Tutorial 1

Tutorial on Getting a Map-object Model Skinned and into Quake 3 from 3D Studio Max

By Dick Dastardly

Part 1 - How to create a simple model in 3D Studio Max, UVW map it, skin it and export it to Quake 3

1.0 This tutorial will guide you through creating a very simple skinned model (a box or crate) and getting it into a Quake 3 level. I wrote it because I had to wade through a load of different tutorials to figure out the complete process, and I thought others might appreciate having all the information in one place. Whilst I'll try to make the guide as simple to follow as possible, you should already have some basic knowledge of 3D Studio Max and GTK Radiant.

To follow the tutorial you'll need 3D Studio Max with the Texporter and Pop n Fresh plugins installed. (I used 3DSM R3) but other versions should be similar enough for you to follow the general process. You'll also need a map editor to actually get your models into Q3 - I recommend GTK radiant.

In Part 2, we'll create a model and skin it with a shader rather than a normal texture.

1.1 In the meantime, though, begin by creating the following folder structure within baseq3:

models/mapobjects/ddtutorial

Now fire up 3D Studio Max.

On the right hand side (hereafter RHS) of your screen, on the create tab, click [box] and draw out a box in the perspective view. Then enter dimensions of 32 in the length, width and height boxes under parameters.

1.2 Okay now we have our box, but we need to tell 3D Studio Max how to wrap a skin round it. To do this we first have to split it into it's component sides. Select the box, click on the edit tab (RHS) and apply an edit mesh to the box (by clicking on [More…] then “edit mesh”). Now click on “Sub-Object” then "polygon" (the red square) on the RHS.

N.B. Throughout this tutorial, make sure you save your progress at regular intervals. To help you keep track of which version is which, it might be a good idea to number the various saved versions with the corresponding paragraph numbers from the tutorial e.g. ddtutorial1_1.max, ddtutorial1_2.max etc.

1.3 Select the side of the cube which faces the front, click on [Detach] on the RHS (under “Edit Geometry”), call it “front” in the detach pop-up which appears and hit [Okay]. Repeat this process for each side of the cube, calling them “left”, “right”, “top”, “bottom” & “back”.

1.4 Once you’ve detached all the sides, you’ll be left with an empty “box1” object, click on [Sub Object] mode to turn it off, then hit the delete key to get rid of the empty object. If you’ve done everything right, when you hit the "Select by name" button

. You should see something like this:

1.5 Select all and then make a back up copy by holding the shift key and dragging the faces to the side somewhere. N.B. This step is very important. You should now have two cubes:

1.6 Hide the copy you made (by clicking on the utilities tab then [Hide Selected]. Now we move back to our original cube. We’re going to rearrange the pieces so they’re in a 2d plane so we can apply a 2d texture to them.

Select the left side, hit the “Select & rotate” button and rotate it 90 degrees so it faces the same way as the front. (You can see how many degrees you’ve rotated the object at the bottom of the screen as you drag it round). Then hit “Select & move” and move it so that it's lined up next to the front face. Repeat this process for each piece until you’ve got something like this:

1.7 Select the front face then click [Attach List] (on the RHS). Choose the first item in the pop-up which appears and click [Attach]. Repeat for each item in order until they’re all attached and looking like this:

1.8 With the now attached pieces still selected, change to a front view and apply a UVW map modifier. Under parameters, select planar and under alignment select “Y” then [Fit]. You should now see an orange box surrounding the pieces.

1.9 Q3 likes textures to be square whereas we have a rectangular shape so let’s change that. Copy whichever number is higher out of length or width to the other one like this:

1.10 Now in our case this will mean we have some wasted space on the texture above and below the faces, but we’re not too worried about that. Obviously if you’re making a more complicated model you can arrange the pieces so they fit a square better.

Apply an “Unwrap UVW” modifier (by clicking on [More] on the RHS, then “Unwrap UVW”). To check this has worked, click on [Edit] (also on the RHS) and you should see this:

1.11 Finally we have our 2d layout of the pieces, but we need to save it so we can paint our texture on it. Close the “Edit UVW” pop-up window, then click on the Utiltities tab

and [More…]. Choose “Texporter” from the list then under parameters enter 512 for width and height. (This will let us paint a high res version of the texture which we can later scale down). Now click on [Pick Object]...

1.12 ...and select the flattened faces in perspective view. A pop-up like this should appear:

1.13 Hit the save icon (the floppy disc) and save it wherever you like as box1.tga. Now you can open that file in Photoshop or whatever graphics program you use and paint your box texture. When you’ve finished, resize it to 256 by 256 and save it as box1.jpg in baseq3/models/mapobjects/ddtutorial. (In the save options dialogue make sure you use the "Baseline Standard" jpg format or Quake 3 will be unable to use your picture).

If you can’t be bothered to make your own texture, you can use the masterpiece I’ve created instead by right clicking on the image to the right and choosing "Save Picture As".

1.14 Okay, back to 3DSM, with the flattened box selected, hit the “m” key to bring up the materials editor and click the blank square to the right of diffuse:

1.15 Choose “bitmap” from the pop-up, then navigate to your baseq3/models/mapobjects/ddtutorials folder and select “box1.jpg”. The texture should appear wrapped round the first sphere. Hit “Assign Material to Selection”

and “Show Map in Viewport”

then close the materials editor. Now you should see the texture on your flattened box. (If you don't, hit F3 and the textures should appear).

1.16 Hit the Display tab and [Unhide All]. The backup copy of the box should reappear. Select the front face of the backup, then hit the edit tab and [Attach List]. In the list you’ll see “front” which is the flattened version we made, and “back01”, “bottom01”, “left01”, “right01”, and “top01” which are the backup copies. (“Front01” doesn’t appear because we have that selected and you can’t attach an object to itself).

1.17 Now repeat the process we went through earlier in 1.7 for the backups by attaching front01 to each of the other backup sides in turn (in the same order you followed before, working down the list). N.B. Make sure you don’t attach the flattened version called “front” to the backups. When you’re done you should be left with only two objects, the flattened version called “front” and the assembled backup version called “front01”.

Now select the flattened version, click the create tab and under geometry choose “Compound Objects” from the drop-down:

1.18 Hit [Morph], then [Pick Target] and click on the backup box. Ta daaa! Our flattened version has now changed back into a cube.

1.19 Now we can get rid of the backup cube, so select and delete it. Then select the remaining cube and from the menus choose “File” and “Export Selected”. Call it “box1” and save it in the folder baseq3/models/mapobjects/ddtutorial as type “Quake III (*.MD3)” in the dropdown. (If this doesn’t appear as an option, you haven’t installed the Pop n Fresh exporter properly).

A further pop-up will appear asking which frames you want to export, enter “0” and hit [Export Now]

1.20 Congratulations, you’ve just made an md3 and can now add it to your level. To test it, open GTK radiant, make a simple box room, right click, choose “misc”, “misc model” from the pop-up, then navigate to your md3 and select it. (It should be in the folder baseq3/models/mapobjects/ddtutorial). The box should now be in your level. (You can change it’s facing by hitting the “n” key and clicking on an angle.)

And here are the boxes in-game:

Part 2 - Creating a model which uses a shader

2.0 Now we’re going to make something slightly more useful – a simple model of a bush. (This part of the tutorial assumes you've already completed part 1, so I'll go into less detail here as the process is very similar). To begin, download and save this file as “bush1.tga” in the “baseq3/models/mapobjects/ddtutorial” folder you created earlier. The tga has an alpha channel which we want Q3 to use to determine which bits of the image should be transparent and which should be opaque. To do this, we'll need a shader so in your baseq3/scripts folder, create a shader called “ddtutorial.shader” and paste in the following text:

models/mapobjects/ddtutorial/bush1

{

            cull none

            nopicmip

            {

                        map models/mapobjects/ddtutorial/bush1.tga

                        alphaFunc GE128

                        depthWrite

                        rgbGen vertex

            }

}

N.B. If you're using a version of q3map older than version 2.3.37 you will have to reverse the direction of all the slashes in the shader i.e.

models\mapobjects\ddtutorial\bush1

{

            cull none

            nopicmip

            {

                        map models\mapobjects\ddtutorial\bush1.tga

                        alphaFunc GE128

                        depthWrite

                        rgbGen vertex

            }

}

2.1 Okay, now we’re all set up – you’ve got the bush texture in baseq3/mapobjects/ddtutorial and you’ve got a shader called ddtutorial.shader in baseq3/scripts. (By the way, it doesn’t really matter what you call the shader file, we’re just using ddtutorial for consistency). Fire up 3DSM and create a 64x64 rectangle in the front view (by clicking on the “create” tab, then “shapes”, then [Rectangle] ). Convert it to an editable mesh and move it so that the bottom of the rectangle is resting on “0” on the z-axis.

2.2 Hit [UVW Map] and an orange box should appear round the rectangle you made. (If it doesn’t, change the alignment and click [Fit] ).

Apply an “Unwrap UVW” modifier, then with the rectangle still selected hit the “m” key to bring up the materials modifier. Click the blank square to the right of “diffuse”, choose bitmap and then choose bush1.tga in your baseq3/models/mapobjects/ddtutorial folder. (The bush texture should appear on the sphere).

Now click “Assign Material to Selection” and “Show Map in Viewport” and close the materials editor. The texture should now be visible on the rectangle. (If it isn’t hit [F3] and it should appear).

2.3 Change to top view and click “Select and Rotate”

. Then hold down the shift key to make a copy and rotate it 60 degrees round the z-axis. Make another copy and rotate it a further 60 degrees until you have a shape like this:

2.4 Select all three pieces then go to the file menu and choose “Export Selected”. Export them to the folder baseq3/models/mapobjects/ddtutorial as bush1.md3. (As before enter frame “0” in the Pop N Fresh pop-up)

You should now have a simple md3 of a bush. Fire up GTK Radiant, make a box-room and add a few bush models, varying the size using the _modelscale key. Vary the angle of each model to give them some variety and hey presto – you have some vegetation:

2.5 So there you have it, you should now be able to get your own models skinned and into Q3. Obviously I've just covered the basic process here, but if you want more details about a particular aspect, there are plenty of tutorials on the Net which focus more on stages like UVW mapping or skinning.

Anyway, I hope this guide has been of some use to you, if you have any questions, comments or corrections drop me a mail to mikejsteven@hotmail.com. To have a look at my own first stab at making a model, a Steyr Aug, click here. To check out the rest of my website, click here.