HW2 Models...

[JAL-18]

One of the things that fans have been crying out for in the years since HW and HW:C were released are actual models of them. And even before HW2 comes out some people are already anxiously awaiting to hear news about this subject.

Realisticly, we can never expect to have (good) plastic models of HW ships. HW/Cata are just not popular enough to warrent the expense. (It costs about 2 million USD to make the master mold for a single model...) Even SC, which sold millions, only ever released a Terran Marine and a Zerg Hydralisk. Resin is cheaper, but there are technical reasons why that too is out of the question.


I was doing a completely differant project when it hit me: what's the cheapest, most effective way to get HW ships? Well, the most costly part is obviously on the manufacturing of the models. But maybe Relic won't have to do the actual work themselves...

Paper models. All Relic/Sierra have to do is make the blueprints, give us assembly instructions, and the rest is in our hands. We're the ones that do the printing, cutting, pasting, swearing, ect for the model. It's really not that hard. Paper (or rather, card stock) models are nearly on par with plastic models, are cheaper, and with a little editing, can be made any size you want. For HW, it's even better. HW ships don't have lots of projections and little odd bits that all have to be painstakiningly made. The KISS theory that cranks outsuch realistic ship designs also helps in the transferring of the ships into models.

What if people want their own colors on the ships? Easy. A progrem is released that lets you use the template for X ship you want, and much like the color selection screen we have, change the colors on specified area's on the ship. Then, you save the new copy and print it out. (I'm thinking of a Ship viewer type of thing.) This allows people to have massive fleets of individual ships, not all uniform Hiigaran/Taiidan/Kadesh/Turanic/Bentusi/Beast/Vaygr marked ships.

What's even better, this way opens the way for a possible HW2 tabel-top game (similiar to BattleFleet: Gothic.) All at very little expense to Relic and Sierra.

For an example of what I mean, go to www.digitalnavy.com

What do you guys think?

[Enterprize]

Well I doubt that they'd give us instructions but we could probably figure it out with detailed blueprints and 360* screenies of the ships. Sounds like a really COOL idea but I doubt it would be done.

If I decided to do it I would of course post the instructions and all that stuff

[Dasvidoniya]

I think it would be interesting.....
A table top game would definatly catch both my eyes. Maybe relic could evn make it so that different rods/polls/stands for each ship were different lengths giving the game table top version a 3d enviornment effect. This may even revolutionize table top gameing...
my two and a half cents

:drive: (almost)

[NovaBurn]

...or not and they can actual make the 2 millon master mold. Hell if they made them I'd buy every single ship for HW, HW:C and HW2!!

I mean come on, PAPER?!? :yech:

[Pirate1Eye]

Hey! Paper models sound great to me!

I've just started scratch building a Turanic Missile Corvette. I've had to go through a lot of gyrations just to get good plans. (open .big file, find model file, extract it, convert it to RAW format, convert it to AutoCAD format, bring it up in Ray Dream Studio, clean up and fine tune almost every vertex. What a pain!!). If I could buy a paper model, It'd be so much easier to transfer it to plastic, add lights, and superdetailing.

Bring ‘em on!

[PhdGarfield]

the idea of paper models is cool and sounds fun, id like it.

but instead of making it out of paper i would just take the templant (or diagram of w/e they use for paper models) and copy it onto balsa wood (my personal favorite for modeling) and but it from there. it would be too hard. i did that with a globe theatre paper kit =P

[Watts]

If, as expected, HW2 delivers on the same level as the original, I’d buy models (paper sounds great, JAL), T-shirts, embroidered bath towels… whatever.

…middle ground…

If, for argument’s sake, HW2 proves to be a sin against the noble legacy of HW, I’d just as soon spend my money on a Jar-Jar action figure or an MJ Wizards jersey. That is to say, I would not buy those things.

Relic are the only ones who really know where on the quality spectrum HW2 is going to fall. If it’s everything we hope it is, please bring on the merchandising. The fans are poorer and happier, the guys at Relic are richer and happier – everyone’s happy.


Speaking of models, I hope Relic have plans to release a new, feature-packed unit viewer. It was a very cool idea the first time, next time it could be fleshed out into an instruction and reference tool for aspiring 3D modelers.

[CruiserCarrier]

Problem is, you need a mega franchise to be worth the risk of making the models. I can guess someone can custom make them, but'll be damn hard to. I think we all agree that we would like to see more HW products. Unfortunately, the HW universe isn't as hot as, say, X-Men or Spiderman or whatever.

[Arconin]

Good Marketing could solve that, I can see a HW based TV Show, or Anime or what have you, that would ramp up interest.

"Merchandising, Merchandising, Merchandising, Homeworld action figures, Homeworld the comic book, Home world toilet paper, Homeworld Lunchbox, Homeworld FLAMETHROWER!!! The kiddies will love that one."

[CruiserCarrier]

So in a sense, you are shoving merchandising and/or marketing of an "unpopular" franchise down the throats of people that have never heard of Homeworld... I don't think it'll work very well. The franchise needs to be launched with an excellent game and slowly expand from there.

[Arconin]

shoving nothing, market economy works, if people dont like it then they dont buy it, look at all the crap that is out there now that people buy up in masse just because of good marketing.

Mind you, if it was not for marketing nobody would hear of anything anyhow, thats the purpose of marketing, to get the word out.

The franchise was launched with an excellent game and is folowing up with an equally promising looking game, or are you of the opinion that HW sucked? Its the Story and the world that would carry it, not the gameplay.

Am I serious? not really, hence the Mel Brooks rip, would I like to see it happen, hell yeah, I think we all would.

[CruiserCarrier]

Agreed. And you are wondering if I dislike Homeworld? Hhhmm, what forums were I posting on again? Probably the Counterstrike forums. By bad. So that's what I've been doing wrong the post year or so.

As for the marketing gimmick, what would you feel if a company decided to heavily promote a "Super Slinky Banana-Man" franchise if they started it up?

On a more serious note, I personally would not spend any money on HW2 products unless they were movies or games or something. However, I would like to see the franchise thrive and grow. I want HW to be the next big thing.

Now, lemme try some marketing gimmicks myself.

HW1--"No hype, all game."
HW2--"Think different."

[GuaRRand]

I remember (here we go again) someone making a wooden 3D model of a...interceptor??..
Wasn't it Kitania or kal?...hmmm....

[evil penguin]

i know a friend whose dad makes molds...maybe i could get it a little cheaper if you know what i mean *wink**wink*

how about a model rocket? that would be a lot cheaper, since they are made of cardboard, and they would fly...lol

[ÜberJumper]

Guar:

I think Xypher's got a plastic Taiidan bomber... from one of those 3d printers... don't remember a wooden interceptor... or was there one that was entered in a starshipmodeller.com contest?

[Kirtar]

Give me 20 minutes, a piece of wood, a saw, a small variety of fileing tools, and some paint and i could make a ship model. I made something that sort of resembles a taiidani interceptor. It was a ship from by story (Star Frontier). Throw in $20 and I could make one for you...

[GuaRRand]

Originally posted by ÜberJumper
Guar:

I think Xypher's got a plastic Taiidan bomber... from one of those 3d printers... don't remember a wooden interceptor... or was there one that was entered in a starshipmodeller.com contest?

Hmm..could have been plastic....but i seem to recall a wooden one made by someone who had access to a nifty 3D woodcarving machine...

But i could be mistaken wood for platsic ... don't ask

[Tangent]

Homeworld, the Lego model.

Someone built a Banana Mothership, or a reasonable copy of one.

[JAL-18]

(I don't think people are understanding me here...)

The entire point of these models is that they are free for download. The downlaod includes the color editing program, the pages that include the parts of the model, and assembly instructions. After you dl it, you edit the colors, save the pages, and print them (and the instructions) out. (on card stock: it's a very heavy, sturdy paper that is readily available. Think the stocff they print cards on.)

[Pirate1Eye]

Hey JAL-18

I know what you are talking about!

Many years ago I remember talking to someone who used AutoCAD ver12 at work. He said that if you create a 3D model in AutoCAD, it can be printed out on paper or cardstock, cut out, then assembled.

Anyone out there have AutoCAD? I’ve already exported most of the HW models into RAW format. I can easily convert them to AutoCAD format (.dxf).

[MissingSea]

It's a very interesting idea, and I could see it working.

On the whole franchising side of things, I think Hw could be one of those games that could just about make it. If they did try and franchise other merchandise other than the games, they should probably start with selling small novella's based in the HW universe, if they do well expand it into other areas.

I don't know how battletech started out (table top game I think ??) but if it did start out as a table top game, it's grown into a whole lot more.

[RaptorXENO]

Originally posted by JAL-18
(I don't think people are understanding me here...)

The entire point of these models is that they are free for download. The downlaod includes the color editing program, the pages that include the parts of the model, and assembly instructions. After you dl it, you edit the colors, save the pages, and print them (and the instructions) out. (on card stock: it's a very heavy, sturdy paper that is readily available. Think the stocff they print cards on.)

YES that way you don't have to buy them every single time if you wanted a small fleet of these things. If I had enough time and I was bored... I may just do that very thing.

[Koloth]

I wrote a program that could take Homeworld geometry and unfold it into something that could then be printed out and then folded. The reason I never released this program was because it most of the time flat out failed on the majority of models, however, I have been sucessful at unfolding the swarmer and the Kushan scout. In the following link is an image of the unfolded and then refolded swarmer. If I had some convenient web space I would upload the images that you print to make one of these.

http://members16.clubphoto.com/a7084...ner-0919.phtml

[Montial]

seems to me, koloth, that that is exactly what is needed. Perhaps if you could find a way to seperate the models into sections (assuming that the problem lies in some models having overlapping planes..), to be printed out seperately...

[F'Lar]

holy crap. that swarmer kicks so much ass. i want one, and i would be willing to pay for it. dude, can you see if arioch would host that so we can print and make our own cause i want a claw of 5 hanging from my ceiling

[Montial]

ill second that

[Amglco]

First time poster in these forums. (Heck, I just registered 2 seconds ago)
This sounds awsome! I saw Koloth's model, and ever since then i've been trying to do the same with an advanced swarmer, but no luck... could you share that program you used to lay them out, or possibly hint as to how it does it? (I'm not a programmer or that good of a modeler, but I can do a few things with 3d editing programs)

[MaxxQ]

This is the sort of thing I was thinking about when I mentioned in the ship scale thread about building models of the HW and HW2 ships. I think Montial is onto what the problem is with that program. The 3D models would have to be split up into several sections, THEN unfolded to be printed as cutouts. 3D modelers usually "build" their model in sections, then join, weld, or group them together to make the final ship - you would need to figure out how to reverse that. At that point, you could probably use the UVW mapping part of a 3D program to "unwrap" the polygon mesh, and it should give you something that could be worked with - adding glue tabs and that sort of thing.

I'm not really sure if it's as easy as it sounds, though...I'm just now starting to play around with a 3D program (gMax - still working on the tutorials), so I don't really know a lot about that sort of thing.

Pirate, I have AutoCAD14, but I don't know if it has that feature. I've never really gotten the hang of using it. I usually use CorelDraw for any sort of blueprinting and such. However, if you want to email me one of those ships in .dxf (maybe the harvester, since it seems fairly simple - basic shape is a hexagonal cylinder with a few bits and bobs sticking out of it), I can reinstall ACad and give it a try and see what happens. No promises though.

BTW Koloth...that's a sweet looking model there, but it looks like you just printed the textures more or less straight from the game model - they seem very jaggy, compared to the lack of jaggies on your hand. Any way to clean up and define the markings and such better?

[Koloth]

It's good to see that people are enthusiastic. I wasn't expecting this good of responce. As I said, the program barely works well enough to do the process on a few of the models. I am not a very good programmer and I used this as an exercise to help me learn java. The reason il looks just like the ingame model is because to create it I took the ingame model with texture information, converted it through 3d exploration to an OBJ file, and then ran it through my program. Since the program is in java, you woud need the java runtimes inorder to run it, and it is not very user friendly at this point (command line). If space were made available, I would gladly post the program and all of it's good output so far. I have had fun making some of these. On average, I'd say it take between 1-2 hours to make the model once everything is printed out; it's a good thing to do infront of the TV. If anyone wants the files for the swarmer, I can e-mail you the files along with instructions.

[F'Lar]

can you email them to me. i'll pm you

[JAL-18]

Me too.

[Mnementh]

I can host the files, rather than have you transfer to the peeps individually if you like.

[Koloth]

That would be awsome, could you PM me with the info I need to get those to you?

Just so the rest of you know, I am going to wait for him to get me that info instead of e-mailing it to each of you.

Actually, I will send both of you the image file for the swarmer since it is small, but I will wait to get the actual program out. It needs some fixing.

[Amglco]

While waiting for the information on Koloth's wonderful program, I thought I might take a look around and see what other programs might exist. After sifting through the general crap that permeates the internet I found a thread in some other forum that discussed programs that could unfold a 3d model. I found only one program thus far that does this, it's called TouchCAD. Unfortunatly, it was developed for the mac originally, and although it is for windows also, its not very intuitive of the windows user. You can try the demo at www.touchcad.com
I myself found it difficult, even a little buggy, and have yet to successfully unfold a homeworld model with it.

[trebmal_ca]

I posted these a few months ago in the gallery forum. I made it in AutoCad 2002. Alot of it was guess work, as only 2 views of the ship were posted at the time.
Iv also made blueprints for a guy who has made a junkyard dawg, I will see if I can find the link.

[Amglco]

Forget TouchCAD... I found something more devoted to just the unfolding process... Try this site out.
http://www.page.sannet.ne.jp/jun_m/t...index-eng.html

http://www.e-cardmodel.com/pepakura/ (if you can read... uhh... whatever language that is)

http://www.flatpackheads.co.uk/FPHfaqs.html (just a little something to play with I guess)

[evil penguin]

(attempting to find correct syllable to express desire for swarmer thingie)mm....mer...merpglooow...give me one!!!!

[Dan]

oh man that flack/assult frigate would totaly decorate my room!

Just thinking about having the entire Higarian fleet hanging from the seeling gives me the monkeychills!

:mdance: hohooo!

[CQD]

Originally posted by Amglco
Forget TouchCAD... I found something more devoted to just the unfolding process... Try this site out.
http://www.page.sannet.ne.jp/jun_m/t...index-eng.html

http://www.e-cardmodel.com/pepakura/ (if you can read... uhh... whatever language that is)

http://www.flatpackheads.co.uk/FPHfaqs.html (just a little something to play with I guess)

http://www.e-cardmodel.com/pepakura/
Japanese...

I only tried Tenkai, it is amazing.

Step 1: Used 3D explorer to export ship peo as 3ds.
Step 2: Run Tenkai and open the 3ds
Step 3: Press Start.
Step 4: Print it....and done

But there is a problem, I cant make it read texture file correctly

[Amglco]

Export as and .obj file... textures work on it, but you can only have 1 texture file (also make sure its bitmap) at a time. So even though you get textures, its gonna take a little work to put the one or two others that arn't part of the big page together and then I guess your gonna have to redo the texture mapping.

[W0ps]

w00t this is cool!
I wanted this program all my life!
(I'm a modeler)
w00h00
2bad the demo can't do more than 20 faces... get the real thing must get the real thing w00t..!

[evil penguin]

ahh how do i do this? i cant read japanese!! ok i installed what i think (and what looks like) the program, and i rename p2swarmer.shp as p2swarmer.obj and open it with the progam and it comes up with an (unreadable) error message! please help me! i am sooo close!!!
edit: w00t!!! w00t!!! must.. make stupid japanese thingie work...w00t!!!!!

[Amglco]

Calm down evil, its easy, first go to http://www.page.sannet.ne.jp/jun_m/t...index-eng.html

Download the program, register if you wish but you don't have to. (it costs money)

No installation is required, just unzip the contents into a folder, maybe named Tenkai?

Now you should have 2 other programs that are very important, the .big file viewer and 3d exploration. (I forget where to find them so look at homeworld editing sites)

Now instead of extracting the .shp file from the .big file, you should be looking for the .peo and its textures are .lif, there are several level of details (LOD), lod0 is the highest detailed.

Now with those 2 file types, you use 3d exploration to open the .peo and then save it as an .obj, and the .lif's as bitmaps (now unfortunatly, tenkai only uses one bitmap at a time, so you might have to do some texture remapping in another program)

Now you simply run tenkai, open the .obj file, use file menu to add the bitmap texture, maybe edit where it will cut or connect a little, and then hit start.

I strongly suggest you read some of the tutorials and help info on the site (don't worry, its in english and is not long at all)

There, hopefully your not confused anymore :nod:

[evil penguin]

thanx man
edit:
[QUOTE] Thank you for requesting trial software. You will receive an email with download instructions within 24-hours. [ /QUOTE]
NOOO! lol

[Amglco]

Just for the heck of it, here are the 2 mines.

http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-...3/r1mine05.gif

http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-...3/r2mine05.gif

[F'Lar]

hey. can you post the swarmers like that, already done cause i want the ship models but i am not good at all that computer language stuff. so for those of us that dont know everything, could you post some of the models like the mines

[Lathian]

yeah that would be cool

[Amglco]

Here, I've kinda done the research vessel. Its not perfect, and has no instructions, but I think you can figure it out.

http://www.geocities.com/wabu19/r1researchship01.gif

By the way, my file names have the 05 or 01 at the end because that is the scale that they are saved as(05 = .5 or 50% and 01 = .1 or 10%) Course this is the scale as the program Tenkai sees it.

If anyone could take a picture of the finished model of this research vessel, or at least tell me how impossible it is, it would be well appreciated. (but give some idea as to how I can improve it)

Edit: Use copy/paste with the url, it's my first time doing anything with webpages so please forgive.

[W0ps]

heck that texture editing is annoying... And I'll need the full version... somebody made a finished model already? (photo!?)
and they're way too complicated to fold...
luckily I can now make my own models in 3d

[Dan]

I might try it later today Amglco.... i'll tell you how it goes