TF2 - Polypack - Progg

Progg · May 2010

UPDATE: 6/27/10... DONE!

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Don't forget Proggie!

Well.. I have been away for the last 4-5 days on a crazy job interview trip.. but I definitely want to try and compete in this contest. I am jetlagged right now but I have concepted a really quick sketch of some basic ideas.. with a bit of reference material I am using.

Class Selection:The Pyro
My Theme: 'The Gas Man'

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I always considered the Pyro to be a little bit nutty, so for my theme I chose to do a gas station service man. Humble, 1950s gas station attendant by day, crazy pyromaniac by night... the smell of fresh gas fumes and the squeal of a squeegee on window is just what this once humble service man loves the most.

3 Items:(Official Names will be determined later)

1. The Attendant (HAT ITEM) - hat and a bowtie together in a 1950's gas station attendant's style.

2. The De-Greaser (PRIMARY WEAPON ITEM) - old school 50s gas pump handle attached together with an old gas-can or something along those lines. The barrel will be crafted from an old WW2 style stove burner and some other gas station items such as a metal funnel. The underside will be attached an old school fire extinguisher. The compression blast will now eject CO2 particles and icey gas instead of the standard air blast, thus helping to further extinguish teammates and deflect rockets. I still haven't completely worked out the entire style of the flamethrower yet... I'll concept that out next.

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3. The Powerjack (MELEE WEAPON ITEM) - antique automobile jack to lift up cars to replace spare tires. Packs a devastating punch with the weight of the car battery.

Swizzle · May 2010

That hat paintover is slick. I'm going to keep an eye on this.

Zipfinator · May 2010

Great ideas! Can't wait to see the flamethrower replacement develop.

I have one tip for you though. I don't think your flamethrower should be designed too much around the C02 design since it could lower your chances of having it chosen. The rules also specifically state that you should replace the functionality of current items, not come up with new things like CO2 blasts. Of course many people are ignoring that because it's boring to stay within the functionality of most weapons. You could definitely still go with the idea of the C02 but I don't think you should focus much on integrating it into the model. A kick ass gas pump flamethrower would be great enough. Sorry for the long rant but I just wanted to make sure you know this is supposed to be completely about the art.

Looking forward to seeing this thread progress!

Progg · May 2010

Zipfinator wrote: »

Great ideas! Can't wait to see the flamethrower replacement develop.

I have one tip for you though. I don't think your flamethrower should be designed too much around the C02 design since it could lower your chances of having it chosen. The rules also specifically state that you should replace the functionality of current items, not come up with new things like CO2 blasts. Of course many people are ignoring that because it's boring to stay within the functionality of most weapons. You could definitely still go with the idea of the C02 but I don't think you should focus much on integrating it into the model. A kick ass gas pump flamethrower would be great enough. Sorry for the long rant but I just wanted to make sure you know this is supposed to be completely about the art.

Looking forward to seeing this thread progress!

Thanks for the tip Zip. I didn't plan on changing the behavior of the flamethrower.. I do think it would be cool to have it be a bit of co2 particle effects instead of the air blast, but it will only use the airblast effect initially.. it will still work just blasting air from the extinguisher.

Zipfinator · May 2010

I think a CO2 blast is a good idea but I don't see how it fits in with the gas pump/serviceman theme at all. Maybe you could design an item based on it outside of the contest just for fun.

Sharkisss · May 2010

Nice ideas Progg

dickless · May 2010

Zipfinator wrote: »

I think a CO2 blast is a good idea but I don't see how it fits in with the gas pump/serviceman theme at all. Maybe you could design an item based on it outside of the contest just for fun.

Every gas station will have plenty of fire extinguisher's around, trust me. That's the thing with gas, sometimes it's a bit of a fire risk.

Snex · May 2010

Really liking the hat and the gas pump, I think your 3rd idea, the squeegee needs some work.
Maybe forget the melee and try a secondary or misc item.

Progg · May 2010

Update to the hat and bowtie concept. I'm calling it The Attendant for now. Added the bowtie... calling it done and moving onto the weapons.

Naso · May 2010

Finally another Pyro set submitted, the hat looks pretty swell, re minds me of the milk man someone is doing for the scout. Can't wait to see how the flamethrower will come out.

Progg · May 2010

This is where I was thinking I would head with the squeegee I have dubbed The Squeeg. Basically my idea was to shorten the overall rubber blade length so it was more stocky and weapon like and incorporate some broken window shards of glass into the other end of it

oobersli · May 2010

you could always shape it to look like the axe with the head on the side. or atleast make it longer.

Luxy · May 2010

Bowtie should be misc.

Acumen · May 2010

huge glass pieces in a rubber blade - now thats some constructed coincidental weapon creation

you should finally get going and create some models for me to drool over

dickless · May 2010

The squeegie/glass idea is great. Can't wait to see some models.

Progg · May 2010

Model mostly done.

so... bowtie with the hat or as a misc item. And if misc... can we submit 4 things?

Swizzle · May 2010

Sweet! I like how loose and floppy the hat looks.

Also, no jokes about loose and floppy. I mean it.

Simski · May 2010

I'm loving the hat.

I'm wondering about your flamethrower though, as the original already uses a 50's gas handle thingie...

Zipfinator · May 2010

Looking nice! I don't like the position of the badge though. I think it should either be in the center or removed completely.

Frump · May 2010

That hat is rad. Great modeling. Already I think it's my favorite for the Pyro.

Valve is going to have their work cut out for them just choosing one or two sets to include.:)

Ikimono · May 2010

Frump wrote: »

That hat is rad. Great modeling. Already I think it's my favorite for the Pyro.

Valve is going to have their work cut out for them just choosing one or two sets to include.:)

Unless they do the smart/cool thing and make an update including more than 1 hat per class. ...Since it's so incredibly easy to integrate hats.

Huuu · May 2010

YOu've got some solid stuff there Progg. Looking forward to seeing your end results.

Progg · May 2010

Damn. I'm at a bit of a standstill right now because I can't decide whether to pair the bowtie and the hat together like I did the hound dog items or to have them be misc... I think it fits the theme better to have the 2 come as 1 item.. but what do you guys think?

Some Jerk · May 2010

Progg wrote: »

Damn. I'm at a bit of a standstill right now because I can't decide whether to pair the bowtie and the hat together like I did the hound dog items or to have them be misc... I think it fits the theme better to have the 2 come as 1 item.. but what do you guys think?

Submit them as a combo and also submit them as separate items. Let valve decide what to do.

Psyke · May 2010

together

no chance about it

together

whiskered gentleman and this?

would be godly.

Progg · May 2010

nrek · May 2010

Looking good Progg

.

BANG! · May 2010

Hahaha very nice! in my opinion it fits very well to the game.

Thrillho · May 2010

Damn, looking excellent so far. :-)

EvilShadow777 · May 2010

I'd say keep it as 1 item, would go great with Whiskered Gentlemanne attached. Loving the concept so far, let's see how it progresses.

duoxan · May 2010

hahaha nice work on the hat and bow tie, reminds me of steve martins 'jerk'

Nzdjh · May 2010

Ikimono · May 2010

Nzdjh wrote: »

I love the hat. For whatever reason it just seems to go perfectly with the Pyro. Even unfinished it looks awesome.

Shoot, just try it with a few color variations (red/blu for the main part) with a black strap, etc.)

Soon as i see a flamethrower then i'll really start doing jazz hands though :P

chickenman · May 2010

In my opinion, I think that the hat should be a tad bit bigger, more in line with your original Mock-up. Other than that, it's awesome.

Progg · May 2010

I can't for the life of me get the textures to load in the model viewer

I never compiled the stuff for the Hound Dog... I got the model to compile but for some reason even with the .qc and .vmt pointing to the right area I can't get textures to show up.

Konras · May 2010

Hmm, did you double checked that model in 3d software was having this texture binded before export, and you placed the textures in tf/materials/models/player/items/pyro/ (not just in tf/models/player/items/pyro/). Anyways this is really frustrating process, you need to experiment... maybe just name vtf the same as vmt, or just name everything the same, so it would be easier. Also you could post you /qc, and begining of .vmt, and for sure someone will help ASAP

Zipfinator · May 2010

Was the name of your material applied to the hat in 3DS the same as your VMT? That's the first thing I'd think is wrong. Otherwise one of your files is probably referencing the wrong location.

nrek · May 2010

This is a quote from the materials section of this site, it managed to solve one of the many problems I was also having like this.

http://www.kathar.net/hl2modding/errors.php

Pre-export Checks:
By doing this check, we can figure out whether the issue is (at least partly) caused by incorrectly applying the texture before exporting your model as an SMD. The quickest and easiest way of checking to see if your reference .smd has correctly applied textures is by opening it up with a text editor (wordpad is good for this). Now, just scroll half-way through and you should see that every three rows of numbers, another line follows, which should show your texture's name. If it does, your model exported fine and this isn't the problem (don't worry about what file extension it shows, in my experience any extension is fine). However, if the line that follows the three rows of numbers is blank, or shows "debug/debugempty", then you either didn't apply a texture to the model at all, or didn't apply it correctly. I can't help with this as every application differs, so search google if you're unsure how to apply a texture properly. Also, if you have more than one texture, check that all of them can be seen in the SMD.

Progg · May 2010

EDIT:

Got it to work. However I noticed on some exaggerated animations the bowtie pulls away from the body

... not sure how I am going to handle that.

Zipfinator · May 2010

Progg wrote: »

hmmm .. I looked through that post and checked my stuff. I just don't see the problem. What should my .qc and .vmt look like code wise?

And no the material in max was a tga before I exported the SMD.. how could it be the same as the VMT

I didn't say be the same as the VMT. I said have the same name. The .MDL looks for a VMT file that has the same name of the material that was applied when the SMD was exported. Then it textures the model based off of the info in the VMT.

Also if you don't mind post the text in your VMT and .QC.

Progg · May 2010

Zipfinator wrote: »

I didn't say be the same as the VMT. I said have the same name. The .MDL looks for a VMT file that has the same name of the material that was applied when the SMD was exported. Then it textures the model based off of the info in the VMT.

Also if you don't mind post the text in your VMT and .QC.

Got it to work sorry Zip.. you were right on the name.

Khthon · May 2010

That bowtie in the animation problem doesn't seem like too big a deal. You could always make it a clip on tie and have a bit of wire holding it in place (like those wires on puppets hands in Sesame Street). That way it will be comedic when it is out of place - you'll see the Pyro couldn't connect it properly and just stuck it on a wire taped to his suit.

Or just have a strap around his neck so it looks like it's hanging down.

Mico27 · May 2010

I believe you can make attachements to different bones even if it's a hat in the qc file. Maybe if you'd attach it on the neck bone instead of the "bip_head".

Khthon · May 2010

Yeah mico27 is right. I'd try that first.

Progg · May 2010

EDIT:

Nice call on the different bone. Bound the bowtie to the neck bone and it works great now.

Progg · May 2010

Calling 'The Attendant' hat done for now. Working on the flamethrower tomorrow.

Ravidge · May 2010

Amazing work, the bowtie really makes it click together

Khthon · May 2010

Are you leaving it gray? Maybe off-white with team colored strap clasp?

Naso · May 2010

I liked it gold, it matched the Pyro's container. Also the badge could be the team colored thing if he added it.

Simski · May 2010

Could you 2 or 3 separate versions of your hat?
One with bowtie and hat, one with just the hat, and one with just the bowtie.

In case Valve decides that hats aren't allowed to have additional items that aren't direct part of the hat :O

Naso · May 2010

I don't think they would disallow that.

TF2 - Polypack - Progg

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