Emule kart

[asciimonster]

That is as really cute mule!

Improvements to the documentation are always welcome.

[Auria]

Improving the documentation is always welcome

[hiker]

Thank you !
I've exported the kart with the exporter, it works like a little charm This tool is fantastic : just clic and play !

That's the way it is supposed to be Great that it worked!

I am planning to improve the kart making tutorial, firstly by adding a checklist to sum up every point that should be respected before using the kart exporter (eg. reset transform, name wheels models, etc), and then maybe add more detailed instructions. What do you think about it ?

Oh yes, that would be very helpful. As a developer (and esp. being not much of an artist myself) I just don't have the right perspective when documenting things. So documentation from a user's point of view is highly appreciated!

Cheers,
Joerg

[Kinsu]

I am happy to present you Emule ! You can consider this as a beta version, and I would be glad to know your feedback : thoughts, feelings, bugs you experience, etc.
Please note that the icon is not finished yet and that feedback about it is not as useful as feedback about something else, because it will be modified very soon.

To install the kart :
Linux : simply copy/paste the unarchived "emule" folder to the data/kart directory of your STK installation folder.
Mac : right clic the app and browse the package to get to the data/kart folder, then paste in it the "emule" folder.
Windows : I guess this is kind of similar, but I couldn't tell you


(Screens taken with STK 0.7, I also tested the kart with Xeno's latest package on Linux 64b)

@Rudy : I did have some ingame animation problems because I was using as you told me 2 different models, so I finally merged them. I guess STK does not support multiple armatures/animated meshes, because without animation, or with animation of one mesh only this is fine.

[Arthur]

Very nice work there! I think the kart handling is very good, which isn't always the case because of the physics in STK, but the design of your kart made it very stable and easy to use. The animations are excellent, and while I at first didn't think I'd like the character so much, I think it's one of the better ones. I'm not sure if I like the exhaust pipes so big, but anyway that's of minor importance.

Good work! I look forward seeing your future projects.

[Auria]

Hi,

this is VERY good work, congratulations
I would be more than happy to include the kart in game, but first I would need information on licensing. Did you make everything (models, textures) yourself? If so, do you agree to release your kart under the CreativeCommons By-Attribution Share-Alike 3.0 license? or another license you prefer?

Regarding multiple armatures, I'm a bit confused, I thought this had been fixed in irrlicht 1.8 :'(
If you still have the problematic files, you could give them to me so I can test

[Kinsu]

Thank you for the positive feedback !

Good work! I look forward seeing your future projects.

I have in mind (and already a little on paper actually) another kart to re-use the skills I got with this one, and see if I can make another one in less time . But I'm going to improve the kart-making documentation first.

I would need information on licensing. Did you make everything (models, textures) yourself? If so, do you agree to release your kart under the CreativeCommons By-Attribution Share-Alike 3.0 license? or another license you prefer?

I made everything (the released files are fully made with Open-source softwares ! EDIT : except the icon that I forgot ), and for the license I think it will be CC-BY 3.0 but I'm not sure yet. I'll check this out to make my final decision.

Regarding multiple armatures, I'm a bit confused, I thought this had been fixed in irrlicht 1.8 :'(
If you still have the problematic files, you could give them to me so I can test

Ah, this is a pity I did not make a copy of the bad-working file... I'll try to recreate one from the old non-animated files I kept. The problem came out just when I added a second armature to animate the car in the same time than Emule : the character was not animated anymore, and the vehicle was deformed instead (wrong vertices were transformed so it ended up with a messy shape). Then I tried to animate both meshes with only one armature, it did the same thing, until I merged everything to have one armature and one mesh.

[STKRudy85]

What a fun, A very good kart.
A little bad point I note is the inside of the Rear Wheels which isn't textured.
Can you send us the blender files ?

You're a good artist

[Kinsu]

A little bad point I note is the inside of the Rear Wheels which isn't textured.

You're right, I've seen it but I didn't take any note so I forgot to fix it. This will be done, thank you !

I will send the .blend file soon, when everything is finished

You're a good artist

Thanks a lot

[Kinsu]

Here is the final release of the kart, including the .blend and the .xcf files. I fixed the wheels' texture and finished the icons. The license is CC-BY 3.0. I wasn't able to make the windshield 50% transparent using "materials.xml", as Puffy's windows... Emule's one stayed only 0% or 100% transparent, I must have missed something. EDIT : I've just seen the material.xml wiki page and learned that the transparency attribute is deprecated, I'll test the new way.

emule_package.zip

Emule files. Paste the "emule" folder in <STK>/data/karts to add Emule to your STK copy.

(2.29 MiB) Downloaded 356 times

I also made a test_armatures character which has 2 armatures animating 2 meshes : in STK, the first mesh (the character) is not animated at all and we can see the transformations of the 2 armatures are applied to the 2 mesh only (the vehicle).

test_armatures.zip

Test character for multiples armatures. Paste "test_player" in data/karts.

(581.49 KiB) Downloaded 359 times

[Auria]

Hi,

thanks a lot, very nice work
I added the Emule kart to SVN

[Kinsu]

Glad to contribute to STK !

This is only the beginning

[Auria]

Contributions are very welcome

We have many tracks and some karts that need to be polished so feel free to improve/contribute

[Auria]

Rehi Kinsu,

I tried your "test_armatures.zip". But everything works fine for me ??
Are you sure you tested using STK 0.7.1 (built with irrlicht 1.8)? In STK 0.7 (with irrlicht 1.7.2) it is known that issues happen, but for me in 0.7.1 all is fine

[Kinsu]

I tried with the "supertuxkart-0.7.1-svn7824-linux-glibc2.12-x86-64.tar.bz2" version, and it was bugged. I've just tested with the last 0.7.1 mac and linux versions, everything is now OK... If I knew that, I would'nt have merged meshes ><

[Auria]

I tried with the "supertuxkart-0.7.1-svn7824-linux-glibc2.12-x86-64.tar.bz2" version, and it was bugged. I've just tested with the last 0.7.1 mac and linux versions, everything is now OK... If I knew that, I would'nt have merged meshes ><

Ok, well at least now we know the bug was indeed fixed, you scared me a bit

[Kinsu]

I wanted to do more (including adding a challenge), but I can't figure out when so I release a little intermediate v1.1 with a few changes.

[Auria]

Thanks! Can you tell us a bit what is new?

However, can you please do File > External Data > Make all paths relative and upload the blend again? In your blend the textures are broken

Also, at the front there are quite a bit of polygons used to create a flat surface (see screenshot)

Maybe you can clean that up a bit, and, with the gained polygons, you can perhaps make the pipes at the back a bit higher-resolution?

Screen shot 2011-06-06 at 9.12.25 PM.png (7.61 KiB) Viewed 13352 times

Since those pipes are very visible, I would say that having more polygons there is more important than at the front

It could also be argued that the bars at the front of the kart could be replaced with a few polygons with a striped textured on it. And emule's nose is quite high-poly too :

Screen shot 2011-06-06 at 9.14.33 PM.png (14.81 KiB) Viewed 13352 times

Anyway don't feel like I'm criticizing you, I'm very happy with your contribution the main point here is to get a blend with proper texture paths, and a little constructive criticism on the way

[Kinsu]

Can you tell us a bit what is new?

Of course :
- Reduced tri number by nearly 1000
- Improved tires look
- Converted png textures without transparency to jpg

I included this little changelog in the licence file (maybe not the best place, but anyway...)

However, can you please do File > External Data > Make all paths relative and upload the blend again? In your blend the textures are broken

Thank you for that tip, I had hard time reloading each time textures from one computer to another

Also, at the front there are quite a bit of polygons used to create a flat surface (see screenshot)

Regarding polygons, this is indeed the biggest improvement Emule needs. I've begun, but could not find enough time to finish it (I think I can bring the tri number down to 3000). Thank you for taking the time to look at the model, these areas are listed on the Low-Tris Redeemer List
When I made the model, I thought it was good to have only quads faces, but it appeared this is useless for Irrlicht.

For the exhausts, I like them like that - indeed very angled, do they feel that bad ? ^^

I don't think I'll work on Emule very soon, but all of this is planned for the next little version.

[Auria]

Him

thanks for your answer, but... can you please give me the fixed blend? I'd like to commit the new version without having to manually fix the paths

[Kinsu]

Here is the same package than previously, but with all paths made relatives.

I had hard time to do it on my mac, as on leopard, blender has a GUI problem and is veeeeery slow

[Auria]

Thanks a lot Kinsu I added your updated emule to SVN

(if you feel like making more contributions, feel welcome to do so, you are a very talented modeller )

[Kinsu]

Thank you !
I sure will, but this summer I'm super busy. Mid-september I'll have more free time.

[Kinsu]

Emule update : v1.2. Again, no very visible change ingame but the model now meets STK's requirements in poly numbers

Changelog :
- Reduced triangle number to 3138 (around 850 tris removed).
- Adapted textures to the new model
- Replaced the 64x64 icon by a 128x128 icon
- Changed license to CC-BY-SA 3.0

Please also commit the license file on the SVN, as I changed the license. You can also delete the material.xml file : it's outdated and not used.

Is a 900 tri model still required for LOD ? I've understood that a kind of automatic LOD has been added to STK, though I'm not sure if I'm right.

[Auria]

Committed, thanks! Great job

A lower-poly version is currently not mandatory since it's not used yet. But in the future this is the kind of feature we could want