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| Re: Logical Bodytypes[message #258750]
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Sun, 08 August 2010 13:38  
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| CptMoore |
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Messages:224
Registered:March 2009 |
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Hey Bio, I'm the guy how made some changes to the cover display (END-toggle) and I just wanted to ask why the heck the performance is so bad when several transparent tiles are added to the scene? Is transparency (half transparency where you can still see the background) just slow or should it have same performance as normal objects?
My implementation and algorithms are not optimized, but when the main problem is this transparency stuff then an optimization somewhere else wouldn't change anything.
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Sergeant 1st Class
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| Re: Logical Bodytypes[message #258791]
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Sun, 08 August 2010 20:50
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| Bio |
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Messages:62
Registered:April 2009
Location: Rhineland-Palatinate/Germ... |
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Hi CptMoore,
hmm not sure, would have to see what functions you are using (which blitter function is invoked and what is done beforehand). The blitting of partially transparent tiles should be very efficient. I can't imagine a noticable performance degredation if blitting a lot of these. For instance at times I was blitting all 15 defined layers for all bodytypes (so for the stock bodytypes 15 x the same animationsurface per render cycle). I probably had around 4, 5 mercs on screen. Thats about 60 additional tiles blitted (the bliter invoked supported transparency and shadows afaik). I did not register any performance degredation (CPU utilization was not notably higher either). 60 is a about 8 x 8 squares. I don't know how many tiles you are blitting, judging by the screenies you posted maybe about 16 x 16, so maybe about four times as many? I don't think that should be a problem.
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Corporal
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| Re: Logical Bodytypes[message #258800]
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Sun, 08 August 2010 22:06
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| CptMoore |
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Messages:224
Registered:March 2009 |
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Ok, thx thats what I needed to know. My guess it must be the LOS function itself, but I'm afraid of touching it (its a curley bracket monster used by almost every other function in the code).
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Sergeant 1st Class
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| Re: Logical Bodytypes[message #258849]
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Mon, 09 August 2010 01:46
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| Bio |
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Messages:62
Registered:April 2009
Location: Rhineland-Palatinate/Germ... |
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One last update before I'm off for the week (or I'm probably gonna import my sources and release a build tomorrow or the day after).
Thankfully I realized on time, that mixed palettes were completely unnecessary. I simply changed the head into a seperate layer (it was already defined anyways). So in my demo setup, the dress uniform has it's fixed palette (no body parts shown), while the head has the dynamic palette and thus the skin and hair color of the merc wearing it. Looks great.
For this to work for other body skins as well, it will obviously require to put the hands into an extra layer as well, but that's not really a problem.
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Corporal
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| Re: Logical Bodytypes[message #260404]
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Mon, 23 August 2010 23:49
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| Bio |
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Messages:62
Registered:April 2009
Location: Rhineland-Palatinate/Germ... |
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Progress is being made, albeit not quite as fast as I would like (my careless notion about making the hands into seperate layers being a piece of cake, well it was not quite so). I wasted a good junk of the last weekend on that problem alone. Sorry for not releasing anything yet. The main reason (the actual main reason begins with la and ends on zy) I decided against releasing, was that I felt some documentation was needed. It has reached a grade of complexity were it wouldn't make much sense to hand it out without at least some basic readmes/howtos. Also I wanted to produce some more material to enable others to properly test it (especially features like dynamic hands, that probably no one beside myself cares about right now  ).
In the meantime, I worked on both the 3dsmax rendering script and the post processing framework.
Stuff that I needed for a new concept I coined overlays. So the hands for instance are not a layer but are an overlay over another prop. In the case of hands that would be the body. Other examples are LBE stuff, holsters. Or for instance goggles on the head prop (though those probably would be barely noticable. Overlays are like skins in that they don't have own geometry. The difference being, that there is only one skin rendered per prop (for instance the default body xor the dress uniform, or the ak47 with wooden buttstock/handguard xor without) but there can be multiple overlays that are rendered in the same layer over the skin. Mind you overlay is a concept that exists only for the render scripts and the post processing. The logical body types or LBT implemenetation does not need to know about it.
Also began giving the post processing framework a major overhaul (as indicated as being necessary earlier), to accomodate for all the new stuff I added recently. It's probably still a weekend of work, but after that the infrastructure for both the batch rendering process for 3dsmax (blender is also on the roadmap) and the post processing will be finished and will satisfy the needs of the logical bodytypes implementation.
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Corporal
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| Re: Logical Bodytypes[message #261920]
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Tue, 07 September 2010 22:53
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 jmaze |
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Messages:2
Registered:September 2009 |
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AndrewBTwo questions actually:
Are these graphical detail features going to be implemented to enemies as well ?
I too am curious about this feature
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Civilian
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| Re: Logical Bodytypes[message #261956]
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Wed, 08 September 2010 06:32
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| jmaze |
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Messages:2
Registered:September 2009 |
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[quote=Bio]AndrewB
Another good question would be though, whether it is still worth all the effort, if next year JA reloaded will be released? I hate the idea of spending so much time (and all the animating work still required will require a sh!itload of additional time) only to see all modding effort switching over to the new game as a modding baseline. I wish I had adopted this project a couple of years ago...
I would say the effort is well deserved Bio.Please dont abandon this project
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Civilian
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| Re: Logical Bodytypes[message #261968]
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Wed, 08 September 2010 13:57
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| CptMoore |
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Messages:224
Registered:March 2009 |
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JA reloaded will not come out with its source code right? So it will not be able to compete with JA 1.13.
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Sergeant 1st Class
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| Re: Logical Bodytypes[message #263443]
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Fri, 24 September 2010 07:15
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| sorca_2 |
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Messages:202
Registered:September 2010
Location: California, USA |
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I couldn't agree more and... actually yes there is! I was going to wait another day or two to post an update here when I had a little more detail, but here's what I know for sure. Hopefully Bio doesn't mind my speaking on his behalf:
Bio is pretty busy right now, but he's still working on it. He accepted my offer for help (!!!) with the massive amount of Photoshop gruntwork that needs to be done. I hope this will cut down on the time to completion and reduce the psychological stress of tackling a giant project alone. I communicated with him a couple of times this week, and he's working on giving me my first official assignment very soon. I don't want to say much more without knowing more details myself.
Meanwhile I've been messing around with adapting JA1/DG merc faces for JA2 just to get back in the Photoshop saddle because I've probably got more will than skill right now. I also began work on the new user guide, but I had already decided that help on the logical bodytypes is the most important contribution I could make, so I'm 100% committed with any way I can help on this. The guide might take a little longer than I thought, but even if I only finish the first 2 sections, it'll be more than we have right now.
Anyway, I hope that's what you wanted to hear. 
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Sergeant 1st Class
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| Re: Logical Bodytypes[message #263843]
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Tue, 28 September 2010 21:23
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| Bio |
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Messages:62
Registered:April 2009
Location: Rhineland-Palatinate/Germ... |
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No, I don't mind at all. However we should clarify that the amount of photoshop work that will be needed in the coming weeks is a result of the decision to go a secondary path in the generation of animation content.
The idea is, to create prop layers for the stock models too (which will have to be done manually).
This is actually what someone in this thread inquired about and I denied him, because at the time I thought it would be impracticle. But I had a change of heart. After Sorca inquired about stuff he could help out with and mentioned photoshopping specifically, I thought that maybe it would be a good idea to revisit that idea of adding layers for the stock models. So I tried to apply one of my already rendered props (a hat) to one of the stock models
and it worked quite well indeed (due to the fact that the stock models and the one I did have roughly the same geometry/height/pivot point). Still to get a good result, every single frame should be corrected seperately.
So although this is a lot of manual work, I think it is worth the effort.
Not only will it probably be finished sooner than the creation of all animations for the render scenes (for both Blender and 3dsmax) due to the fact that it is easier to find people with photoshop skills than with animating skills. But also a few people voiced their concern of JA2 losing it's "flair" with completely new, albeit more realistic models. So for these people you get layers ontop of the stock animations, preserving the JA2 style and adding more ways of differentiating the different characters.
I think I mentioned this before in a different thread. Hats, facial gear, maybe hair/facial hair and backpacks and stuff, should be quite achievable. It's gonna be harder for clothing and especially weapons though. We will start with a couple of simple props and see how it goes. Also this will enable others to play around with the logical bodytypes implementation in a sensible fashion.
And maybe Sorca will also help me with the documentation a bit? 
[Updated on: Tue, 28 September 2010 21:23] by Moderator Report message to a moderator
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Corporal
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| Re: Logical Bodytypes[message #264625]
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Sun, 10 October 2010 03:29
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| Bio |
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Messages:62
Registered:April 2009
Location: Rhineland-Palatinate/Germ... |
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For the record. There are now 3 separate (all though closely connected) projects going on:
LOBOT - The logical bodytypes implementataion.
BARE - The batch render and post-processing framework. Collection of tools, scripts, scenes, models and so on for rendering animations (in 3dsMax6 and hopefully soon in Blender). As well as generating STI containers and XML code for the use with LOBOT.
JADES - Jagged Alliance Dynamically Equipped Sprite. For the generation of layers for the stock body types. I wrote a small batch script for extracting all the frames of an STI container in such a way, that it can be used with BARE. I hope that Sorca will take the lead on this one.
In time there will be separate threads for all three in the development sub-forum.
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Corporal
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) do you have any examples of the work so far that would be great. I know it would help to keep us even more interested than we are at the moment.