Live by the Force |
Live by the Force |
Sunday, December 30, 2007
I suppose an update is in order, seeings how the project was lifted from the depths of the 2nd page of the project listings by an innocent yet good question on the forums.
Let's see, the last time I worked on anything was *checks LbtF Folder* 10/21/07. I believe I was trying to iron out the last kinks of the IK system. Ah yes, coding in the human range of motion for each joint, because up until then, it has just been 'hacked' to restrict to a semi-human limit. If coding had gone to plan, I could have told the hands to be anywhere, and the code would take care of the rest to make it look real. However, that didn't happen. Though I had coded in the path for the hands to take when moving the mouse, the arms just wouldn't co-operate no matter what I tried. I had hit a coding brick wall as the underlying IK system/formula just wasn't configured for the complex task I'm giving it.
If you Google up IK (Inverse Kinematics) you will more than likely find some stuff related to graphs and finding the lowest point on that graph with a serious block of code for it all. You might happen to come across the method that I'm using, which really is laughable compared to the graph way, but it works well for JK.
With a lack of understanding anything above Algebra, and doubts about JKs netcode and underlying engine framework to handle it all, I doubt I will be continuing this project. With the whole 'move your mouse to move your saber' philosophy and saber clashy clashy fights like the movies (which I hadn't even began to touch upon) riding on the IK code, I just can't do it any other way. There's only so much keyframes can do, and they have no place in the original concept of Live by the Force.
Who knows, maybe some day I'll be sitting on the can and go "THAT'S IT!" and be working on this once again, but until that day possibly happens, I'll just be here and there, helping out once in a while. If you think this is one of those "I'm leaving JK" kinda deals, your wrong. It's more of a stepping out of the coding arena for a bit and turning off the spotlight, as I can never truly put away JK. =)
Tuesday, October 09, 2007
Some of you may have noticed I posted the weap_saber.cog in all it's entirety on the forum. Just curious if anyone has taken it and used it for something they're working on. I'd like to know how it's going, or if there have been any improvements on the code. =)
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
About a week ago I got the saber to collide using a string of slow moving things created every frame. It winds up colliding quite accurately as shown in the vid I have uploaded. =D
Friday, September 07, 2007
Nothing much, but realized I had not shown this off yet. Somewhere between finalizing the glow of the saber and now, I had coded in the swing motion for vertical strikes. Download the latest vid to see.
Sunday, March 11, 2007
I spent most of the day toiling and sweating and banging my head trying to get the glow around the curve of the blade to work right. As you can tell from the various screenshots, I've finally got it done.
Sunday, March 04, 2007
I have done it! Both arms, pitching and yawing! All that's left is to code in some limitations so the forearm doesn't bend in an unnatural way. Check out IK5.avi under downloads, and be blown away! =D
Friday, March 02, 2007
No lockups! And I squashed a bug that wouldn't let it rotate 360 degrees. Not that I want it 360 degrees in the end, it's just that it wouldn't rotate past 90 degrees straight up or down. Now it does. Check out IK4 under the downloads!
Friday, February 16, 2007
Well, who would have thought that putting my code into a while loop would have worked out so perfect, that it would get stuck and never end? I sure didn't.
For the past 3 weeks, with what little time I've had to work on LbtF, I've been debugging and wrapping my head around lots of vectors. What you see happening in the last video (the arm slowly moving to reach it's destination) is now happening instantaneously thanks to putting it into a while loop inside of the pulse. So the speed at which you move your mouse is how fast the arms will move. However there is a slight glitch, which I'm sure is due to JK's rounding or truncating of decimals.
What sometimes happens is that when the arm is almost in the right position, it'll overshoot the destination, then go back and overshoot it again, leading to an infinity of overshooting the destination. I finally discovered it earlier this week, but haven't had a chance to code in the fix just yet. Rest assured, progress is happening. Once this bug is squished, the rest of the arm movement will fall into place rather easily. Then I can code in the specifics of the swing mechanics, not to mention saber trails. That'll be fun. =D
Sunday, January 28, 2007
What is IK? It's a method of manipulating a jointed structure to have the tip reach a desired point. Basically put, it's used for arm movement. View the IK vids under downloads to see it in action.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
In order to refresh myself with my code, I have gone back to the first incarnation of the arm code to perfect it. I have uploaded a video, and if you watch it, you'll see that it works nice, and there's a few bugs to iron out.
Monday, January 22, 2007
*blows the dust off LbtF*
Well well, after life kicked into overdrive last May, the dust has finally settled. Also after a little 'pep talk' with Zeq and Jedi Kirby, I'm feeling a little more motivated to breathe some new life into this project. Not to mention Zeq has taken over cogext and has coded those verbs I spent weeks trying to implement. =D
My first step will be to finish up the arm movement. I last left off dabbling with keyframes so that each arm piece would use the model you chose. That and coding SetThingPosEx() to set their positions and sector, which I failed at. THANK YOU ZEQ! =D =D <3
I'm also hoping to implement some of this netcode theory along the way, which I need to refresh my memory on what I was rambling about. >_<
Here's to doing what you love!
Sunday, April 16, 2006
So, because I need some new cog verbs, I am diving head first into the cogext.dll source, and making the verbs I need. =D
Tuesday, April 11, 2006
Part 1 of implementing the saber movement system is complete. Moving the mouse left/right/up/down circles it around the player. To yaw, simply go all the way to the right or left.
I have uploaded another vid to demonstrate this.
Part 2 will entail getting the arms linked together. That will probably take the longest to fine tune and tweak.
Sunday, April 09, 2006
After many a day of trying to get this stuff to work, it works! I have uploaded a vid of it in the download section.
Thursday, March 16, 2006
There is a new video showing my efforts at wiring in the key trapping cog. Nab it from the download section.
Friday, February 03, 2006
The upload files portion of the project admin isn't working atm, and I have three AVI's, showing the progress of the saber arms steadily improving. I uploaded them to HR64.com for your downloading pleasure. =)
Enjoy!
Check out the Description for what JK Weapon Arms are all about. =)