[Model] M2 Flamethrower [WIP]

[Tim270]

The flames are the easy part.

[Psyko]

well it looked quite bad on FH2. so are you saying PR can do any better?

[baltimore]

want it...

[paul161616]

Hm, I'm sure it's going to sound stupid, but isn't it possible to use the mechanics of the Specialist rope to "tie" one end to the other?

I have no experience in the field of creating models or weapons whatsoever, but for conversation's sake, why not this? Connect the tanks to the barrel with the same thing as the rope on the grappling hook.
For that i'd assume you would have to have the tanks as part of the weapon as oppose to the kit geom, which with the right placement definitely would look acceptable.
My apologies if this idea has already been proven impractical and i didn't notice.

[AfterDune]

The rope is a projectile, it's not part of the weapon.

[lucky.BOY]

I have put together a quick model of the wand, so as to get all dimensions right. If any dimensions are off or something is missing, please so tell me Just noticed that trigger is missing, also yes smoothing is wrong, it is unoptimised and not welded together. I merely need to check dimensions.

p3d.in - m2 wand



Next up i will move the wand into position it will be in ingame (relatively to the backpack), i will add the hose and start modeling lowpoly and highpoly models from the base i have now. Worst case scenario is the hose will be rigid, which will still look one bit better then what FH2 did

Again, if you find any inaccuracy, please point it out, you will spare me time later in the process.

Cheers

[lucky.BOY]

Update, i got the lowpoly of the wand done.

p3d.in - m2 wand lowpoly



1457 tris.

I still have no idea how to get some estimate of how will the wand be placed in realtion to the tank group, so i could put it that way in max and get started on a decent hose connecting them. If anyone got an advice on this, it would be much apreciated.
I was thinking about setting a simple scene for 3p animation, and then going on from there. Dont know how doable is that, or if there is a good tut on this matter somewhere, though.

[Rhino]

I take it the p3d and the screen are two different models? By low poly do you mean your 3p model? If so, I think you could cut down some what on the amount of faces on the cylinder some what, 1457tris is quite a lot for a 3p model of that and looks like your missing a few little bits like some of the rear handle bit which is in your p3d?

Also without looking at any refs, looks like some of the bits in your p3d model could be rounder? Some bits only having 6 sides etc? Unless they are meant to then you need to fix up your smoothing quite a bit if that's the case.

[lucky.BOY]

Its meant to be 1p model, and yeah, i forgot to move those rear "triggers" with the rest of the model when i made the render, my bad. Apart from that, the p3d and render are identical. I said low poly because i intend do make a highpoly model and bake normals down from that.

The p3d smoothing is one horrible thing, you have to split each edge which dyou dont want to smooth over, now i see i could split edges on those 6 sided nuts too, yeah. They are meant to be 6 sided, but not meant to be smoothed around like they are on the p3d, you are right.

Anyway, i grabbed a couple of screens from 3ds max, They should tell more about the smoothing:



http://i.imgur.com/mRogD.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/QoF5P.jpg

You see, the tip of the weapon is only smoothing badly in p3d, while being smoothed correctly in max...

Cheers

[AfterDune]

/me gets excited.

[Rhino]

Sounds good, although for a 1p weapon model you could add a few more tris where needed

Also always for barrels you should always have a cone rather than a cylinder with a back face as for starters, its far less tris but not only that, it also gives a much better "bottomless" effect when textured with a shadow in the middle and takes up far less UV space and easier on the LODs









But saying that for a 1p handheld weapon like this your not going to ever see down its barrel, only in 3p but still best to model it just encase it dose come up in the animations and also helps with future proofing etc

[|HBD|Bad_santa12345]

About the hose/tank problem. Could not you just export the hose and tank as kit geometry and rig other end of the hose to the bone mesh1 (=weaponbone) and the other end + the tank to spine3. The kit geometries are skinnedMeshes so this is definately possible and it will deform. Only problem is if the kit has other weapons besides the flamethrower because the hose will always be attached to the weapon you are holding.

[lucky.BOY]

I was thinking on having a sidearm in the kit, too, with a field bandage ofc. While field bandage would look that bad as you are holding it out for a second or two most times before you use it, and it would look bad only in 3p (right?), it might be needed to get rid of the sidearm for the sake of having the hose deforming this way...

[{ZW}C-LOKE]

About the hose/tank problem. Could not you just export the hose and tank as kit geometry and rig other end of the hose to the bone mesh1 (=weaponbone) and the other end + the tank to spine3. The kit geometries are skinnedMeshes so this is definately possible and it will deform. Only problem is if the kit has other weapons besides the flamethrower because the hose will always be attached to the weapon you are holding.

Damn... Beat me to it. By a couple of days too, I see. I was going to say the same thing (essentially). If you made the hose part of the kit's mesh and skin, the hose could move and deform with it. But wouldn't it also be possible to have the same kit have no hose when the PC is carrying a different weapon, similar to like how the specialist PC is carrying a shotgun when it has an assault rifle in-hand and visa vis?

[lucky.BOY]

If you mean that the shotgun disappears when he selects it in his kit, no, that doesnt happen. Same with the grappling hook or AT/AA weapons on AA, LAT and HAT kits.


(notice how he is holding a shotgun in his hands and has one on his backpack at the same time)

If you know how to do it, though, please do tell how

[{ZW}C-LOKE]

Oh, I stand corrected... I thought this was something that I've seen happen before, but I guess not. My bad.

[|HBD|Bad_santa12345]

I think it would be possible to hide the hose while not using the flamethrower by using mesh8 instead of mesh1 and add 7 dummy parts to the 3p weapon model. Then animate the flamethrower so that mesh1 and mesh8 are always at the same position and for all other items in the kit you would have to animate the mesh8 to be inside the soldier so that the hose would not be visible.

[lucky.BOY]

Small update, i found correct dimensions of the flamethrower on this forum, so i will go thgough the model and make sure it is correct.

Anywho, this is what i have now. Do i understand it correctly that i only need to make the hose like this and animator and coder will do their magic?

p3d.in - m2 backpack lowpoly

And a little render here (i have made the hose using spline tool rather than what i have in the p3d above):



Tank group with hose is 3214 tris.

[Onil]

looking good, can't wait to have it in game

[baltimore]

looking good thats right ;P