• Welcome to SC4 Devotion Forum Archives.

Moar about Trees

Started by evarburg, September 23, 2018, 06:47:48 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

evarburg

I'm slowly sifting through my prop packs to extract some trees for my personal use -- both single trees and the ones that show up in some prop families I use. The current ones are Jeronij vol.4 & 5. those trees have such unusual shapes, I love them. But. Most are way too dark. I had the vague impression that there was a way to tinker with a prop colour with some SC4 tool. Am I terribly mistaken or is it possible ? I just want them to be, like, two shades lighter.

And BTW : are the names of the trees in the prop families exactly the same as they are in the prop packs ? I have been looking unsuccessfully for these UlnusAmericana in both JRJ prop packs :


mgb204

The names of Props in a Prop family are identical to those without. Because the Exemplar Name property is identical, it's just that such props have an additional property to add them into families.

As for altering the colour of trees (or any model for that matter), whilst technically possible, it's anything but easy. You'd need to extract all the FSH files, convert them to an editable format, make your edits in a image-editor (to at least 20 images, maybe more), then re-convert and package the images back into an override .dat. All the while, ensuring you keep the IDs correct, easy with GoFSH, less so with some other methods.

twalsh102

BSC MEGA Props JRJ Vol05.dat is what I'm showing for those props.

If I might make a suggestion:

Run an SC4DataNode scan of your entire Plugins folder.  Change the view to TGI View and then choose Prop List.  Press the CSV button to export this report.  You will find the exported report in the SC4DataNode folder under My Documents.  If you have the latest version of DataNode (1.0.6) it will be named "Report_22 Lot.csv."  If you have an earlier version, it will just be named Report.csv.  You can now open the report in Excel.  Make sure you change the name and save it.  I would recommend saving it as an Excel file rather than leaving it as a CSV file.

You now have a searchable, sortable list of every prop you have collected.  The columns exported are T. G, I, Ex (Exemplar) Type, Family, Name, Q (you'll have to ask Rivit what that means, but if the value is "=", it means the only instance, or the last loaded instance if multiple instances exist), and finally, Location

I had already exported a Prop list from my Plugins recently (just over 47,000 listed, of which about 6,600 are duplicates), so I was able to find your props in about 15 seconds.

evarburg

ooh, this seems handy ! Thanks, Twalsh, I will try it. (I have the latest DataNode)

And MGB, for modifying colours, thanks for explaining the process so succinctly. I kind of understand better. Not that I will be able to do it any time soon, though. I am currently still floundering about in GoFSH...

mrbisonm

As mgb204 explained, lightening up the colour textures of those trees is really a diffcult and loooong boring process. I have done it once....and this with two files only.....never again, because the efford is not worth it at all. There are more than two dozens of files to ex- ,and later import and work on, change and adjust, import, try ingame, export again etc....etc......could take a whole day (8hrs) for one only.
So, I recommend to ask the creator for the 2ds or gmax files (if he still has them) and retexture them, way more efficient and easier that the first choice.
In case you cannot handle the texturing process in 3ds or gmax, I can help you there, no problem, but....... as long as there aren't hundreds ( &Thk/( ) of them......;)

mrb


....Uploading the MFP 1.... (.........Finishing the MFP1)

mgb204

A couple of things I will add here, since things have probably changed a little.

#1 GoFSH can handle the Extraction / Re-Import phase in seconds. No other tool does this so efficiently or keeping IDs in tact through the process. See here (video) for a how to.

#2 Uniquely to trees and some other simpler objects, using a layer mask and automation, even the editing could be a breeze. Assuming you have Photoshop, open one image, get the settings (adjustments) just so, then use a photoshop action to record your changes. Then just run the remaining files through Photoshop's Batch Processing feature, using your "Macro" or Action created earlier. Best to move the texture used to work out your settings, into a different folder from the rest. That way, you can get the Batch job to run on the folder, without applying the changes twice to one texture.

Note: when I say simpler objects, I understand trees are ridiculously complex as a SC4Model. However, in terms of colour-adjustments, you may get good results by adjusting the entire image set uniformly. Compare that to other models where there are many different colours/components used, then of-course this method is tedious and very complicated. That said, I've done it three times and came to much the same conclusion, it's not worth the effort. However, for these trees, I think it could be and at least with GoFSH doing the heavy lifting, you can concentrate your time on editing textures.

evarburg

Thank you both. I managed to change the colour of my test trees -- not enough but it was a test, so it's OK (besides it made me aware that not only the originals were needed to see the result in game but also another JRJ prop/texture pack !). And I got an idea, indeed, Fred, of how mind-numbingly repetitive it is to do,(esp. as I have... let's say many JRJ trees to re-colour) ; but once that specific set of operation is understood and mastered (well, mostly...) GoFHS is indeed easy and fast enough. But, oh yes, Robin, I WILL use the batch process in Photoshop ! (must learn that too, but it will be a Good Thing, as I often process my own pictures)