i made a tool TriExporter
u need granny2.dll to use it
it is distributed without granny2.dll ... find it on your own in this thread(page 29 Serious Masta post)

screen
with this tool u can view/export/unstuff eve models/resources

remeber that that models/resources are CCP's property!!!

@ Harken Hessel

With Deep Exploration, .max files only open if you have Max installed and the plugin configured, you're right on that point.

In the same idea, Max can "send" file to Maya, but you have to have Max installed on your computer.

Maya can actually open .obj files, under the import menu. have you tried that ?

Go to : Converted Drake and try to open the .mb file that I put in there. This file was obtained by importing an .obj in maya and saving it as a maya scene (the .obj file was obtained by exporting model from TriExporter).

If it opens, you should be able to do the same. If you need some particular ships, give me your list, I'll try to convert them for you.

Is it possible to modify Tri exporter so it can export the bone information when converting to a .X file type?

I was toying with creating an Eve Movie maker in XNA while taking a break from doing some animations and have managed to create a half decent shader for the ships but without the bone information I can't animate the turret movements or ship animations.

Hi everyone.

Im kind of the ultimate newbie concerning 3D and I desperately need help.

I try using Blender 2.6 (latest version) along with Photoshop CS5 (and TriExporter 2009, of course).

Ive been reading the old thread from beginning to end but...

So far, I manage to import 3D models into Blender (yeah!! ) but there is no way I can stick proper textures on them and I cant figure out why...

My problem seems to be that each and every tutorial I found deals with different 3D softwares or older versions of Blender but Im too much of a noob to be able to follow the steps I should and apply the advice I read with my current version of Blender... And thats where I need help.

Anyone would be kind enough to point me in the right direction? Or perhaps give a short but precise uptodate explanation on how to do it with the tools I have?

Thanks a lot in advance...

Use a command prompt (or even better, powerCMD, I recommend it) and type in the following :
readdxt.exe name_of_the_file.dds and hit ENTER
you'll get a list of .tga files, I only keep the biggest one and trash the other ones.

Thanx for your answer, JC Anderson, but I was able to do so.

My problem is precisely that, for some reason, I cant find the proper way to stick the .tga or .png textures on the ship model in Blender 2.6...

I tried following this tutorial, for example, but at some point and for some reason, I get lost. It seems that some changes where made to the UI, as he apparently used Blender 2.5, and Im not able to follow every step he describes within the Blender 2.6 version Im using.... Not sure if I made myself clear but if so, help would be most welcome...

Ill try again anyway, while waiting for noobfriendly answers.

Did I say I was a noob??

Create a folder for temporary storing of export files created by readdxt.exe
Put a shortcut to it on desktop.
Create a shortcut on your desktop to the readdxt.exe, with a "working directory" pointed to your temporary folder.
Drag and drop your DDS file to the readdxt.exe shortcut.
???
Profit.

original post is full of bad links

Anyone able to help me extract the Minmatar CQ as OBJ files? I'm having a helluva time for over a month now.

I had no problem with furniture, etc. Got all the ceiling pipes, couch, tv, chair, all of it.

It's the room itself. When I try to pull out floors, walls and the rest, it comes out as ... well, nothing. It's all messed up in the TriExporter preview.

My guess is the meshes aren't setup in the same standard way, so I've been struggling getting the room itself.

Thanks for the quick reply. And I appreciate the assist.

EVE Mail sent.

No ideas in the meantime?

I had no problem with furniture, etc. Got all the ceiling pipes, couch, tv, chair, all of it.

It's the room itself. When I try to pull out floors, walls and the rest, it comes out as ... well, nothing. It's all messed up in the TriExporter preview.

My guess is the meshes aren't setup in the same standard way, so I've been struggling getting the room itself.

Thanks for the quick reply. And I appreciate the assist.

[quote=Roc Wieler]

alot of stuff doesn't show up in the triexporter window

have you tried exporting the pieces and opening in the 3d software?
i haven't tried this with the CQ yet, though it worked for me with the character model stuff that doesn't show up in the view window in triexporter

Yeah, I've pulled it out and into Cinema 4D, and not had any luck.

Good to know other 3D users, specifically MAX users, are having the same issues.

And I'll be honest, man; a lot of that low level stuff you're talking about is beyond my 3D knowledge currently. I'll either have to spend the time learning what you're talking about, or use that same time to model my own damn floor it sounds like.

Do appreciate the help thus far.

Hello Harken,

I am not super familiar with Maya, I usually use Luxology Modo and Max, but...

...........................................................................................................................................

Have fun, and don't hesitate if you have other questions.

Chears


Nathan

...or does the Eve client just make changes to a generic model once the game loads?...

that's my understanding...otherwise every player in New Eden would need to own every other avatar on their HDD to be able to see them, once WIS kicks in for real...same as every other MMO that have avatars...

Makes sense. But I would think at least the players characters would be stored in some cache/settings file on the HDD. That could possibly reduce load times/lag, and then when ever they enter an area with multiple players, the cached avatar is loaded up from your HDD into the area, that way people can see you, instead of like what you had mentioned, where everyone has everyone's avatars(not feasible).

hmm.

I think that it's server-side...the only storage would be the video buffer on the client, which would dissappear once the avatar is no longer needed.

So, you'd need some way of extracting your Avatar from the VRAM - I've been looking into this in general terms as DX Ripper ceased working on EVE about a year back.

AK

I'm guessing by that, you mean that once you have loaded the game up and your avatar has been loaded, that's when you attempt to extract it?

Another idea might be a standalone character generator, and maybe the ability to export the completed model. But that would probably require some extensive R&D.

thx, worked :) only, that if i take, for example, the thorax, i can's see the 'windows' on it... and the engines are... well... green ^^
(told you, i'm to stupid for it ^^)

i tried to follow this 'tutorial': http://www.newedenlibrary.net/sigs/models.shtml
but they use other textures then i... *confused* ;)

Is it possible to extract the EVE star map with this tool?
or any other ideas how to get it?

Hmm,

I have downloaded the file linked in that video, but whenever I go to the models and double click one I get 'Err!'

In fact I get that if I double click anything in the explorer area.

Where did I go wrong?

EDIT: Nevermind, I have found the 'issue' and it is entirely my bad.

I do have another question now: http://eve-files.com/search.dxd?search=triexporter

There is a more recent file there, and it appears to work. Unfortunately it has no menu for me at the top, so I have no way to export the model. It does seem to be improved as it automatically shows models with the correct texture.

Hmm,

I have downloaded the file linked in that video, but whenever I go to the models and double click one I get 'Err!'

In fact I get that if I double click anything in the explorer area.

Where did I go wrong?

EDIT: Nevermind, I have found the 'issue' and it is entirely my bad.

I do have another question now: http://eve-files.com/search.dxd?search=triexporter

There is a more recent file there, and it appears to work. Unfortunately it has no menu for me at the top, so I have no way to export the model. It does seem to be improved as it automatically shows models with the correct texture.

Does anyone know how tech2 ships can be exported using TriExporter? I was looking in the res/dx9/model/ship/* directories but the models I can find there seem to be only for the tech1 variants (plus a couple extra like AT ships).

What I need is the 3d model of the Rapier. The only ship I found which is similar is the Bellicose in res/dx9/model/ship/minmatar/mc3. This is not the same model as can be seen in the game though: the rapier not only has a different texture in game, but it also differs in the geometry: it has 3 more engines and 2 extra solar panels. Is the EVE client using some sort of compositioning to put on these extra parts, and if yes, where can I find these extra models?

You'll find the model in "res/dx9/model/ship/brutor/mc3"

I'm having issues as well since Inferno. The Amarr ships, other V3 ships, they crash TriExporter. I was just starting a video tutorial series for people as well, to try to get all of our collected knowledge and experience in one place.

I clicked the link for the .NET updated granny.dll but it returns a page error.

Any other solutions?

@craidie:
I will give it a try with the Scorpion. Which *.red file are you using?

@Xenuria:

I think it will be pretty difficult to export exactly your character, as the final mesh of your character is somehow dynamically created out of a set of standard variants that are merged together. There was a nice posting ages ago, when they introduced the character creator, where it was explained. Can't find the link now though...

The best link i could find regarding Character Export was this: [Eve 2 Unreal UDK - Characters]

Mind you now i look at it again there is also an epic posting how to render ships . Maybe i should read that post as well before asking stupid questions: [Eve 2 Unreal UDK - Ships]

Kind Regards,
Andares Sol

Any ideas in which directory i can find the new Stealth Bombers? Hound, Manticore, Nemesis, Purifier
I am too blind to find them .

Thanks,
Andares Sol

After I selected the eve-directory, TriExporter keeps crashing whenever I try to run it. Does anyone know how to solve that problem? I'm using Windows 7 64 bit.

You need to update your granny.dll is my guess. Take a look on the previous page. I think there was a link there.

Well, with the last Patch the *.red files are gone and replaced by *.black files in a binary format.
So that's the end to half way realistic Blender rendering and to my EveLiveWallpaper it seems...
Until someone reverse engineers the datastructure.

Grumble... Why does CCP have to make it so difficult for us...*sigh*

Bests,
Andares Sol

@Cmdr26:
Try deleting the TriExporter registry key...
regedit.exe -> HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\TriExporter

Make sure you point to the EVE directory, not the CCP directory when setting the file path.

Bests,
Andares Sol

DON'T BE THAT GUY

The guy who sits back and waits for OTHERS to do **** for you.

Open up the .black files in notepage+ and figure it out.


God...

The first 32Bit value of the binary token seems to be just counting up.
Second parameter might be number of bytes that follow until the next token. 4 + 4 + 4*4 = 0x18
Third is maybe the type. Seems to be the same for all Tr2Vector4Parameter in the red file, so maybe it means just that in the black file. 1C000100 = Tr2Vector4Parameter?
The next one is maybe the name of the type. 1D001B00 = MaterialDiffuseColor?
And following depending on the type the values.

A lot of dodgy guesswork and most likely quite wrong
Andares Sol

Am I missing something here?

Why don't you just get this sort of information from the client.
Log in to here with a specific ship on screen. Disconnect from internet so you aren't violating any policies.
Open a memory viewer/editor like cheat engine and then hunt down the part of memory making use of the file.
You can pretty much figure out how to read any file the game uses that way. Is it fast? No...

Does it work? YES

Go for it, Xenuria. When you're done, why don't you package up your extraction tool so that others can benefit from your work?

I don't use gimp and I won't unless I absolutely have too. I have photoshop CS 2, unfortunatly when I open the dds file I do not see any layers. Which means that the layers no longer exist and the tuts are outdated OR I am doing something wrong.

This thread seems to go off in a lot of directions, I want a summary.

Links to Files
** TriExporter 2009 w/ Granny2.dll ; Download Link
[url]http://[/url]
**GR2 Converter for 3d Max

Quick line on this; Valve have released the source film making tool.

Anyone have experience converting eve models to the source mod toolset?

If so, some guidance might help the eve community out on this.

Happy to pitch in/colab on any development as this tool looks fuckin' sweet.

AK

I'm....close. I got blender files to SMD files: http://i.imgur.com/LK1jG.png

But in Source Filmmaker this is what I see: http://i.imgur.com/cJxYp.png

When I try and add it in-game via console I get the following:


] sv_cheats 1
] prop_physics_create ship.mdl
ship.mdl : material "models/props_sdk/hull" not found.

One of my materials was called hull, but not understanding why it's not finding it on its own inside the SMD file. Help!


This whole business of the .QC file and using StudioML to get it working is a complete pain in the ass.

How do you use that black importer?
I'm using newest blender, going to User Preferences->Addons->Install addon, but it doesnt work, or there's some other way of running python scripts i dont know of? (I never had to use them before ><).

Here is a mostly-working blender importer for .black files.

Many thanks to Selvin for the work he's done on the .net parser, it was invaluable.

If anyone has feedback on the specular or mirror values and how they map from the .black files, I'd love to hear.

Download from EVE-Files

Tried using the script in Blender 2.59 and 2.63a and in both versions it installed the script but would not allow me to enable it.

Tried using the script in Blender 2.59 and 2.63a and in both versions it installed the script but would not allow me to enable it.

OK, I know it's off topic but can anyone tell me how to /ignore someone in these forums?

Can you please enable the system console (from the help menu) and then copy/paste the error it gives when you try to load?

Here's a screenshot of the console output from my attempt in blender 2.59 (OS is Windows 7).

There are two events in there, the first when I installed the script, the second when I tried to enable it in the add-ons menu.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v75/Wild_Rho/ScriptErr.png

It's the 64bit version, the 32bit version can't allocate enough memory for the compositing work I do.

If a model which had texture(s) added is exported, also the texture(s) will be exported in PNG format.

@AlleyKat:
Ah well bound to happen with only two people testing and both have tons of SDKs and debugging tools installed :D
I have it running fine on Win7 64bit with dll 2.8.12.0 - No need to run as administrator either.

So questions:
- Did the old version work?
- Which graphics card do you have?
- Do you have a d3d9.dll in your Windows\system32 folder and DirectX installed?
- If you single-click and just export the model does that work?

@All
Does it work / not work for anybody else?

Bests,
Andares Sol

Question to those more advanced:
I've started playing with exporter, started with good old cane model and came up with this so far:
Cane

My question is, anyone has any experience in making engine trails? I really dont like blender's particle system but I guess it must do, hopefuly someone will have some advice on how to approach that step.

@AlleyKat
Exporter works like a charm for me on 64bit w7

Didn't thought of volumetric lighting, might work, thanks :)
I'm planning on animating, so I think I'll go for mixing of glow, volumetrics and particles wonder how it will end up like.

Edit.
Volumetric lighting in blender is simply awful, will look into something else :s

Aye defo particles are what I'm going to do for the trail, will have to use some postprocessing for flare/glare behind the engines and sun though.

AlleyKat,
What's your opinion on Elements 3d? As someone who's never worked in blender or a 3d program for compositing, I just can't fathom that they would be as good as AE without some very expensive plugins. Am I totally mistaken here? Will blender be able to do a decent job compositing a shot?

Can ANYONE help me extract the Amarr t3 legion subsystem models into 3ds format with the skins?

me love u long time?

eve/res/dx9/ships/amarr

ac5m_s1v3
ac5m_s2v1
ac5m_s3v1
ac5m_s4v4
ac5m_s5v4

Hi there,
I`m having some issues with the colors. After an update of EvE, I seem to be unable to get colors back into the models. Every texture I pull from the dds file is "gray". I also see the lights channel has been moved. Does anyone else have this problem? Where do I get the colors from now?

Look at the different colors. Left is from way back, and on the right is the one I did today.

They're layered.

From the look of the picture, I believe that is part of the specular, mask and sub-mask intersection, using the specular channel and painting it that rust color.

And the lights should be in the alpha channel.

AK

done

All extracted into 3ds files, including the texture files which should by default choose the diffuse channel.

I don't have 3ds as I use C4D, but they all opened in C4D just fine.

Enjoy.

AK

the models are perfect, however the textures.... well there 512x512. thats a lil small. also there 2 white ones with some detail, but mostly white, and the 3rd one is all crazy pastel colors. none show the lights. example...

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y234/barricuda/Untitled-1-5.jpg

is there a way you can merge the 3 into one with the lights on a separate file ?

Ok, so they moved the colors to another layer, so I have to merge them together. The lights I already found. I`ll go anfiddle around a bit with the channels then. Tnx.

Versions:
TriExporter: 0.4.2.0
granny2.dll: 2.8.12.0

I have:

TriExporter: 0.4.1.5beta
granny2.dll: 2.7.0.9

Where can I get the newest versions? I could only find the versions I have on eve-files.

https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=1771944#post177194

Thanks. Once I got the updated version of granny2.dll, along with the new TriExporter, all the previous app crashing stopped, and I was able to start loading in all the models.

you must break down the pgs texture. I've often wondered why games don't make better use of the available channels in an image. Well it appears they do, or at least ccp does. I'm probably not the first to post this nugget of insight, but just for anyone that doesn't already know. You have to divide up the pgs texture into each of its channels. Each color channel serves a different purpose. You have RGBA. Green is specular and Alpha is the emit channel (lights). The other two I'm unsure of. One is for sure the mirror and the other is probably the transparency (for the sail things on some of the ships)

Hope this helps someone. Reply if you have more insight or just want to tell me to read the whole thread before posting. =)

ffs why did you post?

6 posts above you there is a link to CCP's official pictorial on what channels do what and where.

Why attempt to complicate and confuse people?

http://cdn1.eveonline.com/community/devblog/2010/TexturePack_large.jpg

AK

The other 2 channels in the pgs file are the diffuse mask and submask textures. These 2 channels combined make the reflection map. Each of these maps has their own specularity so keep a eye on that.

How does that work; the diffuse masks? I don't even know what a submask is, and how do they work together to affect a reflection map? I'm not used to working with textures that are much more than simple diffuse, spec, bump, mirror, alpha and such. I do however use Ps pretty heavily and understand much more in depth ways of layering in that program. I use blender btw, but when ppl explain stuff for 3ds or most other 3d programs I understand.

Unless you have the original 'RED' files OR you are able to reverse engineer the EVE gfx (which goes against the EULA) there is no way you will be able to know what or how to color the layers, or even what strength of specularity, glow, fresnel, reflectivity etc to use on any of the RGBA channels

I have all of the RED files btw, and they are available to anyone who asks me nicely.

AK

AlleyKat the data you are talking about is also located in the new black files. You just need to learn how to read them.

this is true AlleyKat that it needs to be reverse engineered. but at least then you have the proper color values and layering sorted. because the red files are outdated. most red files are from the old V2 shaders. and since the sub capital ships for the main 4 races and some pirate factions are already using the new v3 shaders. these black files contain the information you need.

and you can easily convert them to a format that you can actually read just like you can read the black files. all you need to do is look back a couple pages and look for the black2json tool linked in the topic.

this does the converting work for you

I think all this is really a moot point. Why worry about making them eve perfect. The great thing about pulling a model out is that you can make them look 100x better than they ever could in a game engine. At least that's the way I see it. I'm just going to use the mask textures in the pgs as specular/mirror maps to give the appearance of different materials.

Q : I use blender and when I pull a ship in it has multiple materials attached. Are these necessary, or are they sorta like the additional verts you always get when importing an .obj? I can imagine when they might be, but maybe one of ya'll has a better understanding of this and can make it easier on me.

the reason that on some models you have multiple layers is due to the fact that all the uv mapping has been done already. this means that the main ship hull and the engine parts are separated.

this is also done for the engine glow. the engines have a different kind of lighting and reflection then the rest of the ship.

the bigger the ships the more layers you get.
for example the nyx super carrier has 3

while a gun model only has 1

it is all depending on if there is a different between some parts of the model.

hope that explains it a bit

Haha this is how you learn. Here let me show you my latest test run. In the picture you will see a rokh and a abaddon but baddon is under fire.

http://simple-construction.net/images/test.jpeg

this is done completly in max rendertime on this highres screenshot was 1 minute 20 seconds XD

here is a screenshot of my re-creation of the abaddon :

http://img59.imageshack.us/img59/2431/baddon.jpg

texturing done in 4 minutes :)

okay did some more work and in a couple hours simulations of engine trails and gun blasts will be finished :)

finally managed to get the mask to work out correctly.

imageshack.us/a/img217/6307/geddon21.jpg

thanks to composite materials. i adjusted the diffuse texture colors for the mask and submask layers.
then applied the masks and as you can see a good final result if i may say so myself.

How did you do that blue shield thing at the front? That looks really good. Do you subdivide the mesh before render?