TMP Bridge-Lightmaps WIP

[Picky]

I'm proceeding with the textures: I used Baz's panels but if he doesn't want, I'll change them ;)
Textures are complete at 100%! All stations are animanted in 5 frames. Now I'm adjusting the lights to do the lightmaps, maybe we will try to convert two versions: one with the lightmaps, the other without them, and see which is the best.
You will see a darker bridge: I'm trying to match the correct lighting from the movie.
I rebuild also the turbolifts, now they have a minor number of polygons.

[baz1701]

I'm proceeding with the textures: I used Baz's panels but if he doesn't want, I'll change them ;)

No objections help yourself.

One question the turbolift doors are they panels or boxes. The reason I asks is mark pointed out to me that the old bridges used a single sided panel (saves polys) and this was fine until walk FX came out. If you are standing in the lift the doors will be see through, so make them boxes and texture both sides.

[Picky]

I already noticed that: they are obviously boxes ;)
But every single suggestion is well accepted, thank you !

[King Class Scout]

okay...this'll be the first cookie I've given out in a LONG time.

[Aeries]

This is AWESOME, Picky! Will I actually be able to download this one?? Baz's twok bridge download is fubar. XD

[baz1701]

Baz's twok bridge download is fubar. XD

Can you expand on that?

[Aeries]

Can you expand on that?

Didn't you get my PM? The download link on Filefront is broken; stuck in an infinite loop or something of the sort.

[baz1701]

Nothing I can do. Try the link in the comments. Think we need new host site.

[Picky]

I reached the conclusion that it is a problem of the browser: Internet Explorer doesn't work, you have to use Safari, Firefox, Mozilla or Google Chrome. But the link in the comments is a direct link and should work with every browser ;)

Update: I tried to do the lightmaps but the resluts were not so good, so I will follow the footsteps of Lurok and Baz and use the uniform lights of the bridge. The next step are the animations of doors and chairs, right? Do I have to do that with the classic keyframe animation or there is a special path to follow?

Thank you!

[baz1701]

standard key frames. thought not sure they will work as they need to be exported from max 3

[Lurok91]

Update: I tried to do the lightmaps but the resluts were not so good,

Why don't you post them anyway?  We all have times when results not good but if we show them we can get advice on where going wrong.

so I will follow the footsteps of Lurok and Baz and use the uniform lights of the bridge.

Do you mean lightmap with uniform light? 

The next step are the animations of doors and chairs, right? Do I have to do that with the classic keyframe animation or there is a special path to follow?

As Baz said, standard keyframes.  On first bridges was able to export working door anims from Max 9 into Max 3, but not the chairs.  May be possible but never done it myself.  Probably is best to do all anims in Max 3.  

[baz1701]

if your at the animation stage I can help

[Picky]

I was an error in the unwrapping! Now the lightmaps are ok, but I have to lightmap all the objects? The walls are really better without lightmaps.

Baz, really thank you for the help, animations are the next step and your help will be indispensable

[Lurok91]

I was an error in the unwrapping! Now the lightmaps are ok, but I have to lightmap all the objects? The walls are really better without lightmaps.

If you're going down the lightmapping route, ideally yes you should lightmap all objects.  But you don't have to.  May just look a bit strange.

[Aeries]

I'm excited to see what this'll look like at Red Alert!

[Picky]

Probably this bridge will use the natural darkening for red alert: it is a very heavy model and overload it with textures swapping would probably crash any computer!

Update: I'm proceeding with lightmaps, separating the walls in parts gave me more control on the process and now they work correctly ;)
A question: do I have to lightmap also the panels? In their materials, all the panels have Self-Illumination, it is indifferent?
In the screenshots below all the light are turned off: there are only lightmaps

[King Class Scout]

if the bridge is that heavy, just keep the texture sizes down.  it's the textures themselves that cause the BC engine to gag.

every bridge I've looked at has no LM's for the panels themselves in basic.  i think I've seen a few exceptions with the TOS bridges.

[Lurok91]

If those pictures are of your lightmapped bridge with no lights turned on, then you don't need to do anything else.   If everything is illuminated in your lightmap render, then it will look the same ingame.   Congratulations      Personally I'd like to see a bit more shadow/atmosphere - it does look a bit 'flat' - but it's your choice.

And KCS is right about texture swapping:   probably what you should do is have 512 textures for low-end computers but also include bigger textures for those whose computers can handle them. 

[Picky]

Thank you all for the answers.
The textures are 512 x 512, only the panels are 1024 x 1024, but it is not a problem to do a second folder with smaller textures ;)
The only remaining lightmaps are the tubolifts' ones: will do tomorrow.
Then I'll animate the chairs and the doors (hoping that exporting the bridge to 3dmax 3 will not eliminate that step: I don't want to give more work to Baz!)

Personally I'd like to see a bit more shadow/atmosphere

Yes, you are right: there isn't much detail. But this is my first successfully build bridge! Maybe I'll do a second version with some shadow (easy to do: will be a retexture of the lightmaps!).
I choose these regular lights also because I like a lot the atmosphere of Baz's bridge: it is really "smooth".

[baz1701]

Then I'll animate the chairs and the doors (hoping that exporting the bridge to 3dmax 3 will not eliminate that step: I don't want to give more work to Baz!)

Don't worry about that. That will take less than 10 minutes to do once the bridge is fully in max 3.

As for the dark enviroment I will be releasing at some point the hijacked enterprise bridge with only one omni over the helm.