How To: Make Leaderheads! Ekmek's Guide

[The Capo]

I think what's confusing me right now is that you think I am farther along than I really am. I don't see any coloration at all in my NifSkope, no matter who I load up. I loaded up the normal VanDerDonck (unedited with Colonization), and I don't have any coloration in him at all. He is all white. My question is; WHY?

I'm way back to the original post where we start NifSkope, and I haven't even got past part one, because my image looks nothing like your images. And I don't understand why this is, I don't understand any of the instructions or anything like that because it doesn't look the same in my image as it does in yours.

 

[Ekmek]

did you follow the steps here and then save the nif?

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=7463411&postcount=172

 

[Ekmek]

I think what's confusing me right now is that you think I am farther along than I really am. I don't see any coloration at all in my NifSkope, no matter who I load up. I loaded up the normal VanDerDonck (unedited with Colonization), and I don't have any coloration in him at all. He is all white. My question is; WHY?

how are you loading him up? are you opening nifskope then hit load or are you double-clickingon the nif file in windows explorer (which will automatically launch the nif in nifskope)?

do the windowsexplorer one to get the art to show. if it still doesn't show - upload both of your nif files so i can see if something unforeseen happened

 

[The Capo]

Alright, nevermind... sorry. But mine (on the right, obviously) still doesn't show the art for LDF and Morgan (on the hat) how do I get that to show. Sorry, I'm just not used to this stuff at all.

 

[Ekmek]

the ldf and frederick art are in the same folder as the VDD.nif you just opened up? if not that may be the problem - if not then maybe they didn't load because its not called in the original.

but really it doesn't matter that much for the swapping part (its a great way to see if your art is lining up)

try the swap now - i'll be back in 30min. save it as the VDD.nif (since I'm assuming your doing this from your custom assets folder) then launch the game.

 

[The Capo]

I don't know what "the swap" is.

And no I'm not doing it from my custom assets folder, I'm doing it from a mod I'm working on. Basically the one on the left is just the normal VDD, the one on the right is my LH.

I'll be back in 30 minutes to see what you say, I am just asking what I need to do with the art and what files need to go in there. The art for LDF and Morgan are already in the folder with Gustav. So beyond that what do I have to do?

EDIT: I'll re-read everything again.

 

[Ekmek]

so if you are doing irt in your mod folder than the Gustav should have everything from VDD and the additional frederick and LDF art files (fredereick_diff.dds and LDF_1024.dds)

the swap is everything I described here:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=7463411&postcount=172

 

[snipperrabbit!!]

Capo, have you renamed the texture or something ? it may just be a broken path ...

 

[The Capo]

I'll look at it in a couple of minutes and I'll post what I see here, I'll even show a screen of what I have in my folder so you can see what I am dealing with. I am in a huge breakdown in the political situation in my diplomacy game right now, and there are changes and shifting alliances abound. I have to handle that first.

 

[The Capo]

Alright, here is a photo of what is in the folder along with my leaderhead. I have boxed in the parts that come from Fontenac folder, as you can see they are there and yet the body isn't painted. What is the explanation for this?

 

[Ekmek]

looks fine. I think you can do the nif-swap now. but if you wnat me to look at it first, attch your gustavhaircut.nif here.

 

[The Capo]

I'll try out the nif-swap thing, but it looks kind of complicated. Do you want the whole folder or just the Gustavhaircut.nif?

EDIT: Also, why is the body so small? LDF's body isn't that small.

 

[Ekmek]

just the nif

 

[The Capo]

Here's the folder by the way.

EDIT: Sorry, posted before you clarified, its in there though.

 

[The Capo]

Okay, well I reloaded it and it looks like the picture attached below, but I didn't do any of the swapping yet. What exactly does the swapping do and the body still looks a bit small to me.

It looks like he has a hole beneath his neck and above his sternum, so I guess I have to go back to blender again huh?

 

[The Capo]

Anyway, I tried to fix the hole in his chest. But I got an error while trying to export the .nif, any ideas as to why. I posted both the images.

 

[Ekmek]

I didn't do any of the swapping yet. What exactly does the swapping do and the body still looks a bit small to me.

The swapping is what makes it viewable. Blender loses all the lamps and lighting (and some kfm mapping I think). So you have to do the swap in order for it to show in game.

I did the swap in undera minute. Its actually pretty easy (especially once you are used to it)

attached is an ingame shot of the leaderhead YOU made. I just did the nif swap and fixed the materials like I described previously and I'll repost here:

also in the rar below I have a copy of that nif for reference (its game playable).



BUT the body/torso is small (go to edit mode, highlight the whole body and hit 's' and move the mouse to resize it) and you didn't delete the hat rim or the edge of the sleeves in blender. So you'll have to go back. the blend you sent me exported fine. so go with that one (UV apping is a different problem, that I didn't get) BUT do the nif swap first. Once you do that you won't need me much anymore.

make a copy of the original VDD and open it (prefereably in a folder with the art files - you can copy all of VDD and name it gustav if that works for you.) NOTE: DO VIEW BLOCK DETAILS! Open this copy of the original VDD nif & open your exported blender nif of gustav. I usually keep them side by side. Now do these steps:

1) click on the VDD niTriShape (highlighted blue on the LEFT in my screen shot and then right click until you see the box with options (in black on the right side of my screen) choose 'Remove Branch' - this will get rid of the original body.

2) click on the VDD niTriShape (highlighted blue in on the RIGHT in my screen shot and then right click until you see the box with options (in black on the right side of my screen) choose 'Copy Branch' - this will copy your new body body.

3) click on the 'scene root' of the original/LEFT VDD. Then Right Click until you see the box and choose 'Paste Branch' (see picture, more follows)

Now in picture 2
1) click on your new body of VDD. you'll see details open up.

2) click on materials and you see at the bottom more details.

3) the three lines here you'll adjust for the shaders. For now leave it as is and save it. You can go on to add the hat in and everything else or set-up the xml and test in game.

When in game you'll see if its real shiny. if so lower the glossiness to 10. you may also need to add specular color. click on that stuff and mess with numbers. you can do this while the game is still running, make a change in nifskpoe save it, and ten just refresh your civilopedia by clicking another leadr and then go back to gustav.

After doing all this, you made your first leaderhead! Congrats, now go make a Capo Leaderhead gallery

 

[The Capo]

you do that you won't need me much anymore.

I wouldn't go that far just yet. Did you read my last post? I realized that I forgot the extra plate on his torso, so it's black under his neck, and when I tried to add that to the body it wouldn't let me export the nif. I put up a screen shot, do you know why I am having this issue?

 

[The Capo]

I removed the appropriate stuff (the brim, and the cuffs and all that), and tried to export the nif (I saved the blend) and it doesn't save and says "Vertex color painting/lighting enabled, but mesh has no vertex color data"

What does this mean and how can I fix/get around this?

 

[Ekmek]

yeah the UV texture is a problem(but easy to fix). Lets get a working in-game nif first. we'll come back to the breast plate (and other stuff) once you get a handle on nifskope.