Blog for Matt Summers at GarageGames.com

Wednesday Oct 5 7:28

Matt Summers — 2005-10-05T07:28:27+00:00

Its been a while since my last plan, but trust me, we've been busy...

Now that I have the official ok to post some information about the projects we've been working on here at Dark Industries, I figured its about time to let you folks know that we are still around and still working hard on exporters and other projects.

One of the projects we've been working on is the new 3DS Max 7 DTS exporter. This is a complete rewrite using the DTSSDK+ and includes a complete MaxScript utility that automates all of the DTS settings and features.

The Max 7 DTS utility is divided into separate managers that contain automation tools to help make the DTS setup process as easy as possible. The exporter UI is user resizeable with a built in minimize button that shrinks the UI to a tool bar size to free up screen space.

The UI can also be docked in any max view port and remembers its last size and screen location each time it is opened. There are also quick setup/quick export tools that let you literally export any simple object with one button click in the UI. We will be keeping the Max exporter up to date from this point on, and shortly after Max 8 comes out the exporter will be updated work with it.

Another long awaited update is on our progress with the XSI DTS exporter. The core exporter is feature complete and the exporter is compatible with both XSI 4.x and the newly released 5.0. I am now in the process of porting all of the automation tools from the new Max 7 exporter Utility to work with the Softimage XSI so that the feature set and work flow in both 3d apps will be as close as possible.

Shortly after IGC we will be releasing the beta of the free lite version of the XSI exporter, we are still working out what features will be available in the free version so I will post more information on that when it becomes available.

Also, upcoming builds of both the Max 8 and XSI 5 will be available in 64-bit versions. We are in the process of upgrading our operation systems and compilers to be able to support the 64-bit versions of these 3d tools as well the existing 32-bit versions.

Another project we've been working on is a complete website solution for Indie Game developers that has everything needed to create and edit a professional website for your game company. The website features a full content management system at allows you easily add any amount of content, news, forums, downloads, screen shots, blogs and many other features needed by game developers. I'll be posting more information about the Indy Game Sites CMS system in my next plan.

I finally got to take a vacation this year and a few weeks ago I got back from a road trip with my girl friend. We drove my Miata from Western Wisconsin to Yellow Stone National Park in Wyoming and back in about a week and a half and around 2500 miles round trip. Let me tell ya that is a long drive, but there is some amazing scenery along the way. Anyone who has never been there, go check it out, it is definitely worth the trip...

For anyone who is headed to IGC, Ill be there with the latest builds of both of the new exporters. If you flag me down and have any questions I'll be more than happy to answer them there.

Tuesday Nov 16 4:12

Matt Summers — 2004-11-16T04:12:17+00:00

Full steam ahead on the Softimage XSI 4 DTS exporter...

Work is progressing nicely on the Softimage XSI 4 DTS exporter. Right now I'm writing the helper tools that automate all of the setup involved in creating a DTS shape, but everything will still be able to be setup manually for people who like to understand whats going on under the hood. Here's screen capture of the work in progess version.

Some of the cool features I'm working on are a DTS setup validator that scans the scene and list problems before you even export (my selfish attempt at reduceing support) and auto collision shape generation similar to the auto bounds generation in some of the other DTS exporters. i.e. it will auto-magically create a collision box the volume of selected object(s). You'll also be able to export a .CFG file from the GUI as well, for those people out there that fear text editors.

Docs will be built right into the exporter UI so no one will be able to use the excuse that they couldn't find them. (you know who you are people) :)

Friday Aug 20 6:37

Matt Summers — 2004-08-20T06:37:59+00:00

Version 2 of the gameSpace/trueSpace DTS exporter is released into the wild...

Mike Jarosch and I have released version 2.0 of the gameSpace/trueSpace DTS exporter and it is now available from the resources section of the Garage Games website.

Version 2 is a complete re-write of the exporter using the DTS SDK plus and has support for the entire DTS feature set. Get your copy here

The installer also includes detailed documentation on how to use the exporter as well as alot of general DTS knowledge collected from various GG resources. Preview the docs here.

One thing worth noteing is that the workflow process in this version has changed drastically compared to the first version and it now has a work flow very near that of the Max and Maya exporters. Read the docs before using it and you'll be far better off. :)

The set of sample files will be available for download in the next few days.

Tuesday Jul 27 17:09

Matt Summers — 2004-07-27T17:09:07+00:00

gameSpace/trueSpace DTS exporter version 2.0 beta

We've started beta testing the next version of the DTS exporter for gameSpace and trueSpace. This version is a complete rewrite of the exporter from the ground up using the DTS SDK Plus. Because of this the entire setup process has been completely redesigned and it is now nearly identical to the Max and Maya exporters.

The exporter no longer uses layers but you can still use them to organize your scene. Setup now uses a DTS hierarchy with detail markers, sequence markers, etc.

Here is an example of the hierarchy setup:

All of the properties that are stored as custom object attributes in Maya or Max are stored in object notes in gameSpace. (note: because of this we cannot support older versions of trueSpace)

This version is feature complete including: IFL, Ground Transform, Vertex and Texture animation, .cfg files etc.

I'm writing the docs and creating several sample scenes to go with the exporter. Depending on how the testing goes and the time it takes to finish up the docs will determine the release date. I'm hoping for this weekend, but no promises.

Clark's great work on the DTS SDK plus has made this exporter twice as good as the last version. Special thanks to Clark and Joe from Brave Tree and Pavol from Caligari their help and insight.

Friday Jun 18 3:26

Matt Summers — 2004-06-18T03:26:28+00:00

New version of our gameSpace/ trueSpace DTS exporter fast approaching completion.

For all the gameSpace/ trueSpace users that are out there, Mike Jarosch and I are fast approching the release of version 1.5 of our DTS exporter for gs/ts.

So far this version adds:
Ground transform animation, visibility animation, proper object handeling, triggers and node export control is on the way.

Also, the billboard and sort flags were moved to the object name instead of the layer flag so you can use them on a per object basis.

Our additions to the dts SDK including the auto LOD code have been sent to GG so they can add them to CVS.

Friday Apr 9 0:54

Matt Summers — 2004-04-09T00:54:26+00:00

GameSpace/ TrueSpace 6.5+ DTS exporter now available, source code to follow shortly...

The first release of our DTS exporter for GameSpace 1.x and TrueSpace 6.5+ is complete and is now available for download. As soon as I get a chance It will also be posted here on Garage Games as a resource. The source code will be available in the next week or so once we clean it up a bit and make sure our changes to the DTS SDK won't break anything. Download the exporter here

The exporter also includes extensive documentation on how to use it and also information on the DTS feature set. The DTS info was collected from several garage games resources and compiled into the docs for the exporter so the information was all in one place. Preview the docs here

Feature wise it currently supports:

multiple materials per object, material properties, mesh sorting, tri-stripping, custom bounds, mipmap control, multiple collision objects, multiple LOS collision objects, auto Level of detail (like multires), manual detail levels, billboards and billboard detail levels, named nodes (static or animated), encoded normals, Transform animation (skeletal animation), named animations using clips, sequence priority, blend animation, and DSQ export

The remaining features will be added to the next release version of the exporter These include: ground transform animation, material animation, IFL, visibility animation, scale animation, node export control and triggers.

Here is an example of auto generated LOD objects using the Orc:

5 detail levels were auto generated by the exporter starting with original mesh triangles and reduced down to around 500 triangles. Texture coordinates are maintained as best as possible and it works on both animated and static objects.

Our additions to the DTS SDK will make it easy for the Milkshape and other exporters to add missing features like AutoLOD, tri-stripping, DSQ, mesh sorting, and more.

Torque Content Conversion

I am also currently in the process of converting the Torque content into gameSpace/ trueSpace format so users of this exporter will be able to modify the objects and export them for use with TGE.