any guides on how to make custom player models?

[Nickisdoge]

just as the title asks. cant find that much info on the process through google searching. going through a custom made pk3 file kinda doesnt help piece it together for me either.

[BadMojo]

The old polycount website from back in the day used to have tutorials... thankfully you can still access some of it through the wayback machine: https://web.archive.org/web/20050923223920/http://www.planetquake.com/polycount/resources/quake3/tutorials.shtml

[Phoenix]

Anything written by Paul Steed is going to be helpful as he did the player models in Q3.
Here's a start on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Y8OW-Id4Xs

There's also some books out there on Amazon and some other places. There used to be a good tutorial for biped rigging on loonygames but the site is gone. You will need a few pieces of software to make a custom model - an older copy of 3D Studio Max. I know in the tutorial on the page BadMojo linked to Steed refers to Max version 2, but I recommend release 4.2 minimum and release 6 at maximum, as well as Character Studio (this is built into Max 6 I believe and is separate for Max 4.2), as well as some import/export plugins. The main reason for this is the exporter that Pop'N'Fresh wrote as well as the importer that Chris Cookson wrote work for those versions and you will want those if you are wanting to get into this.

Unfortunately I cannot provide links to 3D Studio Max as it is commercial software and I'm not sure where to get a copy of the outdated versions at this point. There is (was?) a freeware alternative called Gmax that Autodesk released but I haven't used it and I'm not sure how well the plugins work. I do know quite a bit about how the model system works inside Q3. Send me a friend request and I can help you understand the .md3 model hierarchy as well as the animation system, and I can provide links to the plugins as well some other .md3 editing tools.

[Nickisdoge]

Originally posted by Phoenix:

Anything written by Paul Steed is going to be helpful as he did the player models in Q3.
Here's a start on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Y8OW-Id4Xs

There's also some books out there on Amazon and some other places. There used to be a good tutorial for biped rigging on loonygames but the site is gone. You will need a few pieces of software to make a custom model - an older copy of 3D Studio Max. I know in the tutorial on the page BadMojo linked to Steed refers to Max version 2, but I recommend release 4.2 minimum and release 6 at maximum, as well as Character Studio (this is built into Max 6 I believe and is separate for Max 4.2), as well as some import/export plugins. The main reason for this is the exporter that Pop'N'Fresh wrote as well as the importer that Chris Cookson wrote work for those versions and you will want those if you are wanting to get into this.

Unfortunately I cannot provide links to 3D Studio Max as it is commercial software and I'm not sure where to get a copy of the outdated versions at this point. There is (was?) a freeware alternative called Gmax that Autodesk released but I haven't used it and I'm not sure how well the plugins work. I do know quite a bit about how the model system works inside Q3. Send me a friend request and I can help you understand the .md3 model hierarchy as well as the animation system, and I can provide links to the plugins as well some other .md3 editing tools.

thanks man but i think im gonna pass on doing this. and this is coming from someone who used 3ds max as the first 3d modeling software. even tho im kinda used to it max has such old jank it made me remember why i switched to blender. plus given the very odd and old limited ways i found on very old sites and forums to export just one model is way too much effort for the output imo. may try again another day but im passing it for now.

[Phoenix]

Hey no problem. It is kind of a pain. If you ever change your mind just let me know.

[BadMojo]

I would just stick with blender, it can pretty much do anything nowadays and it's free, theres even a few md3 import export plugins like this one: https://jkhub.org/forums/topic/12556-md3-importexport-using-blender-33/

Making a new weapon model for q3 is easy as it doesn't need animations or scripts, you just goto export the model to an md3, nothing fancy, maybe try to replace the shotgun model or something with your own model first, even if it's just the starting cube.. at least you'll get the satisfaction of getting something you made into the game, it might rekindle that urge to dive into the more complicated things like player models.