.obj -> .sur converter

Schmackbolzen wrote:
To all who are waiting: We are in the final testing state. Everything is finished and a release depends only on how much bugs are discovered in the last checks. If all goes well I release today.

Changelog:
v. 1.1 BETA

• Fully support every feature of the .sur format
• New more accurate way of checking whether a shape is convex
• OBJ loader now reads more variations of the format
• Fixed all known cases where the .sur file was not correctly generated
• Some new options like merging close vertices and using only the outer convex hull for collisions
• Model cleanup before and after conversion

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It’s out
The multipart support is working very good. I tested it with 4 groups connected to each other, like a train with 4 wagons.

Great !!!

Been playing with the new version. A definite improvement over the last one. I’m only using it in single group models myself but even so, the hitboxes now actually register which they didn’t do before, (you could get the shield down but the hull wasn’t interested).

Not tried the multipart but i’m sure others will chime in with their reports. Managed to find a couple of models it wasn’t interested in making sur files for, but that’s ok. Keep up the good work.

Very many thanks, Schmackbolzen, your long effort is very much appreciated as always.

And thanks to you too, Skotty, for your testing, I know how long it takes.

Just a quick query: are the default settings good for most vanilla ships?

Or what settings are better?

Thanks again.

You can leave the default settings. They work good for nearly every sur (I never had one of my surs where I needed to change these settings).
Just make sure to create convex meshes, I recommend the Convex-Plugin for Milkshape for this.

Skotty. wrote:
You can leave the default settings. They work good for nearly every sur (I never had one of my surs where I needed to change these settings).
Just make sure to create convex meshes, I recommend the Convex-Plugin for Milkshape for this.

I have the plugin Skotty, but am I suppose to use it if you don’t mind me asking.

Schmack, got a question.

I’ve used your older version of the exporter for all the models, 200+ in the FW:ToW mod. We’ve tested every hitbox the best we can and from we can tell, everything is working. It’s a fabulous tool.

That being said, would you recommend I reconvert all the .objs again using this version of the exporter or should I just leave it as is Is there any advantages in reconverting them with this version?

It’s only about 2 1/2 hrs of work as I have all the .objs saved.

Schmackbolzen wrote:
Yes, I recommend it. The recognition of convex shapes now is much better plus there was an error which lead to garbage at one offset. FL doesn’t seem to use it but you never know. Also because of the better recognition the files should be smaller, which also means faster. It would be interesting if you could post numbers of the file size difference. That should give an indication of how often the old recognition was wrong. Also in some cases the triangles of a particular group got mixed up which might not always have been noticed by you.

OK. Thanks Schmack!

Great W0RK as for the older versions, thx

Awesome job! Finally we got a proper sur tool!!! It only took like 7 years

Schmackbolzen wrote:
I am trying to read .cmp files as a next step, so if your release is not in the near future you also could wait with converting all of them again and automatically let the tool include the hardpoint geometry.

What are you saying here exactly? Convert straight from .cmp to sur?

It won’t use the geometry of the CMP, but it will add all hardpoints to their sur parts and it will also make all sur groups belong to each other like it’s set in the FIX file.

Congrats Schmackbolzen, glad you made this! Never figured out the bits section but it seems you have. I spent several months as well working on this problem so I know how hard it was to build this tool, you made it farther than I did.

A simple request, could you make it where it outputs a file other than a sur file such as obj or fbx? Some of the test models in GE have a massive poly count (> 500k) and would benefit from a low poly collision mesh.

The converter itself wont create a low poly mesh. Thats the work of the 3d artist. It will just generate a automatic sur out of each polygon of your obj file if it’s not concave.

Creating physmodels per hand is a important job, because on that way you can be sure to use a low poly count without ignoring maybe important parts of the ship.

Schmack, I was speaking with Sushi minutes ago and I wondered… Did you end up adding command line support? Even something primitive (convert given OBJ to SUR with default settings) would be more than enough, could then make a small batch file to pass through all the OBJs we have.

It’d tremendously speed up the reconversion process