I need an emissive amount of help :-) [SOLVED]

[Sethnizzle]

To preface I have read the sticky tutorial and all the combined works on emissives when it comes to creating a mod for KSP. But none of it is helping.

Problem 1) [sOLVED] Big thanks to DMagic for finding the problem, and Frizzank for the effort.

I am having trouble getting the emissive animation to work in KSP. My goal is to have a heat sink glow while you run the experiment for the part it is attached to.

Here is what everything looks like before following the emissive tutorial.

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Here the part loads correctly and you can perform the experiment as expected.

After following the tutorial and stumbling my way through the new different way you set up the animation in Unity I've been able to get an animation that plays in Unity and looks like this.

I've read that since I have a prefab part instead of applying the animator to the GameObject that I need to apply it to the drnSpectrometer parent. Here is what everything looks like after doing what I've gathered from the current state of help.

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In the first image I am having to use the DEBUG setting just so I can change the animation type to Legacy (I've noticed while trying everything I could think of that doing this has no effect on my in game model, but when setting it to Legacy I can no longer preview the animation in Unity). The Second image shows that the animator is on the mesh parent. The 3rd picture is showing the config file with the animation module uncommented. And the final picture shows the busted part in game. Clicking on any of those items in the GUI do nothing (also they shouldnt be there, see the first album for how the GUI is expected to look ingame) and you can no longer run the science experiment.

You might have noticed that, while there is an animator component there is no animation component, I noticed that too but none of the tutorials say to add it, and I might know why. Because when I did add it, upon loading up the craft I had waiting on the launch pad I was teleported to the beach, the craft (while invisible) started to explode, and a message popped up saying the craft couldn't be loaded because the drnSpectrometer was missing.

Solution:

So if you're having issues with Unity animations try going back to 4.2 (I didn't try earlier versions of 4.3, but they made some changes to the way animations work in that update, which I assume is causing this issue). All old versions of Unity are available here: http://unity3d.com/unity/download/archive. There may be some way around this issue, or it may require fixing, either on Squad's side or on Unity's, but for now the old version seems to work ok.

Click here to go to the tutorial, See page 2 for DMagic's solution

Problem 2) [sOLVED] -- Thank you Nertea

Just after recording all of the images for this post but before making the post, I thought I would start back from scratch and try to reproduce these results just to be sure. However now when I go to setup my material I am faced with not being able to apply my textures to it.

(click to enlarge)

As you can see in the Inspector there are no options to drop my texture and emissive map into it. At this point the part still works like before in game, if the animation module is commented out it works as expected (minus animation) and with it uncommented out it still has the messed up GUI. This is happening on newly created materials as well. I've recreated the animation but I have noticed that when I write the files to my gamedata folder it isn't writing model_EMIT.mbm anymore.

Solution:

Well, I can tell you straight off that that your last problem is just that you minimized the material rollout. Just click on the bit that says "model" on the Inspector, it will maximize the material section again.

Oh boy, Lol. In my defense there should be an arrow like when you are working with the components that rotates from pointing down to point right. Thank you though.

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You can probably see I need a massive (emissive) amount of help. If someone is seeing what I am doing wrong and could help me out, that would be fantastic. I really want to get this working for the next update to my mod pack, plus one of the new parts I am working on for said update is also going to need to light up.

Thanks in advanced!

Edited January 22, 2014 by Sethnizzle
Problem Solved

[Nertea]

Well, I can tell you straight off that that your last problem is just that you minimized the material rollout. Just click on the bit that says "model" on the Inspector, it will maximize the material section again.

[Nazari1382]

You do want an animation component.

[Sethnizzle]

Well, I can tell you straight off that that your last problem is just that you minimized the material rollout. Just click on the bit that says "model" on the Inspector, it will maximize the material section again.

Oh boy, Lol. In my defense there should be an arrow like when you are working with the components that rotates from pointing down to point right. Thank you though.

You do want an animation component.

Ok, A few more details with what I've done with the animation component. For import settings for the model I have chosen not to import an animation (since I didn't animate anything in Blender), the Rig settings I decided to still change to legacy even though I wasn't importing an animation. Secondly when adding the animation component, is it supposed to be added to the drnSpectrometer (same as the animator component)? If that is the case then why am I getting the "missing or corrupt part" warning in KSP? Also, is it normal behavior then, to not be able to preview the animation in Unity after setting the animation type to Legacy?

[Nazari1382]

Delete the animator component, select the object with the emissive material, create an animation for your part in Window>Animation. The animation component has a checkbox that says Play Automatically. You need it on if you want to preview in unity(from the play button), but turn it off for your triggered animation.

[Sethnizzle]

Ok, here is what I just did.

1. Selected the drnSpectrometer (I think that is just a container for the part?) and removed the Animator from it
   
2. Selected the HeatSink object from the heirarchy (the object with the emissive material)
   
3. I then went to Window > Animation. The Animation window opens up
   
4. Then I click the drop down to create a new animation (the rectangle with an up and down arrow) name and save
   
5. Back in the animation window I click Add Curve and from the Mesh Renderer drop down I select Material._Emissive Color
   
6. I edit the values to create the animation and close the Animation window
   

This is where it seems you are making a leap in your instruction.

Doing that adds an Animator component to the HeatSink object, not an Animation component.

1. So I leave the newly created Animator component alone
   
2. With the HeatSink object selected in the Inspector I clicked Add Component > Miscellaneous > Animation
   
3. I then click the little circle with a dot in it to select the "sinkHeat" animation and uncheck the Play Automatically box
   

Also in the Assets window I select the "sinkHeat" asset, and just above the Inspector there is the down arrow with 3 horizontal lines. I click that to change to Debug mode so I can set the Animation type from 2 to 1 (I've read this is how to change it to Legacy).

With the part currently with this set up I write it, and load up KSP. Upon loading up my test game save a window pops up saying my test craft on the launch pad couldn't be loaded because the drnSpectrometer part is missing. I check the R & D to make sure its not there, and the debug menu confirms that my model count is 1 less than it should be.

**EDIT**

I tried deleting the Animator that was added to the HeatSink object and get the same results in game.

**EDIT 2**

I also tried with and without the Animator that was added to the HeatSink while changing the Animation Type between 1 and 2, and the part is still not loading.

Edited January 10, 2014 by Sethnizzle

[frizzank]

May I suggest finding Unity Animation tutorials. Your problem seems to be with your familiarity with unity itself and its sometimes steep learning curve. You kind of jumped head first into the deep end without learning how to swim first.

[Sethnizzle]

I just wanted to bump this so everyone who is having the same problem can see straight away that it has been solved.