Topic: What can we do with CrystalSpace?

[Dawn]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v227/LW-Neo/LeagueHUDVersion0-2Full.jpg

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Umnm, with proper Textures and scripting, does Precursors have any chance of ever looking like that? My current concern is that the game is not going to have the quality of graphics that are nessary to keep interest...

edit (contingencyplan): Split topic from Neo's artwork, added quote to link back to the picture reffed in the post.

[contingencyplan]

Well, for starters, that depends on the artists we get - for instance, through this competition.

Further, the graphics aren't an absolutely necessary component to keep interest - game play will keep the interest going. Granted, if they look like shit, then people will grow frustrated, but we don't have to get only 20 FPS on the next-gen graphics card. The graphics may attract some to the game initially, but regardless of the graphics, the game play will keep them coming back.

That said, I'm all for kick-ass graphics - if you know of any artists, then let us know!

[Caenus]

I am an artist, but I don't do graphics.  I DO however do concept art and technical blueprints.

[Dawn]

Well Cae, see if you can do a test blueprint in PSD format for me so that I can take a crack at making it look like a ship. I would be glad to attempt to convert them into K-3D and make them 3D models, from there our possibilties are much less limited. And with the team of people we have in this project... I am not afraid that we can't make some bad-aaaaa butt looking graphics. We just need to start bouncing stuff around from person to person and start utilizing everyone's potential.

And let me add to this, I know that we can pump out some good looking stuff... My question is, will the graphics engine take what we have and make it look as tight as it should? My real question: Can we get this to look anything like eve? assuming that we had the artists they do.

[Morgul]

Well, I think we can. CS is amazing when it comes to the raw polygon crunching ability. With no potimizations, or level of detail, I get about 12 FPS on my laptop (which gets about 7 or 8 on Unreal Tornament 2004) on a map with about 80k pollys. Yeah, in Halflife about 700 polys brings my laptop to it's knees. Go figure.

Now, that doesn't directly answer your question. CS hasn't been focusd on the pretty so much as the pretty fast, andother engines, like Ogre3D have out 'shined' it for a while. That doesn't mean anything though. CS has all the framework for allowing us to creat some tight looking things. Here, I'll link ot a few screenshots, and then to the CS screenshot page. These are all from projects (which are all unfinished) that have decided to share screenshots. I will also link to two movies showing what CS can do.


CG Shader Test. No normal smoothing applied


Parralax Shader Test


Water Test


Deus Irae


Deus Irael


4D


Those are just an example of what CS can do. All of those are using older version of CS as well. They have ban making masive imporvemtns, and are gearing up for 1.0.. which will be a huge boone to us. Yes, Virginia, we shall have teh shiney.

For more Screenshots, sheck this out: http://community.crystalspace3d.org/tiki-browse_gallery.php?galleryId=5

Also check out the movies page: http://www.crystalspace3d.org/tikiwiki/tiki-directory_browse.php?parent=2

So, does that answer your questions?

[Caenus]

Nice.

Dawn . . . I'll crank something out, but what you've gotta understand is I'm an ARTIST in the classical sense - i.e. you ain't getting any sort of digital format - you'll be getting hand drafted blueprints and hand drawn concept sketches. 

Email me the specifications on a ship and any design ideas you have, I'll design a few variations, you can help me finish the concept and then I'll make a blueprint.

[contingencyplan]

Looking forward to seeing what y'all come up with.

[Dawn]

Ok, having seen all that, I'm a believer! We really can have teh sparkley! My question now is, what do we lack in getting there? Are we just missing the Textures?

[Morgul]

textures, and models. Give me those, we'll add teh sparkley!

[Dawn]

Ok, Caenus and I are working on the models.. I do need to know what format they need to be, as well as the textures. What format do these need to be in and how do we put them together?

[Morgul]

They need to be in blender format. Or 3DS... but blender is the prefered format. Everything goes into blender, and then we export it to CS's own format.

Oh, and we can have textures in any format.. I like .png

[Dawn]

Affirmative. Can you post links to this Blender/3DS porfavor?

[Caenus]

Heh "Caenus and I" . . .

Lemme put it this way:

Caenus's format = paper + pencil.

[Morgul]

Well, blender is easy:

Blender

3DS is te old format for 3D Studio Max. That is not free. Look to *ahem* other sources. (If you ask nice I think I might know of a copy floating around a hard drive I amy or may not own, that I may or may not be able to send to what may or may not be your computer. Maybe.)

We can handle a good deal of other formats. so long as it gets to blender eventually. So, yeah, send me whatever you're most comfortable with, and I'll make it work. If not, I'll work with you till we can.

[Dawn]

Can you work with models directly exported from k3d?

[Morgul]

What is k3d? What's it's format?