[TUT] NIF Viewer Tutorial - Part 3

[sepamu92]

Rabbit, White, I have followed this tutorial, and I tried to make an _FX version of a unit I have made how you said. I have opened the .nif, opened the Properties of the body, and in Geography tried to change "Default Fixed-Function Pipeline" to "TCiv4Skinning" like you said, but for some reason it isn't there In fact the only option I have is the "Default Fixed-Function Pipeline". I even tried opening the _FX's of some other units and every time I do, a pop-up shows and says:

"Cannot find shader TCiv4Skinning, Implementation -1
Failed to find shader TCiv4Skinning, Implementation -1"

I don't understand why the shader options aren't showing up. Maybe there's something wrong with my version of NifViewer?

 

[Rabbit, White]

Rabbit, White, I have followed this tutorial, and I tried to make an _FX version of a unit I have made how you said. I have opened the .nif, opened the Properties of the body, and in Geography tried to change "Default Fixed-Function Pipeline" to "TCiv4Skinning" like you said, but for some reason it isn't there In fact the only option I have is the "Default Fixed-Function Pipeline". I even tried opening the _FX's of some other units and every time I do, a pop-up shows and says:

"Cannot find shader TCiv4Skinning, Implementation -1
Failed to find shader TCiv4Skinning, Implementation -1"

I don't understand why the shader options aren't showing up. Maybe there's something wrong with my version of NifViewer?

How do you "open" the units? Do you just double click the NIF files and let them open the viewer? Because if you do that it wouldn't load the shader. You need to load the viewer by itself, using its exe file first, then use the open dialog to open up the units.

If you do open the viewer first and you still get the missing shader then something got messed up during "installation" maybe you're missing a dll or something else, and unfortunately I can't help you with that.

 

[sepamu92]

Oh I see, tried it now and it worked fine. Seems so simple now that I think of it. Thanks again Rabbit, White!

 

[esnaz]

Although when I do the transplant it looks like this:
(see quechaprob.bmp)

but after i save/reopen it, it looks like this:
(see quecha.bmp)

 

[Rabbit, White]

Although when I do the transplant it looks like this:
(see quechaprob.bmp)

but after i save/reopen it, it looks like this:
(see quecha.bmp)

esnaz, you'll need to give me more details. As I understand you do the "transplant" of bones from one unit to another, but when you save and reopen it, it ends up like that. Please describe in more detail what exactly you're doing, so I may be able to help you better.

The only time I saw something like this was when I reset the orientation and position of bones for the unit itself, i.e. without moving it to another unit. But in those cases you can see the effect immediately.

Also, just for a test try to do this on a small scale. I.e. go through the tutorial again but just do it for a few bones, like maybe just the arm - clavicle, upperarm, forearm and hand bones. See if you can make it work, maybe you just missed something.

 

[esnaz]

I did the bone transplant like you said, with an archer unit, and when I did the transpland and fixed the orientation, it looked fine

i saved the file, but when I re-opened it to check on it, to see if it was still a good file, the jaguar unit was scrunched up in a ball at the bottom, but the archery weapons were still intact...

I hope that explains it!

p.s.: i kno someone who plays GuildWars

 

[Neomega]

How do you open two "scene graph trees" as in the "bone transplant" section?

 

[Rabbit, White]

How do you open two "scene graph trees" as in the "bone transplant" section?

I'm sorry if it was misleading but I simply photoshoped two scenegraph trees together for the screenshots (so you can more clearly see the differences between two states of the tree), you can only have one open at a time.

 

[Neomega]

Am I doing something wrong, or does the scene tree re-collapse every time you parent a BIP bone?

That really makes the tedium more tedious.

 

[Rabbit, White]

Am I doing something wrong, or does the scene tree re-collapse every time you parent a BIP bone?

That really makes the tedium more tedious.

If you delete something then the whole tree collapses. As for parenting BIP nodes, if I remember correctly if I first select the parent, then the node I want to move (to that parent) and then drag it there then the tree remains open. If I however, don't select the parent first then that branch (to which I drag the other node) will collapse, but only the branch. I don't think I ever had the whole tree collapse when I drag a node. However, I didn't do anything in any settings or anything like that to make it behave that way. So if it acts differently for you, there's not much you can do about it AFAIK.

NIF viewer is generally buggy, unstable and an exercise in frustration. Having said that, many engine developers don't bother with tools like that at all so we still got lucky.

 

[Bahmo]

Hey Rabbit. Could you please see if you could answer my question in part one?

 

[Rabbit, White]

Hey Rabbit. Could you please see if you could answer my question in part one?

Done

... short message... cannot comply... danger, danger...

 

[GarretSidzaka]

this is the best tutorial in the whole civfanatics

 

[Rabbit, White]

Something I should've done long time ago - I put a PDF version of the tutorial on the file database. I linked it in the first post or you can just go here - http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=4389

 

[GarretSidzaka]

good job. this tutorial is indispensable for unit makers, a must-read!