Neither, they don't contact you saying they'll put it in or if they don't put it in. The only time you'll hear from them is after it is already in the game. I found out my item was in through cyborgmatt.com before I heard from Valve. Obviously there's exceptions to this, but that's the general way that this happens.
I have already asked this, but only one person answered and he wasn't very sure about it. If my set didn't win the contest, will I be able to submit the items as a normal set anyway?
After the contest if you continue to make parts for your set that you didn't get to make such as with mine I didn't make the wings or belt if I made them now that the entry part of the contest is finished, can they still be added to the set but not for judgment?
Would that some how disqualify my entry for adding them after the due date?
I just want to get all the items done as a complete set and only be "judged" on the set I entered the contest with, though for me I want to get the remaining pieces done aside from the contest.
Or do I have to wait till all of the processes are handled for this contest then send my remaining items off?
It seems like we can edit the content of each item.
I took the plunge and added one video on one item to see what happens and the date of the last update didn't change.
If you now go and see on the right lower corner there is this yellow frame around the submission date that I think it wasn't there before. It also no longer appears when or if there was an update after you change something, the original submission date remains.
But then again, if you guys don't want to risk better always to play safe.
Neither, they don't contact you saying they'll put it in or if they don't put it in. The only time you'll hear from them is after it is already in the game. I found out my item was in through cyborgmatt.com before I heard from Valve. Obviously there's exceptions to this, but that's the general way that this happens.
That kinda sucks. So how long was it between you uploading your item and finding out it was added through cyborgmatt?
I don't recall exactly but it must have been 2-4 weeks. In the context of the Polycount Contest, however, that might not apply since it's another thing altogether than just a 'regular' submission.
I did not manage to finish my set in time, partly because I cannot get the skinning to work in Maya for my items. I'm working with the drow ranger, no matter how I try I just manage to get the item skinned to the bones, but when trying to paint the weights I get errors. This even happens when I open valves version of the items and try to paint skinwieghts. However I am able to paint the weights in valves version for some reason, but the errors still read the same. // Error: No object matches name: spine2.liw or which ever bones the items are skinned to. I skin the items to the root and to the designated joints by smooth bind and skin to selected joints. How do I solve this? I have tried skinning so many times now and still get the same errors.
I did not manage to finish my set in time, partly because I cannot get the skinning to work in Maya for my items. I'm working with the drow ranger, no matter how I try I just manage to get the item skinned to the bones, but when trying to paint the weights I get errors. This even happens when I open valves version of the items and try to paint skinwieghts. However I am able to paint the weights in valves version for some reason, but the errors still read the same. // Error: No object matches name: spine2.liw or which ever bones the items are skinned to. I skin the items to the root and to the designated joints by smooth bind and skin to selected joints. How do I solve this? I have tried skinning so many times now and still get the same errors.
Try to skin the joints just too the joints and not the root. For example select each joint you know will be used, not just the top hierarchy, and use smooth bind and skin to selected joints again.
If you could show a screenshot of the error we could be able to help a little more.
Your settings seem fine. Are you importing the skeleton into the scene? Maybe open the drow maya file, and import your object so all skeleton is untouched. If your importing the rig/drow maya file into your object scene it could be automatically adding namespaces which might be causing the error.
I'm having trouble replicating your error though.
Make sure your history is cleared etc on the object (not the skeleton).
Your settings seem fine. Are you importing the skeleton into the scene? Maybe open the drow maya file, and import your object so all skeleton is untouched. If your importing the rig/drow maya file into your object scene it could be automatically adding namespaces which might be causing the error.
I'm having trouble replicating your error though.
Make sure your history is cleared etc on the object (not the skeleton).
I thought that might have been the problem as well, no I'm in a fresh scene importing the shoulder fbx file. Im just deleting the exsisting valve mesh and replacing it with my own and then skinning it. Every fbx file got the skeleton included. History is already deleted on all items
This is why I'm so unsure of what is wrong. I might have to reinstall Maya or something. The extension ".liw" is that something all joints have though it is hidden usually? Otherwise maybe I have to rename the joints to include ".liw" on them. Seems very fishy though.
Wait... Have you tried to use the Maya Ascii file included in the character's zip for skinning?
No, but I have a friend that also entered the contest and he said that the fbx files are what you are supposed to use, the Acii file is not the latest version of the hero in all cases. I have done everything the way he used his settings and all and that worked out for him with Spirit Breaker and Doom Bringer. That's why I have no idea why this is not working.
Hey guys, I have a problem implementing my items on Void's model. I get a really weird stretching problem when I import the bracers and shoulder pieces. This is what it looks like...
I've no idea what's it called and why it's doing that. Any help would be appreciated. I'm using 3DS Max 2012.
Were I a betting man, I'd bet a buck that there is more influencing that specific part of the shoulders than the bones that you intended.
Another thing to check for... Did you resetXforms on the shoulders?
Yes, I did. Also I've been using the SMD imports than the FBX. The FBX tends to make my items disappear when I export my items to FBX. This is what the imports for Faceless Void looks like for SMD and FBX:
Vertical It may sounds insane, but SMD import seen on the right is correct Errors in bone display is a result of some kind of bug in importer, but after you export your model connected to those bones, everything works just fine.
Best what you can do is to attach your mesh to original shoulder mesh and than delete original geo, after that adjust vertex weights. At first chose only one bone (this above shoulder) and see if there will be any stretching.
@vertical - Wunderboy discontinued development of his SMD importers, and thus they haven't been updated to properly import the SMD version used by Dota 2. I would venture a guess that it's the reason for the weird bone orientations on one half.
Use Cannonfodder's SMD importer if you need proper bone mirroring. However, that wouldn't necessarily fix your issue. Look up how to do vertex mirroring on the bone envelopes in max, and mirror the rigging/envelope from the shoulder that shows up properly to the bugged one.
jsut to let you know how i did it to fix floating geometry in the wrong places, even with xform etc
go to max, select the object,
go to skin, advanced parameters,
uncheck always deform
make sure you are on your refernce frame (default frame 0)
now go in the edit poly under your skin modifier
now go to the tab where you can change your pivot point and hit reset pivot
now go back to the skin modifier and check always deform
this fixed it for me
box method didnt worked for some reason, neither did xform
also you do not have to export your bones, the skin modifier remembers what bone it is linked to, and normally you export the bones with the model,
but the dota engine already has the bones in the game, so you can just export the model with the skin modifier
i used fbx, if you do make sure animations is checked, and deformations skin/morph are checked
I have now tried every possible solution to my problem. I got the suggestion that the fact that I was using a student license of Maya might be the one thing creating this name error. But after spending a whole day to finally be able to get out of the student license, I still get the same error. After that I have assembled my stationary computer instead and transfered the files and when opening them in a different version of Maya. I still get the same problem. However two friends of mine I gave the same files and they both said it was working for them. I am so confused to why this is not just working as intended... Does anyone have any more suggestions for this? On my Stationary I have Maya 2011 with a student license. I have done alot of work in Maya before and have never had any problems concerning the student license, Except getting a watermark. Anyway the license seems to not be the problem.
I still get the error (jointname).liw not found, see earlier posts for screenshots.
The MA file actually do not give me the same errors, here everything seems to be working as intended. But this file is crowded with all items at the same time and a bunch of other stuff. If I am to use this file for my items, I replace valves items and skin mine instead. But then when exporting them, Do I export the items one by one with the whole skeleton in every file then? Because it seems every FBX file have the whole skeleton included.
I have now tried every possible solution to my problem. I got the suggestion that the fact that I was using a student license of Maya might be the one thing creating this name error. But after spending a whole day to finally be able to get out of the student license, I still get the same error. After that I have assembled my stationary computer instead and transfered the files and when opening them in a different version of Maya. I still get the same problem. However two friends of mine I gave the same files and they both said it was working for them. I am so confused to why this is not just working as intended... Does anyone have any more suggestions for this? On my Stationary I have Maya 2011 with a student license. I have done alot of work in Maya before and have never had any problems concerning the student license, Except getting a watermark. Anyway the license seems to not be the problem.
I still get the error (jointname).liw not found, see earlier posts for screenshots.
Did you skin to one of the fbx skeletons? What I read is that the 2009 version of the fbx format had some sort of bug that removed joint attributes that maya looks for. From what I read you can run a script to replace the attributes but I couldn't get it to work. What I ended up doing was re-skining to the skeleton in the maya file, reference in my mesh skinned to the fbx skeleton and copied the weighting from that. What was strange was this didn't happen until I rigged the 5th item and could no longer alter skin weights either with the component editor or the weight painting tools.
Did you skin to one of the fbx skeletons? What I read is that the 2009 version of the fbx format had some sort of bug that removed joint attributes that maya looks for. From what I read you can run a script to replace the attributes but I couldn't get it to work. What I ended up doing was re-skining to the skeleton in the maya file, reference in my mesh skinned to the fbx skeleton and copied the weighting from that. What was strange was this didn't happen until I rigged the 5th item and could no longer alter skin weights either with the component editor or the weight painting tools.
Yes indeed I tried to skin to the fbx skeletons as a friend of mine instructed and he got this to work on two other characters. Maybe there is some problem with my fbx importer then or something similar. The wierd thing is though that I got the same problem on 2 different computers in different versions of Maya. I have had some kind of similar problem earlier as well which I could resolve with a script. But that time around I knew what was wrong and knew what needed to be added or subtracted to get things to work. In this case I do not. Anyway thanks for the help guys, I will try to skin using the MA file tomorrow and just hope for the best ^^
"The Dota 2 Polycount Contest winners will be announced December 3rd, 2012 (UPDATED) December 10th, 2012. That’s right – just like we did with the Team Fortress 2 ‘Polycount Pack’ we’re telling you right now, right here when the winners will be announced."
This is probably a hint that this 10th December is just randomly picked date TF2 Contest ended long after date was stated in the rules.
That should not be a problem. Anyway the competition was most important, not who and when will win. There are more than 180 finished entries, that's way more everyone suspected probably.
I need to check how many TF2 entries were finished
edit: According to this post http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=74543 there were 76 entries - so way less than now, which is really impressive since DOTA 2 items were much more complicated.
Yeah. I know it's a bit confusing exporting FBX between the two softwares Max and Maya.
In Maya, you only need to select the geometry. In Max, you need to select the bone geometry as well as the mesh/poly geometry.
Weird stuff.
you are right, but for the in game compiler i found that in maya if you dont select the bones when exporting the fbx it will relocate the mesh to probably the root when you open it in the compiler, my axes where in the center of the body, animated but in the middle
animated == it recognized the bones
in the middle == it losts the bind pose translation for some reason...
This is probably a hit that this 10th December is just randomly picked date TF2 Contest ended long after date was stated in the rules.
That should not be a problem. Anyway the competition was most important, not who and when will win. There are more than 180 finished entries, that's way more everyone suspected probably.
I need to check how many TF2 entries were finished
edit: According to this post http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=74543 there were 76 entries - so way less than now, which is really impressive since DOTA 2 items were much more complicated.
a tweet from polycount yesterday
Valve Time: The winner announcements for the Dota 2 Contest has be bumped to tomorrow and its going to be a doozy. #Holdontoyourbutts.
That should not be a problem. Anyway the competition was most important, not who and when will win. There are more than 180 finished entries, that's way more everyone suspected probably.
- I don't follow, why are date extensions good for any participant who followed the original rules?
- I don't follow, why are date extensions good for any participant who followed the original rules?
I didn't said that delay is good for anyone, but knowing how much stuff (model, textures, rig, etc) makes an item, and how many items makes a set, and how many sets were done I can not even imagine how much time is needed to check everything from Valve's side.
Not even mentioning that all set (excluding mine , however thanks for good word Tvidotto) were fabulous, and judging that is probably a real nightmare.
Anyway Frosty40 I did't had any bad intentions, sorry if my post seamed that way.
Don't be alarmed guys, it's what c.matt likes. Valve is not going to pick from c.matt's list. Valve makes a decision of from everything that has been submitted, 180+ sets.
Goddamnit Valve, they got my hopes up again with that little intro paragraph... Now I'll be twitchy as fuck all week till all the winners are announced.
Replies
After the contest if you continue to make parts for your set that you didn't get to make such as with mine I didn't make the wings or belt if I made them now that the entry part of the contest is finished, can they still be added to the set but not for judgment?
Would that some how disqualify my entry for adding them after the due date?
I just want to get all the items done as a complete set and only be "judged" on the set I entered the contest with, though for me I want to get the remaining pieces done aside from the contest.
Or do I have to wait till all of the processes are handled for this contest then send my remaining items off?
edit: I'll just wait, so nevermind.
http://youtu.be/ivf6JsrQpsg
It seems like we can edit the content of each item.
I took the plunge and added one video on one item to see what happens and the date of the last update didn't change.
If you now go and see on the right lower corner there is this yellow frame around the submission date that I think it wasn't there before. It also no longer appears when or if there was an update after you change something, the original submission date remains.
But then again, if you guys don't want to risk better always to play safe.
That kinda sucks. So how long was it between you uploading your item and finding out it was added through cyborgmatt?
Try to skin the joints just too the joints and not the root. For example select each joint you know will be used, not just the top hierarchy, and use smooth bind and skin to selected joints again.
If you could show a screenshot of the error we could be able to help a little more.
That is the error message, that seems to be only name conflicting of some sort.
Here are my skinning settings as well.
And sosmehow that name error prevents me from painting skinweight.
I'm having trouble replicating your error though.
Make sure your history is cleared etc on the object (not the skeleton).
I thought that might have been the problem as well, no I'm in a fresh scene importing the shoulder fbx file. Im just deleting the exsisting valve mesh and replacing it with my own and then skinning it. Every fbx file got the skeleton included. History is already deleted on all items
This is why I'm so unsure of what is wrong. I might have to reinstall Maya or something. The extension ".liw" is that something all joints have though it is hidden usually? Otherwise maybe I have to rename the joints to include ".liw" on them. Seems very fishy though.
No, but I have a friend that also entered the contest and he said that the fbx files are what you are supposed to use, the Acii file is not the latest version of the hero in all cases. I have done everything the way he used his settings and all and that worked out for him with Spirit Breaker and Doom Bringer. That's why I have no idea why this is not working.
Instead of deleting the original mesh just hide it and use it to copy the weight across as a test.
I've no idea what's it called and why it's doing that. Any help would be appreciated. I'm using 3DS Max 2012.
Another thing to check for... Did you resetXforms on the shoulders?
Yes, I did. Also I've been using the SMD imports than the FBX. The FBX tends to make my items disappear when I export my items to FBX. This is what the imports for Faceless Void looks like for SMD and FBX:
FBX is left and SMD is right:
Best what you can do is to attach your mesh to original shoulder mesh and than delete original geo, after that adjust vertex weights. At first chose only one bone (this above shoulder) and see if there will be any stretching.
Use Cannonfodder's SMD importer if you need proper bone mirroring. However, that wouldn't necessarily fix your issue. Look up how to do vertex mirroring on the bone envelopes in max, and mirror the rigging/envelope from the shoulder that shows up properly to the bugged one.
go to max, select the object,
go to skin, advanced parameters,
uncheck always deform
make sure you are on your refernce frame (default frame 0)
now go in the edit poly under your skin modifier
now go to the tab where you can change your pivot point and hit reset pivot
now go back to the skin modifier and check always deform
this fixed it for me
box method didnt worked for some reason, neither did xform
also you do not have to export your bones, the skin modifier remembers what bone it is linked to, and normally you export the bones with the model,
but the dota engine already has the bones in the game, so you can just export the model with the skin modifier
i used fbx, if you do make sure animations is checked, and deformations skin/morph are checked
hope this helps someone
I still get the error (jointname).liw not found, see earlier posts for screenshots.
Yeah. I know it's a bit confusing exporting FBX between the two softwares Max and Maya.
In Maya, you only need to select the geometry. In Max, you need to select the bone geometry as well as the mesh/poly geometry.
Weird stuff.
Did you skin to one of the fbx skeletons? What I read is that the 2009 version of the fbx format had some sort of bug that removed joint attributes that maya looks for. From what I read you can run a script to replace the attributes but I couldn't get it to work. What I ended up doing was re-skining to the skeleton in the maya file, reference in my mesh skinned to the fbx skeleton and copied the weighting from that. What was strange was this didn't happen until I rigged the 5th item and could no longer alter skin weights either with the component editor or the weight painting tools.
Thank you very much, you have been most helpful
Finally I might be able to finish this first item set ^^
Yes indeed I tried to skin to the fbx skeletons as a friend of mine instructed and he got this to work on two other characters. Maybe there is some problem with my fbx importer then or something similar. The wierd thing is though that I got the same problem on 2 different computers in different versions of Maya. I have had some kind of similar problem earlier as well which I could resolve with a script. But that time around I knew what was wrong and knew what needed to be added or subtracted to get things to work. In this case I do not. Anyway thanks for the help guys, I will try to skin using the MA file tomorrow and just hope for the best ^^
"The Dota 2 Polycount Contest winners will be announced December 3rd, 2012 (UPDATED) December 10th, 2012. That’s right – just like we did with the Team Fortress 2 ‘Polycount Pack’ we’re telling you right now, right here when the winners will be announced."
right where exactly?
That should not be a problem. Anyway the competition was most important, not who and when will win. There are more than 180 finished entries, that's way more everyone suspected probably.
I need to check how many TF2 entries were finished
edit: According to this post http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=74543 there were 76 entries - so way less than now, which is really impressive
you are right, but for the in game compiler i found that in maya if you dont select the bones when exporting the fbx it will relocate the mesh to probably the root when you open it in the compiler, my axes where in the center of the body, animated but in the middle
animated == it recognized the bones
in the middle == it losts the bind pose translation for some reason...
a tweet from polycount yesterday
Valve Time: The winner announcements for the Dota 2 Contest has be bumped to tomorrow and its going to be a doozy. #Holdontoyourbutts.
btw, loved your set Konras =]
- I don't follow, why are date extensions good for any participant who followed the original rules?
Not even mentioning that all set (excluding mine
Anyway Frosty40 I did't had any bad intentions, sorry if my post seamed that way.
I don't *think* he is from Vavle though, so we should wait and see. However, I could be wrong. :poly121:
Valve, you are such a tease! :poly124:
Here's hoping for Day 2 and 3!
Now that I got the list I need not be concerned.