questions about my android wip. (picture inside)

[magnetmannen]

my questions are as following:

1. do i have to make a totally new skeleton for animation, and totally new animations for this new skeleton, or can i rip a skeleton from a existing model for it?

reason i ask is that its bigger and mush wider over the shoulders than a normal personmodel.

2. can anyone here skin it for me? im crap at skinning, and need help on something this advanced. currently its just 3dstudio materials applyed to the different parts.

3. the hands are 1500 polys together, from the handjoint out to the fingertips.
should i remove the hands for the 3 person view and replace them with simpler models? model total polys are 4000.(hands included.)


o and any critics are welcome.

 

[Brian Damage]

Heh, looks pretty cool. I think I heard something about a limit of 5000 polys for character models... but I'm not sure.

 

[Brian Damage]

Really? And to think that there are people going around saying that HL2 will have low poly characters...

BTW, magnet... dude... what proggy are you using?

 

[magnetmannen]

what u mean? i use 3d studio max. is there some thing wrong? dude?

 

[Brian Damage]

No, just wanted to know... dude.

 

[random.hero]

hehe...dude

theres two limits. for main characters, Barney, Alyx and possibly Kleiner, the count is around 7000, which is all parts of the body, including a very detailed face ( the main reason why the count is higher ). for the lesser characters, such as Scientists and possibly Combines, the count is around 5000 maybe 6000, depending on the complexity. and the well known count is for the humble headcrab, of 3000 polys. just to clear up other confusion, weapon models are 2000-2500, INCLUDING hands, which i recently found out, by asking the SDK blokes. i shall glady post the emails if requested.

and by the way, i am not an HL2 :dork: i just know a lot about modelling for HL2...apart from the hands being included in the weapon models

 

[clarky003]

question about the skeleton, (bones) , you'll need to make another skeleton for him, simply because the skin modifier will already be set to the other character (if the modifier has been applied ) , and the skeleton is linked to him, so copying and resizing a skeleton onto another character when its been linked to the other models mesh wont work cause of the existing bone envelopes.,, there might be some way around it, but one i dont know. its best to start a new rig. shouldnt take all that long.

when you rigg a robot, you'll want to seperate the head torso arms and legs and rigg them seperately then use helpers to join them up later, so as you can use the skin modifier and have each bone apply their effect on seperate parts , so other parts of the mesh arnt included, allowing the movement of the lower arm without influencing the upper part. (robot joints, unlike the human joint where the skin effect influences the joint area of the mesh)... ive confused myself slightly, its hard to explain, but you might get what i mean