A few questions about Leadwerks?

[kirk]

I am a game artist and curious about Leadwerk. Here is a few questions I have, Would be appreciated if somebody answer.

1. 
   Does it support rotated (edited) vertex normals within its importer?
   
2. 
   Does it support hierarchical lods ? It's when a group of separate objects (hierarchical branches) are replacing into a single object ( parent trunk ) with a distance and so on. So you have a lot of separate objects close to a player and a few ones on a distance. Is there any tool to organize such a hierarchy or import it from a 3d soft directly?
   
3. 
   Does it support any visual, node based shader creation? Any third party tool like Mental Mill?
   
4. 
   Is it supposed to be be used with its editor terrain system only? The modern 3dsMax/ Maya versions are quicker imo for an environment creation and more flexible than any game editor imo.
   

[Pixel Perfect]

Does it support rotated (edited) vertex normals within its importer?

As far as I'm aware yes, if you have changed the normals then it should import them as they are.

 

Does it support hierarchical lods ?

Yes, Leadwerks supports a LOD system where the parent file is called mymodel.gmf and the subsequent LOD versions would be called mymodelLOD1.gmf, mymodelLOD2.gmf and so on. This distances between the various LODs can be configured.

 

Does it support any visual, node based shader creation? Any third party tool like Mental Mill?

No. Leadwerks comes with some nice shaders but there is no semi automated shader design facility. It uses GLSL based shaders (OpenGL) so should support any third party tools that output these.

 

Is it supposed to be be used with its editor terrain system only?

It has a good terrain system but no, you are not forced to use it. You can design you terrain in another modelling app and import it as a mesh, the only downside is you cannot then use the vegetation system or terrain based textures on it.

 

 

Hope this helps answer your questions.

[Road Kill Kenny]

1. Pretty sure it does but I'll let someone else answer for certainty sake

 

2. No.

 

Yes, Leadwerks supports a LOD system where the parent file is called mymodel.gmf and the subsequent LOD versions would be called mymodelLOD1.gmf, mymodelLOD2,gmf and so on. This distances between the various LODs can be configured.

 

Not in the way he explains it though pixel. What he means (or at least my interpretation) is say you have like 5 barrels standing there as separate objects. Then when you zoom out to LOD level. Those 5 barrels are linked to an LOD of 1 object that is 5 barrels. So the 5 objects become one object at the LOD distance.

 

3. No.

 

4. No you don't have to use it with the editor only. You can use whatever you want to create terrain models and then load them into your scene with code.

 

Note that these above answers only relate to LE2.X. I have no idea for LE3D as we don't know still exactly all the features as it's still in development.

[Pixel Perfect]

Not in the way he explains it though pixel. What he means (or at least my interpretation) is say you have like 5 barrels standing there as separate objects. Then when you zoom out to LOD level. Those 5 barrels are linked to an LOD of 1 object that is 5 barrels. So the 5 objects become one object at the LOD distance.

Ah I misunderstood, in that case as you say ... No

[Josh]

Not in the way he explains it though pixel. What he means (or at least my interpretation) is say you have like 5 barrels standing there as separate objects. Then when you zoom out to LOD level. Those 5 barrels are linked to an LOD of 1 object that is 5 barrels. So the 5 objects become one object at the LOD

That's a pretty good description of how the vegetation system works. Of course that is all automated.

[kirk]

Thanks evreybody for the answers

 

That's a pretty good description of how the vegetation system works. Of course that is all automated.

 

Does it mean that it's not possible to do something with the auto generated LODs ? For example, there is a group of trees seating on a cliff and I would like to replace the whole group to a flat poly and pre-baked “group of trees” small texture at a certain distance?

 

Is there any workaround for lods hierarchy? Maybe in that barrels case it's possible to have a kind of “grouped 5 barrels” object that is shown only when zoomed out and never at a close distance?

 

 

ps. Have anybody used some GLSL code exported from Mental Mill and whether it's possible at all considering Leadwerks deffered render? I am interested mostly in adding some extra Fresnel effects and a few animated things to a standard “specular + normals/parallax” shaders.

[Naughty Alien]

Does it mean that it's not possible to do something with the auto generated LODs ? For example, there is a group of trees seating on a cliff and I would like to replace the whole group to a flat poly and pre-baked “group of trees” small texture at a certain distance?

 

Is there any workaround for lods hierarchy? Maybe in that barrels case it's possible to have a kind of “grouped 5 barrels” object that is shown only when zoomed out and never at a close distance?

 

..natively trough LE 2.x no..system is set as it is..however, if you build your own library for LOD, yes, anything could work..if your project reach stage where depend on such library, PM me and ill send you some nice LOD library for all those things you asking for..

[Josh]

Does it mean that it's not possible to do something with the auto generated LODs ? For example, there is a group of trees seating on a cliff and I would like to replace the whole group to a flat poly and pre-baked “group of trees” small texture at a certain distance?

You don't need to do that by hand. The engine does it automatically.

[kirk]

..natively trough LE 2.x no..system is set as it is..however, if you build your own library for LOD, yes, anything could work..if your project reach stage where depend on such library, PM me and ill send you some nice LOD library for all those things you asking for..

 

Thanks for your offer. I am still a bit hesitant regarding Leadwerks. Mostly because my coding experience is limited to some expressions/commands in 3d soft only. I am searching for something an artist friendly but still good graphics capable. If I'll make my stop at Leadwers I'll definitely avail myself of your offer.

[Benton]

I am an artist, and sure, using Unity with Playmaker or what ever it is called (visual scripting) is easy, but learning Lua is not hard at all. In fact it is one of the most easy languages out there. Unless you use something with visual scripting, nothing will be as simple as Lua. The flexibility you get with Leadwerks is out of this world! Visual scripting might be good short-term, but what if you want to do something that the visual scripting can't do? That means still using a programming language.

 

And if your project grows bigger, and you hire a programmer, he will NOT wanna work with a visual language. He will probably first port it all over into a real language, costing you money. And it is always good to know how to program.

[kirk]

I think I saw a few links to Lua tutorials somewhere on this site. Are they still here?

[Benton]

http://www.leadwerks.com/files/Tutorials/Lua/Getting_Started_With_Lua.pdf

[kirk]

Thank you, Benton

[DigitalHax]

Lua is mainly used for per object scripting, and coding the world, not the game. Although some people are coding with just lua, it is the best shot to have a go at learning C or C++ for the main game.

[Road Kill Kenny]

Lua is mainly used for per object scripting, and coding the world, not the game. Although some people are coding with just lua, it is the best shot to have a go at learning C or C++ for the main game.

 

This is true. Go with C++ or bMax or anything that is actually a coding language and not a scripting language. Many people have gone through the motions with coding entirely using LUA and they all come to the same conclusion:

 

- Keep Lua as a scripting language as it is intended.

 

It is true that LUA is much easier and simpler than C++ and other languages. However, will lose the benefits of C++ or other coding languages if you only use LUA.

[Benton]

I guess it depends. C++ for the main script, but script everything else in Lua.

Personally I bought LE2 because Josh said buying LE2 and upgrading to LE3 will be cheaper then waiting to buy LE3. Without that incentive I would have maybe looked for another engine. Crossplatform is important to me, so is Lua and visual editors for models and materials. I don't expect to have a finished game with LE2, but definitely lots done for the mobile game I am making. LE3 will also have a visual LOGIC (not visual scripting, more like a game flow editor) which will make life easier for us artists.

[Radgravity]

1; How do you import things in to the editor? I don't seem to have the option, I even copied the my things in to the folders

 

2; How do you change the enviroment textures?

2.5; How do you do that errosion thing shown in the demo video? I can't find that option even by following the video

 

Thanks.

[cassius]

You convert your models into gmf format first.

if you have a folder called props for example and you want to place a barrel in it you prefix the barrel file name with props_

Like this : props_barrel01.gmf

The item will then appear in the right panel of the editor in the props folder.

Do all models like this.

[Benton]

Erosion thing?

[DigitalHax]

The old editor had an eriosion filter for terrain. It was discuntinued in the new versions. Personally I generate a terrain with L3dt, which has options for erosion and cliffs and other things, and export it into le and tune to my liking.

[Radgravity]

I am guessing I am going to have to pay for the full version to actually test it correctly..

 

I am using Cartography Shop 4, which is 99% identicle to 3d World Studio, but seems to be 0% compatible?

[DigitalHax]

Well the evaluation is nothing but a 30 day version of le full. The only thing that you really get when you buy LE is full access to the site. Not any great extra functonality of le.

[Radgravity]

Well the evaluation is nothing but a 30 day version of le full. The only thing that you really get when you buy LE is full access to the site. Not any great extra functonality of le.

 

When trying to import my work from CS4 (to no avail) to see if it was compatible, I noticed a vast amount of stuff in the folders I can't find or use in the LE Demo.. So how do I 'unlock' that stuff to test?

[Benton]

There is nothing to "unlock"