Anim8or Community

General Category => General Anim8or Forum => Topic started by: almost cool on March 22, 2009, 03:15:12 pm

Title: MDL
Post by: almost cool on March 22, 2009, 03:15:12 pm

I have noted that mods are becoming very popular, and anim8or is good for modeling for mods.Well if we could make it export directly it would definately simplify.When i have to export to obj, run it through another modeling program, export, etc then it definately adds to the problems ;D.

Title: Re: MDL
Post by: texel on March 22, 2009, 05:59:01 pm

I hope to release a new version of Ani2Pov which export skinned meshes in .ms3d format this week.
http://texel3d.free.fr/projets/ani2pov/index.html
This will make possible to create animated models in Anim8or and use other modelers or converters to convert .ms3d to other file formats.

MDL file format seems to be used by Half-Life 2 ? This file format seems to be a compilation of several files (.smd for meshes and animations + physics + i don't know).
Maybe it could be possible to convert .an8 files to .smd (reference mesh and skeleton + animation).
Maybe i could try to do it, but only if it is really usefull and if i found some people to test it (i don't know anything about mods and i do not have Half-Life 2). Maybe .ms3d file can already be easely be converted to Half-Life 2 models ?

Title: Re: MDL
Post by: CowTail on March 22, 2009, 07:36:06 pm

Yes, milkshape3d converts to the .mdl format rather easily, so the best thing would be to perfect Ani2Pov's .ms3d converter ;)

Title: Re: MDL
Post by: texel on March 23, 2009, 08:50:06 am

Actually, the .smd file format is maybe not hard to export.
Maybe i will try to export .smd files in the next release of Ani2Pov.

Title: Re: MDL
Post by: Raxx on March 23, 2009, 11:59:32 am

A more reasonable format to focus on after .ms3d is the collada or fbx format. This is a universal format supported by all the major packages such as 3dsmax, maya, cinema4d, softimage xsi, etc.

Title: Re: MDL
Post by: Aeth on March 24, 2009, 02:42:22 pm

opening anim8or up to .mdl files will also enable people to use Moray, and it's plug-ins (i.e. POV-Ray). I tried using a .mdl file in anim8or a while back, it loaded, but came up blank. I tried it a different way, and it just errored and said it couldn't load.

Title: Re: MDL
Post by: baxter on March 24, 2009, 03:19:09 pm

an mdl file is a file composed of other files together that work for the same model, the files used in mdl are smd and .qc, smd files typically describe how the model is formed and how it moves and the .qc file is a line of script which tells the Source Engine(the game engine used to make Half Life) how the model reacts in its environment(damage +1 = explosion or something like that) if You're interested in getting your models to this format I recommend a program called Softimage SXI Mod Tool

The basic program is free and can be used to make mdl files. though source sdk is required

http://www.softimage.com/products/modtool/

Title: Re: MDL
Post by: almost cool on March 24, 2009, 06:31:11 pm

Hold up, MS3D can do it, i could just use that, it can import obj or sumthin right?

Title: Re: MDL
Post by: Raxx on March 24, 2009, 07:17:52 pm

Just use texel's Ani2Pov .ms3d converter and then in MS3D import it and then you can export to .mdl or almost any other game engine format. If you just want to convert static inanimate objects then yes, you can just use anim8or to export .obj or .3ds and import into MS3D

Title: Re: MDL
Post by: Aeth on April 18, 2009, 08:12:17 am

well, I would benefit greatly from being able to convert from .mdl to .an8, so I'd be happy to test that if you want to write it.