AC Modding Questions Thread

[Mitch9]

[...]if I split them before hand, will that force them to split the right way?

It's fine, that's just the way in which it's being triangulated.
Generally speaking, "the right way" is whatever doesn't cause any issues, and I dont see any here. To answer your question, yes, if you do the triangulation manually then it should be kept when you export the model.

 

[Pretext]

I use a bunch of different extensions for my tracks and the camtool file that works on the base track isn't visible on the extensions. It seems like I could get the base track file to work on the extension if I could just get the naming conventions right. Can anyone offer more insight into how Camtool decides whether a file should be visible for loading?

 

[Ben O'Bro]

I use a bunch of different extensions for my tracks and the camtool file that works on the base track isn't visible on the extensions. It seems like I could get the base track file to work on the extension if I could just get the naming conventions right. Can anyone offer more insight into how Camtool decides whether a file should be visible for loading?

I'd say it depends how it's done.
I imagine any camera tool needs the ai line to work? To know where to switch camera according to the car's position on the line.
If that's the case, then a new ai line means you most likely can't use the old work you've done on the camera. Everything would be offset and end up being very wrong.

If you still wanna try and keep that anyways, find where the file is located on your harddrive, open with a text editor to find where it says what track it is etc.

 

[Pretext]

I'd say it depends how it's done.
I imagine any camera tool needs the ai line to work? To know where to switch camera according to the car's position on the line.
If that's the case, then a new ai line means you most likely can't use the old work you've done on the camera. Everything would be offset and end up being very wrong.

If you still wanna try and keep that anyways, find where the file is located on your harddrive, open with a text editor to find where it says what track it is etc.

I don't think the AI line should matter so much since the player may take any goofy line on the track and the camera should still work as intended.

If the track has a different coordinate system or a radically different layout, I'd understand the cameras being wonky, but in this case, Camtool won't even display them for loading.

I've looked in the camtool files several times, and as far as I can tell, none of the contents explicitly identify the track and extension they belong to. The only exception is the filename itself, but either I'm using the wrong naming conventions to convert from base track to extension, or I'm missing something else.

 

[Ryno917]

I don't think the AI line should matter so much since the player may take any goofy line on the track and the camera should still work as intended.

Can't speak to Camtool's methodology, but for the base game the car's position relative to the AI line is absolutely used. That's how the cameras know when to switch from one to another. They'll follow the car itself, but the car's position along the length of the AI line is what tells the game when to switch to the next cam.

 

[Johnr777]

Nah, the issue is with the extension, like Pyyer's stuff for the F1 tracks.

I think it needs a certain naming convention like track_track_f12023_-1.json or something weird

 

[Moonland]

How can I set up the functionality for visible tire marks in grass and sand areas for an already existing mod that doesn't have it?

Is something I can add in ext_config.ini, or do the meshes/materials/shaders need to be something specific?

 

[Johnr777]

How can I set up the functionality for visible tire marks in grass and sand areas for an already existing mod that doesn't have it?

Is something I can add in ext_config.ini, or do the meshes/materials/shaders need to be something specific?

View attachment 692072

Should just be mesh name dependent, like 1GRASS or 1SAND

 

[DisPartysCached]

Hey all, I have a question about what's going on in the photo below and am hoping one of you have come across this before and know how I can resolve it. I've tried searching several resources already, and feel at odds with finding a solution.

I'm getting this weird occurrence where items with the same texture and shader are showing up differently. Some of the curbs look like they are in shadow for some reason, but others don't— and a few of the smaller connecting roads show up brighter than the rest of the asphalt.

I've played with just about every normal setting that exists in blender and can't seem to figure it out. Any ideas?

There is no consistent difference that I can see in any of the affected objects.

 

[Ben O'Bro]

Hey all, I have a question about what's going on in the photo below and am hoping one of you have come across this before and know how I can resolve it. I've tried searching several resources already, and feel at odds with finding a solution.

I'm getting this weird occurrence where items with the same texture and shader are showing up differently. Some of the curbs look like they are in shadow for some reason, but others don't— and a few of the smaller connecting roads show up brighter than the rest of the asphalt.

I've played with just about every normal setting that exists in blender and can't seem to figure it out. Any ideas?

There is no consistent difference that I can see in any of the affected objects.

View attachment 692227

In 3dsmax I'd say smoothing group issues

If it can apply to blender
I would reset the normals and smoothing groups to be sure

Alternatively, you could take the good object and attach the messy one.
And re detach and rename to how it was

 

[Stereo]

Should just be mesh name dependent, like 1GRASS or 1SAND

It may also be using the texture colours to make some decisions, I know the csp 3d grass defaults are "only green pixels"

 

[DisPartysCached]

In 3dsmax I'd say smoothing group issues

If it can apply to blender
I would reset the normals and smoothing groups to be sure

Alternatively, you could take the good object and attach the messy one.
And re detach and rename to how it was

Combining the objects did the trick! Thank you!

 

[Ryno917]

Hey all, I have a question about what's going on in the photo below and am hoping one of you have come across this before and know how I can resolve it. I've tried searching several resources already, and feel at odds with finding a solution.

I'm getting this weird occurrence where items with the same texture and shader are showing up differently. Some of the curbs look like they are in shadow for some reason, but others don't— and a few of the smaller connecting roads show up brighter than the rest of the asphalt.

I've played with just about every normal setting that exists in blender and can't seem to figure it out. Any ideas?

There is no consistent difference that I can see in any of the affected objects.

View attachment 692227

Have you been making use of Blender's "multi-user objects?" (ALT+D instead of Shift+D when duplicating to create another instance of an object, instead of an unlinked copy).

In anything since Blender 2.79 the FBX exporter was changed to remove the older FBX format from the tool, and now the multi-user objects do not import into the editor correctly, causing any manner of weird behaviours. Sometimes they're jet black no matter what, sometimes they get assigned a different material, etc. Totally random as far as I can tell.

 

[DisPartysCached]

Have you been making use of Blender's "multi-user objects?" (ALT+D instead of Shift+D when duplicating to create another instance of an object, instead of an unlinked copy).

In anything since Blender 2.79 the FBX exporter was changed to remove the older FBX format from the tool, and now the multi-user objects do not import into the editor correctly, causing any manner of weird behaviours. Sometimes they're jet black no matter what, sometimes they get assigned a different material, etc. Totally random as far as I can tell.

I've been using Shift+D for duplicating. I'm not sure what went wrong, but I did mirror local vertices a few times on different objects and I wonder if that's the cause. It doesn't happen to all objects that were flipped though, so I don't know. Also, some of the meshes are not copies and still have that problem.

I might try exporting smaller FBX files and see if that helps. This base terrain is betting somewhat large.

 

[Stereo]

Mirrored objects (both by object transform and the hidden parent inverse) can definitely end up with weird normals, I think those should be correctable in object mode though by using ctrl+A to apply any transforms.

 

[Moonland]

Should just be mesh name dependent, like 1GRASS or 1SAND

Thanks for the comment, but I can't get any further with this.

Looking at the grass surface with the CSP object inspector:

Mesh: 1GRASS_field1
Material: GRASS
Shader:ksMultilayer

Could you please type the lines I need to add to the ext_config.ini in this case? So I can at least get the tire marks visible for a start, and then I can optimize the parameters as needed?

I'm pretty sure it is just a few lines I need to add, but I couldn't find any documentation and I can't figure it out myself, even after looking at the brands/laguna configs.

 

[Johnr777]

Thanks for the comment, but I can't get any further with this.

Looking at the grass surface with the CSP object inspector:

Mesh: 1GRASS_field1
Material: GRASS
Shader:ksMultilayer

Could you please type the lines I need to add to the ext_config.ini in this case? So I can at least get the tire marks visible for a start, and then I can optimize the parameters as needed?

I'm pretty sure it is just a few lines I need to add, but I couldn't find any documentation and I can't figure it out myself, even after looking at the brands/laguna configs.

There are no lines to add

 

[Moonland]

There are no lines to add

Okay, so do you know what is missing then and where? What is needed for the tire marks to show up on the grass, like in brands/laguna/etc.?

 

[Johnr777]

Okay, so do you know what is missing then and where? What is needed for the tire marks to show up on the grass, like in brands/laguna/etc.?

No I do not, like I said above, I assumed it’s based on mesh name.

But try looking in the surfaces.ini, see if anything there differs from the tracks that have it working

 

[Ryno917]

I've been using Shift+D for duplicating. I'm not sure what went wrong, but I did mirror local vertices a few times on different objects and I wonder if that's the cause. It doesn't happen to all objects that were flipped though, so I don't know. Also, some of the meshes are not copies and still have that problem.

I might try exporting smaller FBX files and see if that helps. This base terrain is betting somewhat large.

I like splitting tracks up into several FBX files, even just for ease of updates. For my main WIP right now I've got separate FBX files for the terrain/visual road/curbs/walls, physics meshes, trees, tire walls, pit crew and timing objects, crowd objects, and buildings. Makes checking new edits in game easier since loading up in the editor is a LOT faster. Also forces me to keep my scene organized in Blender so I can easily enable/disable all items from a single FBX at once without missing anything important.

On the original question, I second Stereo's comment of making sure all scale transforms are applied. Rotation and location shouldn't cause any issues for most objects on tracks, but scale definitely can, especially if anything has a negative scale factor. You could also double check to make sure normals are correct on all objects by using the face orientation view option in Blender. I usually work without the backside clipping enabled so I can see everything, but comes with the downside that I usually forget to check normal direction before exporting. I often wind up having objects that are inside out as a result, so a quick check is helpful!

I'm wondering if maybe you have an inverted normal duplicate over top of some of the darker objects? It could be invisible from a normal viewing angle but still be casting a shadow maybe?