My friend ShinobiFreedan and I began this project around 6 months ago, and here it is.

The set: http://steamcommunity.com/workshop/filedetails/?id=378900075


Thank you to everyone in this group, you all have helped us out on several occasions. And especially HellJumper, your tutorials and assistance helped us more than you know.

Scratch that, we figured it out. I opened the SMD in notepad++ and apparently it was using a different texture name for the parts of the model that we imported, so I just went "replace all" to change everything to the correct .bmp name. It's all good now, thanks for your help!

Would you mind if I sent it to your email or through steam chat, just so I'm not putting our model file on a public forum ;)

Hello,

My friend and I have been working on a TF2 weapon for several months (we've kind of lost count) and are nearing the final result. Unfortunately, as we were making LODs we ran into an unfortunate error. Parts of the weapon were not appearing in-game, even though they showed up just fine in blender. I noticed that everything that wasn't appearing in-game had been imported from a previous version of the model.

By "imported," I mean that I appended a portion of the highest poly model using append > mesh > "mesh name" in blender, then joined that portion of the model to the existing one in object mode by selecting both models and pressing "Ctrl J." I did this because after I had already made one LOD, I noticed some errors in the high poly model that needed to be fixed. In order to keep things consistent, when I changed something in the high poly model, I would append the high poly model and apply the changes to the low poly one.

For example, I changed the "grate" of the high poly model (seen here: http://i.imgur.com/zRzEG6W.jpg ), then appended it to the low poly file, deleting the low poly grate and joining the new grate to the old model. Everything that was joined this way (Ctrl + J) does not show up in-game. In blender, these imported polygons show up just fine. They are even assigned to the bones of the model. http://i.imgur.com/POU3JmQ.jpg

I need the entire mesh to show up in-game, otherwise I will be forced to redo the entire LOD (After having reduced it by about 2,000 polygons from the highest LOD). Any help would be greatly appreciated.

More examples of the issue-

Good: http://i.imgur.com/tH760gh.jpg
Bad: http://i.imgur.com/r9td70f.jpg

I've asked about this in a few different places, can't really get a complete answer. I have a working model that replaces the engie's default pistol just fine (using c_pistol.mdl):

http://i.imgur.com/t7S1ioz.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/vah6UMb.jpg

Now I need to make custom animations for it, since it isn't designed to reload like the stock pistol. A battery clip should pulled from the back and replaced, similar to the syringe gun's reload animation: http://i.imgur.com/yCarcnO.png

I've done some experimenting with v and w models, but that turned out to be horrifyingly bad:
http://i.imgur.com/NKSTrUd.jpg

Now I know that valve is transitioning to c models, so I tried replacing the pistol reload smd in c_engineer_animations.mdl, but that completely removed the viewmodels for all of engineer's weapons. I could still hear the sounds though, so I went into the qc and tried removing the reload sound and it worked. I suppose that means it may have successfully replaced the animation though I just couldn't see.


So my question is: What file do I manipulate/replace to override the stock animations with my own? Can I add them to c_pistol.mdl, or did I just use c_engineer_animations.mdl wrong?

Any help is appreciated, thanks.

Ok I figured out the problem, and this will help anyone else having normal map issues... I was using VTFEdit to convert my .tga file into a .vtf. Don't.

Instead, I draged and dropped my .tga onto "vtex.exe" which is located in:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\SourceSDK\bin\orangebox\bin

You have to put the .tga in a certain place to make it work, and make note of where vtex.exe outputs your new .vtf, go here to figure that out:
https://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Vtex_troubleshooting#Problem_figuring_out_outputdir

Beyond that, using "$normalmapalphaenvmapmask" "1" makes the alpha map work fine.

I'm having a problem with normal maps that creates some very strange lighting effects. I made the alpha channel of my normal map a back and white phong mask, since the $bumpmap line in a vmt makes the alpha channel not work in the main texture. When I test it out in game however, the lighting makes all the faces of the model visible as if the model is in flat shading. (Ignore the strange battery thing protruding from the side, that's another issue for another time..)

http://i.imgur.com/4Eep0vT.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/ONQoDBP.jpg

I know the normal map doesn't do this without the alpha channel on it, and I know it isn't the model because everything looks fine without the normal map on there.

I tried to match the vmt of other weapons that use normal maps, specifically the manmelter. Here's what my vmt looks like right now (and what I've tried is in comment lines): http://i.imgur.com/Tw36t04.png


Any idea what the problem is?

To add to this, you need to put a line in your .vmt file that says (with the quotations included):

"$basemapalphaphongmask" "1"

This points to the alpha channel of your texture. Self-illuminated things, as in if you want something to actually glow in the dark, use a self-illum mask. I'm not absolutely sure how these work but I know a little from looking at other weapons with this feature. Basically, make a copy of your texture, then make everything black that you don't want to emit light. If you want something to shine (and I mean SHINE, as in glow like a light) make it white. Make the white duller or brighter depending on how intense you want the glow. Then save the new texture as a vtf and put it in the same folder as your main textures.

Now in your .vmt, write these lines:

"$selfillummask" "folder_path_to_textures/filename"

"$selfillum" "1"

Again since your self-illum texture vtf should be in the same folder as your main textures, the filepath should be the same as what's written next to "$basetexture" except with the correct filename at the end. If this doesn't work exatly, realize that this is just what I'm seeing on another weapon that I know works. I haven't done it myself, but this should get you started.

Also I found this in valve's dev wiki, take a look and see if they explain it better https://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/$selfillum

Let me just piggyback off this question here, I'm working with him on the same project. We added a new bone to our weapon's clip. Freedan fixed the original issue, and he researched a good bit about animation so that shouldn't be too much of a hassle.

The problem we're having now is that the new bone we made is out of place. I figured out how to get the qc file to recognize that it's there, but the clip it's connected to is curently inside the engineer's hand. I ripped the coordinates from the SMD file for the new bone, clearly the coords in the SMD file are not the same coords that the qc needs... how do I find the correct coordinates for this bone to put in the qc file?

http://i.imgur.com/yYPItPI.jpg

:D

Yup, problem was with the smd. Everytime I export from blender it uses the wrong texture throughout the code, so I would go in NP++ and replace all the incorrect texture names with the right one. Eventually I figured everytime I made a change it would be easier just to go into the previous smd and copy+paste the entire document... genius, I know.

So yeah, thank you so much. The funky reflections should be fixed when we add an alphachannel. Look out for the Sap Zapper on the workshop in the next week ;D