lord-gore]

@crazyeddie @Admiral189 I've been thinking i might flesh out the Type 45's with the missing members more for personal use but if other's are interested and it's ok with you both, i'll upload the others when they are done 

Now i got Photoshop again i just need to sort out the .DDS plugin
Also, Eddie, whats with the two letters at the end of each folder is this the names abbreviated may i ask the purpose of this? i'll match that with the folders if necessary 

Edited June 13, 2022 by lord-gore

[crazyeddie]

The 2 letters are the letters displayed on the rear of the flight deck, different for each ship.

You can remove those from the file descriptions if you wish, I just put them there for reference as I was doing the skins in case I forgot what they were.

[Howzzat]

Hi There, am working on a mission and set The Paxtuxtent. I think this is related to the collision box but no sure, When hit by some weapons you see the weapon splash into the water although the hit registers in the mission result screen, but even multip[le hits from bombs, excocets and other antiship weapons it doesnt sink. Any ideas?

[RustyGunner]

Howzzat,

The version I have seems to work fine for taking damage.  Here's the Patuxtent taking a couple of missile hits from another ship.

RustyGunner

[Howzzat]

11 hours ago, RustyGunner said:

Howzzat,

The version I have seems to work fine for taking damage.  Here's the Patuxtent taking a couple of missile hits from another ship.

RustyGunner

Wierd I have the latest version from the front page and mine looks different to yours 

Edited June 15, 2022 by Howzzat

[RustyGunner]

Howzzat,

I changed Texture LS_Rosso2 from red to gray.  In my opinion the ship looks better.  The model and collision shells are the same.  Use ModelViewer 2 to check them against my June 7th post further up.  I am at a lost why yours should not take damage and sink.  

RustyGunner
 

[Howzzat]

17 hours ago, RustyGunner said:

Howzzat,

I changed Texture LS_Rosso2 from red to gray.  In my opinion the ship looks better.  The model and collision shells are the same.  Use ModelViewer 2 to check them against my June 7th post further up.  I am at a lost why yours should not take damage and sink.  

RustyGunner
 

Any Anytiship missles just fly straight through the model and spash in to the water.

[Admiral189]

Speaking of the Kaiser Class Supply ship. I caught her live on the San Diego, CA webcam this morning pulling into port. USNS Kaiser!! You can see her halfway through the video.

Also, I found a better model of the Kaiser Oiler so I will be creating another model.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5JuKS__CXQ&ab_channel=SanDiegoWebCam

[Admiral189]

Admiral Gorshkov-class frigate is coming along well. I will be working on the animation of the missile hatches next. That will take some time as I need to animate all missile cells. There are 24 cells. 

The other weapons will be easy to animate. I'm hoping to be finished by month's end!! Stay Tuned!!

[AvgeekJoe]

Well thanks @Admiral189 for the head's up the USS Patuxent will have a new model.  Currently using the current one to reenact TopGun the original.

 

Below is very much a WIP screenshot:

[Xeno426]

So, I've been modifying some of the ships luas to add things like subcategories, weapon changes (e.g. Oak Hill uses the RIM), name changes to match the current ED naming convention, and attempts to fix sound.

I modified the Tarantul ship to have the proper missiles. Unfortunately, the missiles are rotated 90 degrees (not sure why) and don't play the wings unfolding animation. They otherwise function like they should.

I gave the 688i some torpedoes, copies of the YU-6 (which is fine, it's a copy of the Mk-48 anyway). They don't work so well, but that's the state of torpedoes in general. Especially given that tracking torpedoes aren't a thing yet.

The Oak Hill has an odd issue where the rear RIM turret likes to start spinning in circles and look straight up when it's tracking a target, and thus never fires.

I also added wake effects to most of these ships.

Hope people find this useful, particularly Admiral189.

 

On the note of bugs, I've come across several.

On the Armed Syrian Boat, the download is missing two textures: "forest camo" and "gunmount_d" normal map. Neither of these are included in the download, but the model requests them. Furthermore, the included "glass.dds" breaks IC because it's a filename already used by ED. Model arguments 2 and 4 are also bugged; positive values do not turn it counter-clockwise, but clockwise. As a result, a value of 0.5 (90° turn counter-clockwise) puts the gun at the same position as a turn of -0.5 (-90° turn clockwise). I'm also unsure what the "Armed Syrian Boat_OR.EDM" model version is for.

D650 Aquitaine, the missile covers do not have any polygons on the underside, so when the doors open you can see through them.

On the LCU-1627, the port prop doesn't spin at the same rate as the starboard one, and in fact reverses at about 0.3 value.

On the USS Oak Hill, the two RIM launchers don't have connectors for every launch tube. Arguments 3 (rear CIWS) and 13 (rear starboard MG mount) have the same problem that the miniguns on the Syrian boat have; Argument 3 does not go counter-clockwise when giving a positive value (so the port side can never be covered by it), while Argument 13 is reversed and going to a negative value does not turn it clockwise (so it can only fire into the ship).

On the Iranian Patrol Boat, arguments 188 and 189 being separate (instead of being the same animation argument) means it can't be used as either an "open before firing" like the VLS doors on the D650, nor can they both be set to open as part of the alarm state. Furthermore, the inside of the doors are not rendered and are thus see-through.

As a personal request, I'd love a version of the LCAC without the tank on it and the ramp doors up. Just empty, like the LCU.

Admiral189 Modifications.7z

[toan]

Hi Xeno, thanks for your work and sharing it improving existing Mods seems an excellent approach, and I was wondering if you discussed this with Admiral before ? Also, some updates that you made to the LUA fiiles are unfortunately not commented, and I was wondering for example what modifications you have made to the USS Bowen ? I appreciate modifications to the ships wake effects, because they are very unrealistic in DCS, being too small and limited. Real wakes are visible miles away, which is not the case for most of the existing ships in DCS, and I try to modify them accordingly

[Admiral189]

Xeno, I think it's time we had a chat about 3D modeling lol. As we have been lately!! 

So over time most of the models I created will have some issues. Most are old and outdated and it seems each time ED pushes an update it affects the model's performance. With that said. If you see any issues send me a PM and I will correct them when I have time. It's not a problem for me to work backward and correct the issues but it will delay any future projects I may be working on. 

Admirals DCS 3D Modeling education: 

To correct the issue of seeing through the texture of a model. We just add two sides to the texture in 3ds Max but that will slightly increase the size of the model file. "D650 Aquitaine, the missile covers do not have any polygons on the underside, so when the doors open you can see through them."

Weapon spinning! The weapon may have incorrect Arguments. For example, if the Center Tower, Point Gun, and draw arguments are not the same as what was entered in 3DS Max or Blender. The weapon will spin or point up or down. 

GT.WS[ws].center = 'CENTER_TOWER_02'
GT.WS[ws].drawArgument1 = 3
GT.WS[ws].drawArgument2 = 4
GT.WS[ws].LN[1].BR[1].connector_name = 'POINT_GUN_02'

LCU props just need to be re-animated and that will correct that issue. I have learned that if you give a prop an extra 90 deg turn animation. It will spin faster in SIM. So one prop may have one extra animation than the other. Easy fix.

Regarding the Oak Hill! I have already corrected all the issues with her and updated the model. I just haven't released it.

So I can go on and on about how to fix all the Modeling issues you presented but I think you all get the idea. Easy fixes but they take time.  

At some point, all the model ships need to return to the shipyard for upkeep and maintenance!! Hope this smidget of information helps you all understand some of the issues the models may have.

[Xeno426]

3 hours ago, toan said:

Hi Xeno, thanks for your work and sharing it improving existing Mods seems an excellent approach, and I was wondering if you discussed this with Admiral before ? Also, some updates that you made to the LUA fiiles are unfortunately not commented, and I was wondering for example what modifications you have made to the USS Bowen ? I appreciate modifications to the ships wake effects, because they are very unrealistic in DCS, being too small and limited. Real wakes are visible miles away, which is not the case for most of the existing ships in DCS, and I try to modify them accordingly

Bowen? I added a GT.tags entry, added a GT.DisplayNameShort entry, ensured the GT.Name entry lacked spaces and hyphens, added a Sounder file, added an Encyclopedia entry, modified health and rate to be more similar to other frigates, reduced airWeaponDist to reflect actual anti-air range, added country restrictions.

With the Iranian boat, I created a new "weapon" that merged the missile system and the gun into a single platform (kinda like the Tunguska or Klinok systems). This allows the cannon and missile to share the same rotation argument more elegantly without the chance that they try to fire at different targets.

With all vessels, I added GT.tags to them, added GT.DisplayNameShort, and ensured that all GT.DisplayName reflect the current ED vessel naming trend, i.e. opening all unit names with the unit type followed by the system name. For example, all small vessels have "Boat" and then the unit name, or "Frigate" and then the unit name. Also, all GT.Name entries are modified to remove any hyphens or spaces. This line is actually used to reference the unit in code (such as liveries), and it's usually good practice to avoid hyphens and spaces in those names since those two characters have special consideration in coding.

11 minutes ago, Admiral189 said:

Xeno, I think it's time we had a chat about 3D modeling lol. As we have been lately!! 

So over time most of the models I created will have some issues. Most are old and outdated and it seems each time ED pushes an update it affects the model's performance. With that said. If you see any issues send me a PM and I will correct them when I have time. It's not a problem for me to work backward and correct the issues but it will delay any future projects I may be working on. 

Admirals DCS 3D Modeling education: 

To correct the issue of seeing through the texture of a model. We just add two sides to the texture in 3ds Max but that will slightly increase the size of the model file. "D650 Aquitaine, the missile covers do not have any polygons on the underside, so when the doors open you can see through them."

Weapon spinning! The weapon may have incorrect Arguments. For example, if the Center Tower, Point Gun, and draw arguments are not the same as what was entered in 3DS Max or Blender. The weapon will spin or point up or down. 

GT.WS[ws].center = 'CENTER_TOWER_02'
GT.WS[ws].drawArgument1 = 3
GT.WS[ws].drawArgument2 = 4
GT.WS[ws].LN[1].BR[1].connector_name = 'POINT_GUN_02'

LCU props just need to be re-animated and that will correct that issue. I have learned that if you give a prop an extra 90 deg turn animation. It will spin faster in SIM. So one prop may have one extra animation than the other. Easy fix.

Regarding the Oak Hill! I have already corrected all the issues with her and updated the model. I just haven't released it.

So I can go on and on about how to fix all the Modeling issues you presented but I think you all get the idea. Easy fixes but they take time.  

At some point, all the model ships need to return to the shipyard for upkeep and maintenance!! Hope this smidget of information helps you all understand some of the issues the models may have.

I'm aware that fixing some of these issues are simple but time consuming. I've done model editing myself (mostly in ArmA2, like the Iranian pack), so I can understand that much. I confirmed argument issues by loading the model up in ModelViewer2 to check on them (mostly in an effort to ensure the weapons had appropriate rotation values). It's actually how I discovered the Iranian Patrol Boat issues regarding the launch tube doors. I didn't even know those were animated before, and wanted to use them like the silo doors on the Molniya.

Same with the see-through model components. I'll be honest, that's something I never really fixed in the past because it required re-UV mapping sections and that's an absolute pain in the ass.

Good to hear about the Oak Hill. The file I uploaded here gives them the RIM-116 rather than the Sea Sparrow, since that's what the ship should have according to Wikipedia (and what the modeled launchers are).

Edited June 20, 2022 by Xeno426
Added extra explanations

[AvgeekJoe]

I find it odd that the USS Patuxent when idle still has smoke out of the smokestack.

[patpatpowercat]

1 hour ago, AvgeekJoe said:

I find it odd that the USS Patuxent when idle still has smoke out of the smokestack.

Just cause she's at idle doesn't mean her engines are off...

[CyMPAK]

19.06.2022 в 01:32, Admiral189 сказал:

Admiral Gorshkov-class frigate is coming along well. I will be working on the animation of the missile hatches next. That will take some time as I need to animate all missile cells. There are 24 cells. 

The other weapons will be easy to animate. I'm hoping to be finished by month's end!! Stay Tuned!!

Why only 24 cells? Admiral Gorshkov-class frigate has 2x8 VLS Club-N (УКСК) cells for cruise, anti-ship, anti-submarine  missiles,  and 4x8 32 VLS Redut for surface-to-air missiles:  up to  32 9M96E/9M96E2  (1 missile in cell) and/or up to 128 9М100 (4 missiles in cell)

[Admiral189]

Hello Cympak, I have since done some research and found out what weapons the ships really require. I will update her per Wikipedia. I also have the weapon mods as well. I have to animate all the missile hatches to open and close. It's a little time-consuming!!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_frigate_Admiral_Kasatonov 

Patpatpowercat, when ships are at sea their engines are always running unless they're connected to shore power.

Something to remember. The Game Engine controls all animations of ships in DCS. We just add the code for the animations. I honestly don't like the dark smoke. I would like for it to look like the exhaust from a jet engine.  Clear but looks more like heat rising. As you can see in the photo below. 

[ElvisDaKang]

Can any of you chaps tell me what vessel these go on and where that vessel is located in the file structure? 

In the description at the below it would seem to be a tug that was added by ED/to DCS.  Is this the case or is there a download/mod that these go on ? 

https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/3324673/

What am I missing? 

THX !!!!!!

Elvis

Edited June 26, 2022 by ElvisDaKang
missing link