Planetside Software Forums

I've been using Wings 3D for a while now, it's easy to get used to, and the .obj export seems to work well with TG2.  I've used Wings 3D to convert some free models found on the web, including some free Poser models from Daz Studios.  Just thought I'd let everyone know.  :)

http://www.wings3d.com/

Rich Allen

cool. i have some windgs 3d models i made on my site. i may try and import 1 or 2......

namely a car/tank/ star trek shuttle....

if you want to try them you can download them here
http://homepages.slingshot.co.nz/~rawjdmbj/   drop a email if you do use them

cheers

Thanks!

Very nice!!
Big thanks!

I second this. Wings 3D is actually a powerful program with a great workflow once you learn how it works. There is no point in looking at anything else unless you want to spend a lot of money.

Just to add a screenshot I had at Imageshack of a new Open GL shader in the very latest Wings which makes it easier to see your model. This gives you some more idea about the program. It's a powerful modeler and exceptionally well designed and streamlined UI. That model in the view took seconds to sculpt. It has almost every tool you would ever need to build models to put in Terragen scenes.

It may not be immediately obvious how to do things in Wings. If you try it and can't work something out then I should have the answer. I've used it quite a lot but if you follow the info bar at the bottom it tells you what to do.

Looks nice for a free modeling program.  I didn't like Blender at all.  I use Cinema 4D the most but its obj export didn't seem to work that well in TG2.  I'm going to re-install Maya and give that a try and if that doesn't work well I will try Wings 3D  ;)

here is my first render with one of my wings 3d models

i will have the wings3d files up on my site soon...

---

There are trial versions of XSI 6 FND, LW9.0 and Modo202.
(My pick for the best three Modelling/Rendering applications)

Also remember that TG2 can actually import/export
.lwo and export basic .lws support.

This means that LW/C4D/Modo will all natively
open the scene that TG2 exports.
(not just the objects)

And considering the Rendersize limit on the
demo, and painful TG2 rendertimes...

FPrime and LW or Modo202 can render
exported GI scenes in a fraction of the time it currently
takes TG2.

Modo and LW and XSI all have 30 day trials...
Blender supports .lwo and .obj,  but isn't the best Modeler.

I actually have Modo so I must experiment with exporting from TG2 into Modo and vice versa. Modo is of course very powerful and better than Wings 3D but it's not that cheap.

what are you planning to export from tg2?....

Quote from: Freak on December 28, 2006, 05:09:53 PM
There are trial versions of XSI 6 FND, LW9.0 and Modo202.
(My pick for the best three Modelling/Rendering applications)

Also remember that TG2 can actually import/export
.lwo and export basic .lws support.

This means that LW/C4D/Modo will all natively
open the scene that TG2 exports.
(not just the objects)

And considering the Rendersize limit on the
demo, and painful TG2 rendertimes...

FPrime and LW or Modo202 can render
exported GI scenes in a fraction of the time it currently
takes TG2.

Modo and LW and XSI all have 30 day trials...
Blender supports .lwo and .obj,  but isn't the best Modeler.

Where did you find the 'basic lws' support?

I'm having a few problems arranging the imports in Modo but all I can say is that I can import unbelievably gigantic terrains into Modo. There are problems with the LWS file.

The problems appear to be with Modo. Luxology don't officially support LWS import but sometimes it works. Not from TG output though. Why on earth does TG break up it's export of the terrain in lots of separate lightwave objects?

Quote from: efflux on January 03, 2007, 10:51:11 AM
...Why on earth does TG break up it's export of the terrain in lots of separate lightwave objects?

seems to me because:  the meshes it exports are extremely dense, and layout handles such high poly counts alot better than modeler.  the meshes are not optimized for displacement in layout, but are rather a polygon for polygon snapshot of your terrain.

imho, it's a pretty slick solution, and i've already taken advantage of it :)

Modo will open .lws scenes, but Terragen is exporting LW5.x scenes..
Manually text editing them loads them fine, or re-save in LW, load in Modo.
These days lightwave scene files use LWSC3, Terragen is using LWSC1.

I'm not sure why Terragen breaks the .lws into multiple objects (Oshayan?)
In Terragen 0.9, LW6.x has a point limitation of 257x257 (which sucks)

But this limit was removed, long a go with the .lwo format.
I'm not sure if Matt's aware of .LWO's updated spec format.

So i don't think it should need to break them into multiples anymore,
but it still works fine, it seems to export great detail in TG2.

It's not a major problem but more convenient to simply import the lightwave object as one mesh. I've got individual meshes, materials, lights and cameras on every section of the mesh which I then have to sort out. However I've got TG meshes of over 2 million polys into Modo which is pretty cool. More than enough to use for Modo scenes and the TG terrains are more realistic than anything coming from Vue or Mojo so this is a very nice partnership.