[WIP] Simian Endeavors v0.3.2, May-23

[CaptainKipard]

If you want I can give you the Excelsior nacelle model and textures now and just give you each engine as it gets done. Are you able to figure out the emissive animation throttle response for those blue lights? There are guides for it in the tutorial thread. This one doesn't have a bussard collector so there's no need to worry about it. I think you're right about the simple on/off light for that, KSP isn't advanced enough for animated textures yet. I've asked for help in the texturing sub-forum but no one has a clue evidently.

[TK421d]

I'm fairly certain that the bussard parts didnt change intensity the way the blue bits along the sides would, they were more just an on/off thing. and i've read the tutorials for the emissives, but not yet begun my own tinkering yet, ive been focused on getting things balanced and starting on the exhaust fx.

sure, if you drop off the Excelsior one i can start with getting the emissive tuned

are there any other engine variants you'd like to see? i have a few more that are almost ready, a buck rogers, an x-wing style, and a bsg viper engine.

at the least i could crank out a movie E version, or maybe even one of the jj-prise ones. even alien ships are fair game.

[CaptainKipard]

It's really up to you, it's your mod. Personally I'd love to see a complete pre-JJ set, so the Sovereign class would be a welcome addition.

[TK421d]

I also decided the electric engines need batteries (or maybe its a generator, we'll see) to go with them:

[CaptainKipard]

Why don't you submit this as a radial probe body in the Open Mod thread? I kinda think that's what it should be. You have until Friday I think. Then make Mr. Fusion as a generator

[CaptainKipard]

Here's the model and textures. I've included new collider meshes in the blend file in case you want them.

LINK DELETED

Edited May 21, 2014 by Cpt. Kipard

[TK421d]

It really does look great. still working on the throttle animation. ATM the emissive is just "on" by default

also, the E-E engine is almost done, its a tad slimmer, and about .75m longer than the others:

Edited May 2, 2014 by BobsYerUncle

[Spork of Doom]

It really does look great. still working on the throttle animation. ATM the emissive is just "on" by default

http://i.imgur.com/KUWP1Ul.jpg

also, the E-E engine is almost done, its a tad slimmer, and about .75m longer than the others:

http://i.imgur.com/9IIbBO1.jpg

Very Nice. The Enterprise-E engine looks great. Cant wait to try it out

[TK421d]

having a dickens of a time...

finally managed to get the emissive to work with the throttle, and the animation looks fine in Unity.

but in-game is a whole different beast. it ramps up to max in about 1/4 of a second regardless of throttle%, and ends up pure a pure white light.

i'll dig back into it later, but i need a break. been fighting with it all morning

[NelsonIñigo]

Could it be real size? It makes no sense they are so small engines. : Wink:

[CaptainKipard]

Those engines aren't exactly like the real ones. They've been Kerbalised on purpose.

[StarVision]

having a dickens of a time...

finally managed to get the emissive to work with the throttle, and the animation looks fine in Unity.

but in-game is a whole different beast. it ramps up to max in about 1/4 of a second regardless of throttle%, and ends up pure a pure white light.

i'll dig back into it later, but i need a break. been fighting with it all morning

Is play-automatically enabled in the mesh that has the emmisive? I can't remember how it works but that might be it. If that's not it could you post a picture of the animation tab?

[CaptainKipard]

Intrepid class early progress. Right now the colour of the light reflection is faked using the colour map, but if we figure out how to have two separate emissive animations then I think you'll be able to determine the emissive colour separately for both.

I'm also thinking of adding a specularity channel to all the textures so that the dirt, scratches, and other things shine less than the metal parts.

edit:

Damn I've been using the old model.....

Edited May 4, 2014 by Cpt. Kipard

[TK421d]

Intrepid class early progress. Right now the colour of the light reflection is faked using the colour map, but if we figure out how to have two separate emissive animations then I think you'll be able to determine the emissive colour separately for both.

I'm also thinking of adding a specularity channel to all the textures so that the dirt, scratches, and other things shine less than the metal parts.

edit:

Damn I've been using the old model.....

http://i.imgur.com/u1DKfle.png

ouch. i dont think any of the UV changed between them though, for some reason my export mesh came out boxy in the first version and i just scaled it on one axis and reset the heirachy.

i think this voyager one is my favorite of the pack though. that flat outer side is perfect of a solar panel, or a RCS port. or even a lander leg.

[CaptainKipard]

No worries, I noticed it's just squashed. Thankfully my texture source files are well organised and make it really easy to fix problems like this. Besides texturing this requires me to make my own UVs. I can fix this in about 15 minutes.

[TK421d]

Is play-automatically enabled in the mesh that has the emmisive? I can't remember how it works but that might be it. If that's not it could you post a picture of the animation tab?

i've had the play-auto disabled. it seems KSP just doesnt want to let me use both a bump map and the emissive textures together, i just changed it from bumped emissive to just plain emissive specular and its starting to work. but, i am still stuck with the "always on" i just posted it over on the emissives thread to see if i can get some insight.

here's how it looks ATM:

i even tried editing the starting color key darker and darker to try and get around it, but to no avail.

i wont be able to get much more done on it for a couple days, so i went ahead and packaged up this engine and added link to the downloads in first post.

Edited May 4, 2014 by BobsYerUncle

[CaptainKipard]

Are you sure your keyframes are correctly set?

[The Destroyer]

My god these things are beautiful!

[CaptainKipard]

Ok fixed. Can I get some constructive feedback?

edit:

I just realised something. This and the previous engine are ion engines. They shouldn't even have effects like the one in that video should they? The stock ion engine doesn't.

This is what a real ion engine looks like in operation.

Edited May 5, 2014 by Cpt. Kipard

[TK421d]

Are you sure your keyframes are correctly set?

its a simple 2 second, 2 key animation, as far as i can tell its not the animation, but another instance of my config file 'learning as i go' limitations.

My god these things are beautiful!

thank you kind Sir

Ok fixed. Can I get some constructive feedback?

edit:

I just realised something. This and the previous engine are ion engines. They shouldn't even have effects like the one in that video should they? The stock ion engine doesn't.

This is what a real ion engine looks like in operation.

http://i.imgur.com/LR6dTw4.png

as i previously mentioned, i dont have much experience using the ion engines. and i just looked at the stock ion .cfg and saw there was no running engine effect on it, i just used the smallest blue flame fx on mine.

i'll investigate further when i can, i'll be in my workshop most of today and tomorrow though.

thanks for the heads up!

as for the new texturing, just as before im loving it

the only critique i could give would be the panel line you have at the "neck" near the vents, crossing the stripes. it keeps drawing my eye, and i cant tell why.

also, do you have any insight why i'm having trouble with the normal map? i had to go down to unity v4.2.2 to get the emissives working, do i need an older version of part tools as well maybe?

Edited May 5, 2014 by BobsYerUncle

[CaptainKipard]

The panel line: I will remove it. I tried to make the texture look as if the engine is composed of large chassis parts, and that one isn't necessary. I don't know what I was thinking crossing the decal.

Normal Map: I don't know. I've never tried to make a part with emissive textures. I'm using Unity 4.2.0f4, because I remember reading somewhere that higher versions have issues. I'm also using latest part tools.

I will try to compile the Intrepid engine myself just to test my setup. It has 4 texture maps compared to the 3 in the Excelsior engine, so there's even more potential for problems.

[CaptainKipard]

Uncle could you post your edited texture of the Excelsior engine here? I'll be giving it another pass and I'd like to include your additions, if you like.

[TK421d]

all i added were a few light leak strips to the back on the emissive. I figured it would give it a hint of "warp coils".

Here's the uncompressed .tga https://www.dropbox.com/s/6hy9thbobfb5wia/0bexEmission1.zip

[CaptainKipard]

Intrepid engine textures and models. The blend file includes 3 textured meshes, (main one, and two separate ones for the emissive animation. I think that's how it needs to be, not sure) and 4 colliders. I tried to make the colliders convex in blender, but you should check "convex" in unity anyway.

Colour map has an alpha channel, for specularity. You can use the specular/normal shader for this. The material applied to the models was only there for rendering, but the textures were a little different for that.

LINK DELETED

Could you post your unity project and config for the Excelsior engine, so I can experiment?

Looking at the stock engines it looks like the emissive textures become fully bright at about 1/4 throttle.

Edited May 21, 2014 by Cpt. Kipard

[TK421d]

i started from scratch when i installed unity 4.2.2 for the animation, so all that is in here is the Excelsior engine, i can zip up the other folder if you want, it has all the engines in one project.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/4nghlujgudpjxkp/SE2.zip

edit; it never crossed my mind, but trek engines usually consider about 70-80% throttle "full power" so maybe 100% throttle should have extra heat and or start to glow red maybe?