CMP to SUR Conversion Tests

Thank you, guys, for your comments.

@Gisteron: Yes, you continue to have the balance right: If you don’t like the SUR Builder’s results, then use another method. Thank you for suggesting OPR8R’s SUR method. It is a promising-looking tutorial.

@ST: I would be interested in a second opinion about OP’s method. It looks good to me, but I do not have the right stuff to test it.

@Lonestar: Yes, incomplete documentation of the SUR format prevents a 100% solution.

@Mirkha: +1 for the suggestion to disable multi-part SURs. That is my favorite solution so far!

StarTrader says that a simple model with simple shapes it is not processed correctly by the tool. He doesn’t talk about a perfect sur, he talks about missing parts in the sur.

Yes, that is what he says. If that were the full story, then I would be interested in pursuing it. However, take a close look at his 14-box model (below). I am surprised that the Builder found as many of the parts as it did.

The truth is that every anomaly submitted in this thread has been traced to an issue with the model. The SUR Builder cannot read the mind of the modeler… it can only follow a continuous shape. Like any other computer tool, “garbage in = garbage out”.

Tips for preparing a model for the SUR Builder:

• Make sure that there is a continuous shape for the Builder to follow. Weld seams and close shapes that do not build properly.
• Add extra polygons for shapes that do not build properly (tesselate).
• Use one group per mesh (what is the best way of saying that?)

Bullwinkle wrote:
Tips for preparing a model for the SUR Builder:

• Make sure that there is a continuous shape for the Builder to follow. Weld seams and close shapes that do not build properly.
• Add extra polygons for shapes that do not build properly (tesselate).
• Use one group per mesh (what is the best way of saying that?)

ok, do you mean that each group need to be continuous ?
or the entire model ?
i thought that it was for each group
that the sur builder “draw” a hitbox one after one, so it is not necessary that each group should beside the other

Mirkha wrote:
do you mean that each group need to be continuous ?
or the entire model?

You ask the best questions, Mirkha!

I don’t know 100% of the answer to that.

The Builder attempts to build a convex hull by making successive approximations to the outline(s) that it finds in the model’s parts. I suspect that some models may build correctly without a continuous outline, while others will not. However, that is a bit of a guess.

I would be interested in reports on that topic.

BW is still ignoring the evidence I have put forward, and still accusing me of trying to fool the tool.

I cannot understand why you think that I would want to do that instead of assist to define and identify the problem so that it can be perfected, which is what we all want. We do not want more substandard tools, we have enough of those already as all of the modders here will confirm.

As Mirkha guessed, I did go to great lengths, many hours, over several days, to diagnose this problem and give you verifiable feedback.

Thank you for believing in me Mirkha, it is very much appreciated.

When there is an intermittent problem, the way to find it is to try to isolate it, and make it easily reproduceable.

I have done that for this case.

But you dismiss it. I even tried to avoid that…

The long diagnosis I made was with the ship model. But I needed more definite methods because the ship could be easily dismissed as “faulty”.

But it was a surprise that the sur builder cannot build surs for a series of boxes.

The test file merely narrows down and focusses on the problem, without the possibility of it being “the ship”.

There is no ship, only well-made, welded boxes.

They are formed differently to prove or disprove that the forward angle may make a difference to whether the tool succeeds or not - it does!

An obtuse angle fails, an acute angle works!

They were also placed left and right of the Origin to identify if position makes a difference - it does!

There is no logical reason that it would be OK to generate a sur part for one box but not for the same box when it is moved to the opposite side of the centerline.

Think about this and forget for a moment that you hate and despise me and that you think I am an irresponsible, horrid and spiteful teenager…

Look at the shapes closely, note each shape and its position, whether it had a sur part generated, and where its mirrored or identical twin is too, and whether that had a sur part made.

As you see in the jpg of my test file, the sur builder does build surs for parts that are not attached, not welded to each other, and are not adjacent to each other. That is a VERY positive result of the test file. The large box turned at 45 degrees at the back of the model proves that. And the individual surs at the front also prove that.

Sur builder centers each sur part on the shape it covers, and this is good too - invalidating BW’s comment “how would it know where to place the part”? Clearly, it does, and does it well!

And every box in the test file is properly welded, they are complete boxes.

But in my original model the two wings were not properly welded, some of the vertices were separated, and the wing ends were open - but the sur builder still made a good sur for those wings, only the right tip was not made.

But when I moved the left wing-tip to the right wing (deleting the right wing-tip), it did not make a sur part for it.

Did you understand that?

The only difference is that the part was moved to the right of the Origin.

It is not necessary for ship parts to be welded together, but obviously in a good model they will be adjacent or overlapping if not welded together, otherwise there will be gaps in the model and maybe its textures, not a good thing.

But note - the sur builder can make a good sur for a sphere that is placed between two ship arms without touching them, this is absolutely great - a “plasma” weapon held in place between two booms by “force fields” could now be possible in a model.

I did attach the .ms3d file of the tests too, with the jpg, but it was ignored. So you can make the same tests yourselves that I did.

If you disable the multi-group function of the sur builder you will have destroyed it and LS’s good work.

It will remain a single-sur tool and we already have one that does that well enough.

It will be of no more interest to me, but somehow I don’t think you will care.

After all I believe you think I am an irresponsible twerp bent on discrediting you, or having a laugh at your expense, rather than the opposite, of trying to assist you by spending a lot of my time investigating this and developing a method to isolate the problem, to identify the exact problem, so that you or LS or someone else can debug it and make it the great tool that it can be.

But it’s in your hands, it’s really too much effort, and you ain’t about to let it get better if you can help it, are you.

I wish someone else had taken this on, I really do. As far as I can see right now this superb tool is lost to us.

to progress : Bullwinkle can you make a very simple model like a tie ?
i mean by your own, two sphere + 4 rectangles
less simple will be difficult ^^
and try to make a sur

at the end i think we’ll need a tutoriel with all we need to do and especially what we must not do

at the end, the sur builder is to make multipart sur
as StarTrader says, if it’s only for one group hitbox we can easily done that in milkshape

this tool, for me, is dedicated to replace the sur splicing method
maybe not as acurate than the sur splicer but not so far

can you ?
that maybe can identify if the sur builder treat each group one by one or as an entire model

okay, first of all, ST, stop trolling. you just provoke BW to troll back, that won’t help anyone. BW, don’t take critiques personally, if we report issues, no matter how much, mostly theire supposed to help rather than to disrespect someone.
okay, that being said.
i think we need to pay attention on ST’s investigations, as, if he sais the truth, and shapes are not surred correctly depending on their coordinates or angle, this is not a feature anymore and clearly has to be fixed. ofc, approximation is good, but we can splice approximate surs so what would we need a tool for, if it does deside to build or not to build on its own?
now, to OP’s method. unfortunately its limited to ten model groups, do work or do not work almost randomly and are in this way inefficient for larger ships. moreover i experienced that the random unability of model parts does only appear when you use the ships as solars (sattelites in my cases), while, when you fly them, all parts work just great.
another problem is, that the whole model is streched to the very edges of the mesh by resizing. small parts like a forward gun, if modeled, do sometimes cause unfitting sur shapes. this likely can be avoided by sizing it with the modeltool by factor one rather than by cmp model. in that case it is necessary to have put the model where the ship is, too, if the ship is not centered.

the splicing method is btw very similar, but with one difference: while the ship works fine as satellitte, with both, collisions and shots, most parts are disabled when you fly it (maybe all except for the first?) to collisions, however do detect all armament hits.

StarTrader wrote:
I believe you think I am an irresponsible twerp bent on [something]…

I do not know your reasons for ranting, but I do listen when you effectively communicate a valid point. I certainly respect your experience.

However, I cannot do anything about a phantom that I cannot reproduce. Can you show me a valid model that fails? One that does not include the issues that we have discussed?

StarTrader wrote:
I wish someone else had taken this on, I really do.

So do I, StarTrader.

So do I!

@Mirkha: Actually, I cannot make a model. I don’t even have the tools. I am dependent on you modelers for test objects.

Are you having trouble making a SUR for a Tie Fighter using the single-part method? As I have pointed out several times, the computer does not care about the wings. Hit detection is based on a probability of a hit, so a sphere or a cube will produce very nearly identical results in-game. I would be surprised if you could tell the difference during normal game play.

Bullwinkle wrote:

@Mirkha: Actually, I cannot make a model. I don’t even have the tools. I am dependent on you modelers for test objects.

Are you having trouble making a SUR for a Tie Fighter using the single-part method? As I have pointed out several times, the computer does not care about the wings. Hit detection is based on a probability of a hit, so a sphere or a cube will produce very nearly identical results in-game. I would be surprised if you could tell the difference during normal game play.

ok maybe i can do a model this evening and send you here

no, i haven’t any trouble to do a single part sur
but, i play freeworlds since 4 years now ;), i can say that it has a difference between single part and multi part
really when you see your laser pass between the two wings it’s just … \o/ \o/
and obviously the mod is more difficult with multipart sur

it’s just a choice the dev made for each mod

Gisteron wrote:
if … shapes are not surred correctly depending on their coordinates or angle

Yes, if that turns out to be the case, then it will give me something to investigate.

It is unfortunate that there are issues with other methods. A reliable manual technique would solve most of this discussion.

Mirkha wrote:
i can say that it has a difference between single part and multi part really when you see your laser pass between the two wings

OK, I can picture that. The solution, of course, is a spherical SUR the size of the main hull. That way most hits on wings would score, and shots between wings would miss. There might a a rare shot where you might not hit a wing that you expect to hit but, then again, there is some probability of a hit anyway.

Mirkha wrote:
ok maybe i can do a model this evening and send you here

Good. If you do that, could you try a couple of experiments for me?:

• Make sure that the wings have some thickness (not 2-D).
• Build the main body, then make a SUR for it. Then add the wings. Does the resulting SUR work in-game? That would be very close to what you seek, and could probably be done as a single-part SUR.
• Try the wings 1) connected to the body and 2) disconnected (not touching). Is there a difference in the resulting SURs?

@ST: The bottom line is, the sur builder is a simple tool for newbie modders.

Any serious modder should invest the time to do custom surs by hand rather than put something in a tool and wait for its outcome.
Therefore its perfectly fine if BW doesnt want to spend hours trying to cater to special requests as regards the input model. A model that has parts that are not connected in any way are not a “normal” model, they are a special case.

It is unfortunate that there are issues with other methods. A reliable manual technique would solve most of this discussion.

Thats why Im eagerly anticipating Schmackbolzens attempt to build a obj->sur converter from scratch by using adoxa’s and other’s findings.

Ugh, Are you guys NOT reading what star tracker is saying here?

He has found and reproudced IN A SIMPLE MODEL what casued this tool to fail. And You all simply dismiss it, and call him purpously tricking the tool. UM that HOW someone a problem. First You identifly the problem, Witch star tracker has spent many hours doing. Much thanks by the way. Second You reproduce the problem again ST has done this again. Third You find out why that problem is happining and fix it. THIS IS NOT BEING DONE.

So before you all go and push the hard work of Startracker aside and or ruin the tool, Look at the work that Statracker has done, look at his model and see what the heck the program is doing and fix it.

It is as simple as that, why can you not see it.

edit: Yes I know hte example model is not a REAL model but it ADDRESSES the problems with this tool as it stand currently.

walks away shaking his head in duscus

Bullwinkle wrote:
Good. If you do that, could you try a couple of experiments for me?:

• Make sure that the wings have some thickness (not 2-D).
• Build the main body, then make a SUR for it. Then add the wings. Does the resulting SUR work in-game? That would be very close to what you seek, and could probably be done as a single-part SUR.
• Try the wings 1) connected to the body and 2) disconnected (not touching). Is there a difference in the resulting SURs?

i try, not promise to finish tonight
i’m alone to test so it’s “a little” difficult to test as a ship
and i’m not as good as ST in modelling ;), so it would take more time
but i’m on it

No rush, Mirkha. This is a long-term project.

But I appreciate your efforts.

Guys.

OK, no more trolling -

I will always react strongly to being offended time after time. Nobody likes to be offended, and I also realise I have done that to BW too.

BW: I apologise, my response was out of frustration and being very offended by your offhanded and repeated dismissals.

For the last time, I am not trying to “fool the tool”. What I am trying so hard to do is to give you proof that the problem exists and can be reproduced, so that you can have a starting point to look for the problem.

Note: It did not matter whether the boxes are welded to each other, or overlapping each other or separate. It made absolutely no difference in my first test file.

I separated them to see if there was any difference - and once I had seen that it made no difference (the same boxes still had no surs) I left them like that, concentrating instead on the shapes, making some with obtuse angles and some with acute angles as you can see from the jpg, and you can see the results.

Try to read my previous posts to see the symptoms while I cool off and try to be logical in my next test file.

Some sad news - I just found a couple of hours ago that in a new test model with 13 boxes and two spheres, ONE of the SPHERES did not generate either. I had only made one sphere in my previous test and that had worked.

This problem is also my goal to verify before I present it, like I did with the previous file.

So give me some time and I will bring you more evidence of the problem, and I will show you welded and separated parts too.

In the meantime, those of you who have MilkShape and the .cmp exporter and the sur builder and the sur importer can duplicate my tests yourselves and report back.

W0dk4:

Why do you also say this tool is for beginners?

I understand that you may enjoy doing the occasional model by hand, it does give a lot of satisfaction when it works (finally).

But for the tool I am surprised by your comment and I do not agree with you at all.

I have had to spend those long hours on many models, and redo and redo. I have also had to struggle my way through various “tutorials” that caused more misinformation too. When you take on a project to make several models it’s no longer fun when they fail initially.

If this problem can be identified properly and fixed, it will be the best sur tool at our disposal and will cover so many requirements including large ships, bases, scenery and whatever else modders would like to try.

It’s already great with single-part surs for small ships, although personally I would far prefer to have surs closer to vanilla types, with all groups and HpMount instead of just a single wrapper. But that’s another issue.

And it will be by far better than all other methods. So what’s wrong with that?

It really is so nearly there.

w0dk4 wrote:
@ST: The bottom line is, the sur builder is a simple tool for newbie modders.

Any serious modder should invest the time to do custom surs by hand rather than put something in a tool and wait for its outcome.
Therefore its perfectly fine if BW doesnt want to spend hours trying to cater to special requests as regards the input model. A model that has parts that are not connected in any way are not a “normal” model, they are a special case.

It is unfortunate that there are issues with other methods. A reliable manual technique would solve most of this discussion.

Thats why Im eagerly anticipating Schmackbolzens attempt to build a obj->sur converter from scratch by using adoxa’s and other’s findings.

Ok, first off w0dk4, your wrong about the sur builder being a tool for newbies. Can’t believe you said that. It’s a tool to help people with their projects, just like any other tool made for FL. Next thing you’re going to tell me is i should make my own 3D model making program so i know how to do that as well :-x

Most of us, me included don’t have time to waste on things we either don’t understand or can’t be bothered to understand. If a tool comes along that hastens the overall process, i’m all for it, doesn’t matter what tool it is.

The sur builder is not for newbies that’s for sure, as i’m sure as anything that you use tools for your modelling efforts, this is no different.

Its definately a tool for newbies. Im not saying that experienced modders shouldnt use it, Im saying that if you want a good, quality sur, you better do it by hand.

And what really bothers me is that rather for someone to write a working sur-exporter, people wish for an automated solution that can only give mediocre results at best.

If hitbox generation could be automated to the extent some people in this thread would wish it to be, why are there still custom made hitboxes in todays games?

w0dk4 wrote:
And what really bothers me is that rather for someone to write a working sur-exporter, people wish for an automated solution that can only give mediocre results at best.

Exactly.

The SUR Builder is fast, sure, but wouldn’t it also be pretty quick to build a custom SUR if the Exporter worked reliably?

Then a modder could make their SUR look exactly the way he/she wants it to look.

The SUR Builder makes pretty good compromises, as far as I can tell. It is terrific for newbies and good for some experienced modders who like it. I can envision a modder of any skill level using it for the majority of models in a mod, while saving a few complex models for hand-crafted techniques.

But it will never, ever, have the fine level of control that a 3D modeling program has.

@startrader
go test havoc tools and try it on the simple test
test to see if havoc sur can do it
i talk with lance about it
a while back to make it like that tool
but he never looked into it

but i did find with havoc some times it did miss bits out
but just a simple weld fixed that problem

but looking at the test its like it aint counting the parts
or is it and shrinking them to 1 point ??
if it is i would say its a weld fail
simple to fix then but then it would be down to the model failing not the tool

like i say now and again when i sur i get a total collapse
on some parts but it seems it might be the same fail the tool is having
but test that first on it if it fails its model if not its a simple fact it aint counting the amout of parts

well, as far i can test
the object was always in solar
i haven’t test as a ship yet, and alone it’s a little difficult

tie_0 : tie without wings
tie_1 : tie_1.ms3d, is a tie with each group in each other
tie_1b : tie with welded parts
tie_2 : tie_2_separated_groups.ms3d

tie_multi, and so on : obvious

the tie_1 works ingame without a sur
and a single group sur

the tie_0 works ingame without a sur
and a single group sur

using the sur builder :

single part :
Min MAx sort
No sort : ok
Type 1 : ok
Type 2: no

Secondary sort :
no sort : ok

multi part :

no sort : all seems to be good
type 1 : partial hitbox
type 2 : partial hitbox

no sort secondary : only the sphere

• Make sure that the wings have some thickness (not 2-D).
  yes, as you can see in the ms3d

• Build the main body, then make a SUR for it. Then add the wings. Does the resulting SUR work in-game? That would be very close to what you seek, and could probably be done as a single-part SUR.
  no differences

• Try the wings 1) connected to the body and 2) disconnected (not touching). Is there a difference in the resulting SURs?
  no differences

in the zip all the cmp/mat/sur/ms3d
and screen shots to see what i’m talking about

the only one who works is the tie_multi_no_sort.sur
the cmp is 5 groups,
how i built the cmp :

export it with milkshape choosing 5 groups at the export, back to front and scale 1
then, rename all the materials in the cmp with utf editor to match what i’m used to
and make by hand a .dat and import it in the cmp with utf editor for the cons/fix
the cmp/sur/mat are fine ingame

http://soler.sebastien.free.fr/test_sur_builder/
all is here

i hope it helps

ps : the tie_multi_no_sort.sur with the groups all separate (tie_multi2.sur) seems to also works, in hardcmp
i haven’t tested ingame because here is 2:10 AM

all is in the zip file