EQG Zone Importer

[knowom]

Yeah whenever the next update ends up being I'll make a new thread in OpenZone forum someplace. I actually wasn't sure on where to post about initially in regard to this stuff. It's not really OpenZone either, but along the same premise player developed zones which at it's heart is what OpenZone intentions were about.

[Zaela_S]

Haven't been making any progress lately, but figured I'd put out what I have so far for the animated model tool I've been working on since it makes a decent EQG model and animation viewer. Link, src.

Can't save any kind of changes yet, only good for the viewer. Can press 's' in the viewer to display skeletons ('cept on the base pose), right and left arrow to cycle through animations, mouse buttons to move view around. Does not display a small number of models correctly (ones with alternate heads/pieces). There are one or two eqg files that will crash it, not sure why yet. Can view most EQG weapons correctly as well.

[Bonehard]

Nice work Zaela!

Here is a link to a great 3d library i using in my projects:

http://assimp.sourceforge.net/

It supports alot of 3d formats. For none programmers there is also a nice viewer for 3d models on the website.

There also some api bindings for other language.

"There is a C API as well as bindings to various other languages, including C#/.net, Python and D."


Hope to see more of your nice work.

[Zaela_S]

The model viewer now supports alternate "heads"/model parts (H key to cycle through them, if any) and texture sets (more or less -- T key to cycle through those).

I took a little time out to change how I was doing things a bit (LuaJIT's FFI is pretty nice) and re-wrote most of common code for my tools to be nicer. Should hopefully make it easier for me to expand and fix things in the future.

Related to that, made a new version of my S3DSpy replacement which now has an "Export as PNG" option to convert DDS images coming out. Also fixed a bug where having an s3d or eqg file open in multiple tools at the same time (i.e. EQGExport + one of my importer tools) would make changes made in one tool overwrite those made in the other; EQGExport (and other tools, as I get to them) will now check if the s3d/eqg file has been modified and reload if necessary before doing any Export or Import operations.

Originally Posted by Bonehard

Nice work Zaela!

Here is a link to a great 3d library i using in my projects:

http://assimp.sourceforge.net/

It supports alot of 3d formats. For none programmers there is also a nice viewer for 3d models on the website.

There also some api bindings for other language.

"There is a C API as well as bindings to various other languages, including C#/.net, Python and D."


Hope to see more of your nice work.

I might look into that, but I'm pretty happy using Irrlicht for now. Loading standard formats doesn't matter too much for these tool since they're mostly concerned with going to/from EQ's weird formats.

[Gnomish1987]

Originally Posted by Zaela_S

Related to that, made a new version of my S3DSpy replacement which now has an "Export as PNG" option to convert DDS images coming out. Also fixed a bug where having an s3d or eqg file open in multiple tools at the same time (i.e. EQGExport + one of my importer tools) would make changes made in one tool overwrite those made in the other; EQGExport (and other tools, as I get to them) will now check if the s3d/eqg file has been modified and reload if necessary before doing any Export or Import operations.

Speaking of your newest version of EQGExport, Zaela, I am unable to get it to run. Previous versions open just fine for me, but attempting to open the one you've linked in the above quote gives me the following error:

Runtime error:
.\lib\zlib.lua:11: cannot load module 'zlib1': The specified module could not be found.

I'm eager to see your latest additions, but this is preventing me from opening the program. Interestingly, I also get an identical error with your EQG Model Importer, though not with your EQG Weapon Model Importer. Am I doing something wrong?

EDIT: I might also inquire about the "Export as PNG" option. What becomes of the DDS image's alpha channel when this is done? I've found one of the biggest problems with converting DDS files manually to a more manageable format (always BMP in my case) is that an alpha layer can mess up the entire process unless I remember to remove it prior to conversion. Also, given that BMP is the standard format of pre-Luclin textures, is there an advantage to being able to instantly export PNG instead?

[Zaela_S]

Originally Posted by Gnomish1987

Speaking of your newest version of EQGExport, Zaela, I am unable to get it to run.

Hmm, I'm not sure what's up there. They work out of the box on both Windows machines I have access to (running 7 and 8). zlib1.dll should be a built-in system file since XP, I think; not sure why it might not be able to find it for you.

Originally Posted by Gnomish1987

EDIT: I might also inquire about the "Export as PNG" option. What becomes of the DDS image's alpha channel when this is done? I've found one of the biggest problems with converting DDS files manually to a more manageable format (always BMP in my case) is that an alpha layer can mess up the entire process unless I remember to remove it prior to conversion. Also, given that BMP is the standard format of pre-Luclin textures, is there an advantage to being able to instantly export PNG instead?

Not sure! PNG has an alpha channel so I imagine it just gets converted over as-is.

I didn't have any particular use in mind when I added the PNG export option, I just know I get annoyed when I run into DDS files since I don't have anything to edit them with. There's no reason not to use PNG, at least, since EQ will load any of the common image formats for any purpose. I prefer to use PNG since BMP is a bit of a space-hog.

[Packet]

Originally Posted by Zaela_S

Haven't been making any progress lately, but figured I'd put out what I have so far for the animated model tool I've been working on since it makes a decent EQG model and animation viewer. Link, src.

Can't save any kind of changes yet, only good for the viewer. Can press 's' in the viewer to display skeletons ('cept on the base pose), right and left arrow to cycle through animations, mouse buttons to move view around. Does not display a small number of models correctly (ones with alternate heads/pieces). There are one or two eqg files that will crash it, not sure why yet. Can view most EQG weapons correctly as well.

That's really awesome Zaela. I was looking at a few model animations and it worked perfectly using left-right arrow keys. Sorry I haven't passed you anything yet for testing. School just started up again for me and on-top of work, my time has been extremely limited.

[jdoran]

What is the benefit of converting zones to EQG?

I think it is great that tools like this are being worked on.

I must admit that I like the s3d zones since I can use their models in other zones. Would these EQG tools provide a similar function?

[Packet]

Everything I've done uses png textures instead of DDS and BMP. I've noticed the file-size decrease to be well worth it. Also, the alpha channel with png files can be used if you choose the right shader for the material.

[Zaela_S]

Originally Posted by jdoran

What is the benefit of converting zones to EQG?

Mostly to make them compatible with this tool ;p EQG format zones are easier to work with in a lot of ways...

I'm just getting started re-writing this tool; when I'm done I should easily be able to add the ability to export placeable object models from one zone to another, and improve the s3d converter to be more complete (placeable objects, vertex colors, maybe alpha texture detection, etc).

[Packet]

Originally Posted by Zaela_S

Mostly to make them compatible with this tool ;p EQG format zones are easier to work with in a lot of ways...

I'm just getting started re-writing this tool; when I'm done I should easily be able to add the ability to export placeable object models from one zone to another, and improve the s3d converter to be more complete (placeable objects, vertex colors, maybe alpha texture detection, etc).

Zaela, do you have a changelog anywhere? I've been abscent for a bit due to work and school. I'm uncertain if the original issues I had with your tool are still present.

[rhyotte]

So many cool tools popping up....and Sony just posted a 2 billion loss...

Here's to hoping!

[Akkadius]

Stickied thread

[Zaela_S]

I doubt I changed anything since you last saw it.

[lakedoo23]

Zaela, I was going to attempt reverse engineering the EQG format, but I was hoping you might have some documentation laying around?