Titanoboa Serpentes

Hi, just want to add that there is a third option : ArmorPaint and you can use different versions, one that also has DXR for RTX cards. It's not as stable and elaborate as Quixel or SP and still in development, but it hase lots of options, and you can paint directly on the model. The link is here:  https://armorpaint.org/index.html.

Hi, of course changing the MIP maps colors is way easier. I missed the easiest solution. Thanks amaronap for that. For texture conversion, I use the tools I mentioned above. The texconv.exe from Microsoft gets some updates from time to time, and it gives me correct results. At least I have not seen any degradation on image quality.

From the Microsoft page, I got some info on the structure of a dds file, and although I don't quite understand that yet, it seems that there are specifically optimized to run on 3D hardware, so loading a PNG file might be less efficient. DDS files have a ddscaps structure that is defined through caps bits, which denote the usage of those surfaces that are contained in the DDS file, e.g. DDSCAPS_TEXTURE-Caps-Bit, and DDSCAPS_3DDEVICE. I don't have the knowledge required to understand the bits in detail, but from the given names of those bits, I think the DDS format is way more optimized for graphics hardware than picture formats like PNG and using BC7 and BC5 even gives you a good representation of the original PNG file.

@ddman2 I might try the skin textures as well. Maybe hook5 doesn't use MIP maps at all by have a fixed resolution for the textures. Did you try to use the customizable skin on cloth items? It should give the same results.

Hi, you could try to increase ambient occlusion and fiddle around with the ambient occlusion parameters in the hook5 general settings menu. You get to that menu by pressing F4 and navigate to the SSAO panel. NV HBAO+ or MXAO give the best results. I would activate the SSAOBlurEnable, SSAONormalsEnable and HBAO Detail. Then change the strength and the radius for the SSAO and use the setting that suits you most.

Hi, I didn't know what the engine of the game is capable of. But I assumed that hook5 was capable of it. Unfortunately, I couldn't find any information in the hook5 development thread, and pervo didn't give that much information about the technical aspects of hook5.

@amaronap How did you test if hook5 is using MIP maps? I assume you have looked at the memory consumption of MIP mapped textures versus not MIP mapped textures.

Since I use Gimp to edit textures, I use this plugin https://gist.github.com/Equinox-/19d726d4c9cd59f8617429b3a6a8e16c to export and import BCx format textures. You can then save them in a lossless format to further edit them in other programs. You have to download https://github.com/microsoft/DirectXTex/releases textconv.exe and edit the path in the script to import and export textures. The format can be adjusted by editing the script.

Hi, I do agree with the posts made here. I have made textures for rooms and I think that having a spec map with alpha channel for ambient occlusion can give you a noticeable detail that ambient occlusion can not take into account. I wouldn't recommend using DXT 1 compression for the discoloration that comes with it and the alpha channel is only saved in values 1 and 0 so that means that any soft transition in transparency is lost. I always decide specifically which textures have to be in high resolution and I would use them whenever the objects are close in the camera view. To create my textures, I save them in a lossless format like tiff or png with the resolution I have in mind, so there won't be any information lost. You can, however, downsize your texture. Here is a good article on that matter: 

https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/image-resize-for-web.htm.

For very detailed textures, I use BC7 compression. BC7 compression has almost the same size as DXT5, with lesser artifacts and smoother transitions. BC5 compression is ideally used for normal maps because it doesn't save the blue channel information used for the surface normal, but it doesn't have an alpha channel. I also generate MIP maps. It does make the texture size about 1/3 larger depending on how much MIP levels you want, but it increases performance because objects that are further away from the camera view use the resized MIP maps stored in the file. To gain more performance, it's also necessary to look at the 3D objects and eliminate any hidden geometry and consolidate the textures used by those objects. I did that extensively with the City apartment H5 where only a few spec and normal maps were used, but a lot of meshes had hidden geometry that not only made the file size very big but used more processing power from the graphics card and consumed more memory. If you really want to have a high level of detail for textures and objects, you can use micro detail brushes in the creation process and bake them to your maps to get extra detail like fingerprints and smudges. The specular map can be smaller, but that depends on whether there is specular detail or not. Some items may have different roughness on certain parts and require a specular map that matches that detail, e.g. a wooden table that has different roughness on certain parts on the same plate.

In conclusion, the first step is to find out the texture sizes that you want your model to have to get the best balance for performance and quality. The second step is to create these textures with a program like Blender Gimp, Photoshop etc. and store them in a lossless format. The last step is to use the appropriate compression for the textures: BC5 for normal maps, if you don't use the alpha channel for displacement, BC7 for diffuse and specular textures. Here is a list of all BCx compression formats:

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/direct3d11/texture-block-compression-in-direct3d-11

@Morius The information on hairworks parameters are from the official Nvida hairworks guide and I used some information from the guide of the hairworks viewer tool found here https://developer.nvidia.com/hairworks-tutorials . Some parameters are not found in hook5 but you can get a good overview of the hair system.

Hi, you might want to use textures for the glasses if they are ActiveMod enabled. You need to have txf files with "RGBA_8888" "AlphaBlend/WriteZ" and a _pass.txt file for each texture. The _pass.txt file should contain something like this (e.g. for [Glasses] Wayfarers):

[pass]
name = CustomModel
stage2 = R9Eyewear005_norm.dds
stage3 = R9Eyewear005_S.dds

cull_mode = 3

the _norm.dds and _S.dds files will have to be created.

Hi, I tried to upload more than one file. What options do I have to choose under the upload file section of a mod page? I see that other members have multiple files in their download section of a mod. Are these external links? I tried to upload a file via a link to mega.nz, but I couldn't paste the link into the URL box. Is there a restriction for some file hosting services?

Thanks in advance!

Hi, over the weekend, I just tried different naming schemes for the room in the batch files. It seems that you have to use a number, but I was wrong concerning the way I thought that I couldn't use the original name of the Room. Instead, I just compared the UserRoom1 batch file with the one I created, and the simple solution was to omit the "room" in the XxXdescXxX. So the solution is to use the "XxXaddonXxX" "R9ZRoom305" description and simply omit the word Room in the "XxXdescXxX" line, like so "R9Z305". Everything worked fine after that.

Thanks again for your help!

@nikoli Hi, I will take a look at your file and see if I can find a solution. One thing that I already see is that your _spec map doesn't have any blue value for the TV screen (blue channel = glow channel, any value from 0 to 255). But it seems the textures you're loading for the movie somehow occlude the glow. Maybe tinkering with file formats would alleviate the problem.

@x17 I use Blender 2.79b. I have read your tutorial on modifying the .bs files exported with CTK from newer Blender versions, by the way thanks for the tutorial. I suspected that there had to be a number in the name while looking at some scripts from the VX-Mod folder. But I of course didn't want to just release the room under my name, since the credits got to the original modder.

@HDiddy That's what I had in mind. Originally I tried to export the room with the io_tk17 plugin, but that took ages and I think it would have required the old way of modifying the room. I think the CTK way is much easier and faster.

@HDiddy The tool is especially helpful when working with complex UV setups and then nicest thing is that it's really easy to create color Id maps to be used in other texturing programs like Armorpaint https://armorpaint.org/.

Hi HDiddy, thanks for the quick reply. Yeah, the whole idea was to just correct some errors in that room without stepping on the creator's toes. I think it's best to use your idea to name that room VXRoom305. I was digging though some scripts in the VX-Mod folder, and it seems that some r9 scripts seem to alter and scan scene files and script files to replace or change lighting and other stuff based on their names. But I am not knowledgeable enough to fully understand what they are doing exactly. And in case of the XxXdescXxX it seems it shouldn't match with any of those.

I will try your solution and let you know, thanks again.

Hi, you could try to make a new room out of it by using CollaTKane. I don't know exactly what is happening, but my guess would be that the room that VX loads is the original room from the archives' folder. The game files are protected, or so I heard.

Hi, I also find that difficult, but I usually use the text that shows up in the left corner of the game while hoovering over an item that gives me the ActiveMod folder name  where the textures are located. In your case the name should be "Teela Dressed"

A more complicated and laborious approach would be to change the icons that are provided with the Addons and give them a special look but that would only be good for one pieces because if multiple ActiveMod Clothing Mods share the same modified texture they all show up with the same icon.

Hi, I have noticed that when you do the UV Map correctly for each object or multiple objects that can be merged on one UV Map, which means including making seams where necessary and merging UV Maps for multiple equal objects that have been copied and pasted into a scene into one can also reduce load and make the UV layout clean with no overlapping islands. I fixed some hook5 objects this way and created some new ones. The most important thing by converting waveform obj files into hook5 files is to create them correctly in blender first. As mentioned by others, in your case, you have to remake the UV entirely.

The problem with UV Maps and texture size in general is that you will have to use huge textures for lots of detail when using one UV Map for a certain area of the mesh or the entire mesh. If you use small textures, which is best with tiling textures, you will have to scale up the UV to get the right representation in game e.g. stonewall or floor textures.

A very good plugin for Blender that simplifies the work with UVs can be found here https://github.com/SavMartin/TexTools-Blender/releases

Hi, I took a quick look in the Archives\2.158.001 folder and there you have an images.zip file that you can open up with e.g. 7-Zip. In the Images\Q=Tex032M\Shared\Hair\ subfolder of the images.zip file you can find all the hair textures. Do not modify the textures in the images.zip file, but extract them and copy them to a separate/new folder in the ActiveMod folder of the game. If you use Absurdus' texture pack, you will already have them in the ActiveMod folder. To change the color of the hair, use an image program like Gimp, Paint.net or Photoshop. Take care that you don't change the format of the hair texture.

Hi, I am in the process of correcting the Asian Living (R9ZRoom305) Addon, because it shows rendering errors when I try to use the hook5 sun. I also changed the size of the room a bit, and adjusted the sky dome to be smaller. Maybe someone knows what's going on with the naming conventions for room Addons that are created using batch files for xxx.dae files.

I have used different batch files for the same room and compared the output with Winmerge and Notepad++ but I don't seem to find the solution to my problem:

The first run_exemple_R9ZRoom305_VX.bat contains this code (I tried to keep the original filename.) :

CollaTKane.exe  ^
-s "Asian Living1.dae" "Addons/Custom.R9ZRoom305/Scenes/Luder/Room/R9ZRoom305/R9ZRoom305.bs" "Luder/Room/R9ZRoom305/R9ZRoom305.ma"  ^
-i "Luder/Room/R9ZRoom305/R9ZRoom305_" "Addons/Custom.R9ZRoom305/Images/Q=Tex032M/Luder/Room/R9ZRoom305/"  ^
-tq  ^
-z  ^
-mdl 34 35 ^
-sv "XxXaddonXxX" "R9ZRoom305"  ^
-sv "XxXdescXxX" "305"  ^
-sv "XxXidXxX" "I32(0)"  ^
-sv "XxXiconXxX" "I32(0)"  ^
-sv "XxXnameXxX" "Asian Livingroom"  ^
-sv "XxXfurnitureXxX" "room_position_group"  ^
-fs "room_position_group"  ^
-ef "Setting/Extra_File/commonRoom.txt" "Addons/Custom.R9ZRoom305/Scripts/Luder/Common/R9ZRoom305.bs"  ^
-ef "Setting/Extra_File/acRoom_Furniture_HybridLightMod.txt" "Addons/Custom.R9ZRoom305/Scripts/Luder/R9ZRoom305/AcRoom.bs"  ^
-ef "Setting/Extra_File/acRoomCollision.txt" "Addons/Custom.R9ZRoom305/Scripts/Luder/R9ZRoom305/AcRoomCollision.bs"  ^
-ef "Setting/Extra_File/avFurnitures.txt" "Addons/Custom.R9ZRoom305/Scripts/Luder/R9ZRoom305/AvFurnitures.bs"  ^
-ef "Setting/Extra_File/avRoom.txt" "Addons/Custom.R9ZRoom305/Scripts/Luder/R9ZRoom305/AvRoom.bs"  ^
-ef "Setting/Extra_File/avStartup.txt" "Addons/Custom.R9ZRoom305/Scripts/Luder/R9ZRoom305/AvStartup.bs"  ^
-ef "Setting/Extra_File/activemodRoom.txt" "Addons/Custom.R9ZRoom305/Scripts/Luder/Common/R9ZRoom305.ActiveMod.bs"
xcopy /y "Resources\Default_Icon.png" "Addons\Custom.R9ZRoom305\Images\Q=Tex032M\Luder\GUI\R9ZRoom305_Icon.png"

Leading to a room that is available in the ingame room selection menu, but when loaded is displayed completely black with only the menu showing.

The second one is run_exemple_UserRoom1_VX.bat and contains:

CollaTKane.exe ^
-s "Asian Living1.dae" "Addons/VX.AsianLivingroom/Scenes/Luder/Room/AsianLivingroom/AsianLivingroom.bs" "Luder/Room/AsianLivingroom/AsianLivingroom.ma" ^
 -i "Luder/Room/AsianLivingroom/AsianLivingroom_" "Addons/VX.AsianLivingroom/Images/Q=Tex032M/Luder/Room/AsianLivingroom/" ^
 -tq ^
 -z ^
 -mdl 34 35 ^
 -sv "XxXaddonXxX" "VX.AsianLivingroom" ^
 -sv "XxXdescXxX" "AsianLivingroom" ^
 -sv "XxXidXxX" "I32(0)" ^
 -sv "XxXiconXxX" "I32(0)" ^
 -sv "XxXnameXxX" "Asian Livingroom" ^
 -sv "XxXfurnitureXxX" "room_position_group" ^
 -fs "room_position_group" ^
 -ef "Setting/Extra_File/commonRoom.txt" "Addons/VX.AsianLivingroom/Scripts/Luder/Common/AsianLivingroom.bs" ^
 -ef "Setting/Extra_File/acRoom.txt" "Addons/VX.AsianLivingroom/Scripts/Luder/AsianLivingroom/AcRoom.bs" ^
 -ef "Setting/Extra_File/acRoomCollision.txt" "Addons/VX.AsianLivingroom/Scripts/Luder/AsianLivingroom/AcRoomCollision.bs" ^
 -ef "Setting/Extra_File/avFurnitures.txt" "Addons/VX.AsianLivingroom/Scripts/Luder/AsianLivingroom/AvFurnitures.bs" ^
 -ef "Setting/Extra_File/avRoom.txt" "Addons/VX.AsianLivingroom/Scripts/Luder/AsianLivingroom/AvRoom.bs" ^
 -ef "Setting/Extra_File/avStartup.txt" "Addons/VX.AsianLivingroom/Scripts/Luder/AsianLivingroom/AvStartup.bs" ^
 -ef "Setting/Extra_File/activemodRoom.txt" "Addons/VX.AsianLivingroom/Scripts/Luder/Common/AsianLivingroom.ActiveMod.bs"
xcopy /y "Resources\Default_Icon.png" "Addons\VX.AsianLivingroom\Images\Q=Tex032M\Luder\GUI\AsianLivingroom_Icon.png"

Which doesn't even show up in the in game room selection menu.

The strange thing though is that when I use the original run_exemple_UserRoom1_VX.bat. The room is displayed in the room selection menu and loads up fine.

I checked the folder structure and the scripts, and they appear to be correct. Is there some script working in the background that prevents certain files from loading if they have a specific name, or do I have to use a certain naming scheme?

Thanks for any answers in advance!

Hi, I use Gimp 2.10.24 to edit textures and a lot of other programs in addition. Gimp does come with a normal map plugin by default and I think it also has a dds plugin for export, which supports up to DXT5 (BC5) file export. It doesn't, however, export BC7. You can use an external program called texconv from Microsoft and a script found here https://gist.github.com/Equinox-/19d726d4c9cd59f8617429b3a6a8e16c#file-file-dds-texconv-py  to export to BC7, which gives you higher quality when exporting.

Other programs I use for normal map creation are Awesomebump, NormalMap Generator and sometimes Materialize.

For specmap creation, I use either the exported specmap from the aforementioned programs or I create them from scratch in Gimp. I don't know if you mean hook5 specmaps.

I recently discovered Armorpaint which has the ability to export custom defined maps, so I can export the textures I create directly in the appropriate format for hook5.

Hi, I use a blender setup to create a cubemap file. You can load equirectangular cubemaps or hdris in blender and use a six camera setup with a 90 degree fov to render the separate x,-x, y,-y, z and -z pictures. I use Gimp to combine those maps into one horizontal cross cubemap. You have to name these six pictures accordingly and use the dds plugin for Gimp. I will make a tutorial when I find the time.

Hi, take a look at step six of my installation tutorial. You will have to put the files into the Binaries folder. The reason for this is that hook5 (basic or paid) are hooks, that means, that they intercept the calls TK17-158.001.exe makes and adds or replaces functions of the graphics engine and converts them into DirectX11 functions. That's also the reason why you have to stick to the folder structure for texture mods that have to be put into the ActiveMod folder. Hook5 can only 'see' the files in the ActiveMod folder.

To my knowledge, the DirectX8 error occurs if you don't start the game with the TK17_Launcher.exe in the Binaries folder.

@Bbird Thanks, but I already know that. I thought there was a way to attach the mirror to the room's objects. I think I stick to the add mirror way, that you described.

You need a _level_definiton.txt file for your room and configure the lights and environment, and you may need a texture pack for the room if it doesn't have hook5 ready textures with normal and specular maps. Download a hook5 room and use the _level_definition.txt as a reference, and take a look at the tutorials section here on KlubExile.

The hair needs proper hook5 textures and pass files too. There was a hairpack for the standard game hairs somewhere on MG, but you can find different hairs here on KlubExile. You could use this to make your hair hook5 compatible:

The same goes for your skin. You have to use hook5 skins to get proper skin shading. If you use hook5 paid, you can use the customizable skin system. Be aware that you have to choose the 1x or 4x skin in the customizer for the respective 1x or 4x skin textures. You can find lots of skins by searching for skin in the search box.

Maybe disable iMultithreadRenderEnable. You could also disable tools like shadowplay and the like if you have them enabled.

Hi there, does anyone know how to 'parent' a hook5 mirror to a room mirror like the one in the bathroom? Pervokpetr mentioned this in one of his posts back in the MG days. I think I also included that information in the translated hook5 guide. I tried to use a _pass file for the mirror texture, but unfortunately I don't know what the name of the shader (name =xxx) under the [pass] line should be.

Thanks in advance.