Scripting and Machinima questions

[TheSikest]

So, come from the Nexus because... Well, you know. The Nexus is The Nexus. Can't get help for anything, regardless of how small the issue is... I looked everywhere for an answer I feel should be simple, but I can't seem to wrap my mind around it no matter how much I stare at the GECK. So, one animator I know told me to reach out to this community saying it's a better place.

Background:
I have an idea for a machinima that I desperately want to see turned into the real thing and I plan to work tirelessly to make it so. I've already got a couple episodes worth of script written up (excluding the pilot episode which I'm in the process of filming right now) and I've even got the chance to have a couple famous gamer personalities to do guest voice work on top of the fact that The Vault wiki may be helping out with advertising once I have more to go on.

The Problem:
But I've run into a snag- I was hoping to get through this without to much trouble, but I decided to ditch trying to conveniently cover up characters mouths with scarves or helmets/masks since I feel it would make the product look lazy... But I can't seem to find out how to make npc's go through idle dialogue.

What I'm wanting is to make them do the little lines npc's will sometimes do when you activate them where they will just say one line and be on with it as opposed to zooming and and opening up the dialogue tree, but instead do it with a lip synced line so their lips move and with no audio file so I can actually film them in TFC and dub over them in post.

Less Important Questions and Things:
-I may or may not be needing help on animation in the future. I'd like to get more episodes out and see what people think before I put any resources into something that might not work out. Where on the site would I post it, or is this board where I'd need to go as well?
-On my end, I might needing help with the project, Vault Roulette (working title) itself. Specifically, someone with experience in video editing, one or two people with knowledge of scripting, and a voice actor or two as well. If interested, just message me here on the site~

[Guest tomm434]

To evade fake zoom you need to create a simple quest, add Greeting topic there and add new response for particular NPC. Zoom happens because NPC has no greeting at all.

 

Concerning what you want here - look at my post here while ago http://www.loverslab.com/topic/27700-wipsexoutttw-quest-overhaul/

And then look at my mod page. Moral of the story is that nobody is going to be your personal scripter. (but people here will help you to become one)

 

Modders here has their own project to do. You need to do it yourself or to somehow get someone very interested in your project.

 

Also machinima is very tedious to do. Day before yesterday I spent literally all day on making 3 minute scene. And in my opinion Fallout is not made for machinima because NPC have worst animation ever and transition between idle and animation is not realistic. I I were to make a machinima, I would choose source filmmaker for this.

[A.J.]

If for machinima you mean a pure machinima, something grabbed and then video edited in post using stuff like Premiere etc., you don't really need a dialogue between your npc and you, it will give you strong limitations concerning recording. I suggest you to use a script line like MyNPC.SayTo MyNPC Topic, triggered by you with a certain event (like an OnActivate). You could simply put your correct voiced wav file, generate the lipsync and then remove the wav / replace with an empty audio file, so the lipsync would be "correct" from your perspective.

 

If you play good with scripts, you don't need even need to TFC. I stopped using TFC because it was limiting me in the use of AI packages (when I was ordering a npc to do some things)

 

EDIT: or use conversation between two npcs... I mean, much or less you can do whatever you have in mind, you have the tools to do that and you can do it in many ways, all depends by the scene itself, how you imagine it...

[TheSikest]

I really appreciate all the quick feedback!

@AJ, if I can do this in such a way that the lip syncing is completely correct I'd be so happy. But terrible lip syncing is better than no lip syncing at all, so I'll definitely... TRY out the things you said, if I can find out how to apply it all. Either way, if this does become a thing I'll credit you for your help~

@tomm434
1. Fantastic, I'll keep that in mind next time I'm messing with the quest dialogue.

2. I know, I know... I won't want to hire anyone until I see how this whole experiment pans out anyway since I'm well aware of the high probability of this whole thing flopping. Get a few episodes down, test the waters and see the crowd reaction, and then use that as an effective device to convince people to help me out at that point.

3. SFM is too much of a pain in the ass. In New Vegas, I can tell a character to walk from point a to point b and film it no problem. In SFM, with imported models since I wouldn't want to use TF2 or other Source things, I'd have to animate every frame of that walk myself on top of the dialogue/lip syncing as well as getting the right maps and... It's just too much extra work. Especially considering the story I wish to tell is a Fallout story.

[A.J.]

I find NV lipsync pretty well done. I can't say it's "perfect", but that's the overall impression it gives me. I used to do some videos, as player, like small dumb machinima mixing characters from different games using chroma key, lumia etc in post editing: it was all pure video editing, while in game all I was doing was tfc, setting actors positions with setpos and invoking some idles with playidle, generally speaking the common console commands players know and use.

But it was only when I learnt something about modding that I really could realize more sophisticated scenes. When you start handling GECK, it's much or less everything you need to do a machinima, you become a full "director" and you rule the scene. Ok, ok, it sounds a little silly speaking about directors for ... these things, but... yeah, just grab the concept The difference in using console or modding via GECK is mainly in the camera and in syncing what the actors must do, you have much more control because you plan it before, carefully, scripting it via GECK. Now of course it depends by the kind of scenes you want to realize, but that's much or less my suggestion for you: learn some basic GECK, you can have some good fun with it, believe me then we all will be pleased to help with suggestions concerning the specific troubles of course, but as it is now I think it would require some "work" on your side in the meantime.

[TheSikest]

I'm not ENTIIIIIIIIIIRELY new to the GECK. Just inexperienced in the places that are vital to me at the moment~ I've worked on mods, small and large, but that's mainly been for Skyrim. (Potema's Wolfblade on the Nexus is my design, and I've worked as a concept artist/writer on Skywind). And saying a director doesn't sound silly at all- I'm a big fan of Roosterteeth productions (they do an immensely popular machinima series called Red Vs Blue in case you weren't already aware) and after following them for the last 5 years I've learned a lot on the production side of something like that. Granted, they use consoles for what they do, but the director as far as I can tell is almost always doing the actual machinimating along with a couple others (making spartans heads bob up and down)

Regardless, I have managed to find someone from the dev team on Skywind who would be happy to coach me on scripting. Which is, considering the circumstances, even more than I could hope for. I also just managed to recruit a musician and everything as well~ I love it when things come together.

Quick personal question to you, A.J., before I head off- One of the links in your signature is "Arkansas' Best Day..." But what does Arkansas have to do with the link? Just curious since I happen to be from that... great... state.

[TheSikest]

OH! And after reading other script related help postings, I keep hearing this GECK power-up mentioned. What does this power-up entail, exactly?

 

[A.J.]

Arkansas' my character there I sometimes name characters with some US states, not all the character anyway. And not all the states, some are not so much suitable

 

GECK PU is a plugin that shows you mistakes. When you script some hundred line of script, and you have a mistake, PU tells you the number of the line, otherwise it simply wouldn't compile. It also points out many other kinds of mistakes, with meshes, animations etc. but with scripts is the main reason it's used.