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Making a ground mesh for a helmet.


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I'm trying to make ground meshes for the helmets in Dwarven Devious Cuirass. I've attached one of them here. (The author has given all  permissions.)

 

DwarvenDD_helm_1.nif

 

Following this guide (and a few other ones I watched...), I extracted the ground model for a daedric helmet from Skyrim's BSAs, and copy/pasted the DwarvenHelmetOpen BSTriShape onto to the ground object's helmetGO:0 BSTriShape. (I can't find a "NiTriShapeData / Data line" in the ground object's mesh, and the screenshots and video guide are no longer accessible. Is there an up to date guide on this?)

 

When doing the latter, NifSkope issues an error: "failed to map parent link NiNode>NPC Head [Head]".

 

The only copy/paste that works, is when I stick the entire dwarven helmet's NiNode into the daedric helmet's BSFadeNode. However, then when I try to relocate the dwarven helmet to the BSFadeNode, its model disappears.

 

I am using Nifskope 2.0 Dev 7.

 

Can anyone help?

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First off, make sure the Helmet .nif is not skinned (Under flags in the BSTriShape entry AND under flags in the BSLightingShaderTexture - Should be set to Environment Map as well) Then save it under a new name and open that file, Right click the Mesh in Nifskope and select "Crop to Branch" that gets rid of any dependencies it may have in that scene. next right click the mesh again and select "Copy Branch" then proceed to paste it into the Ground mesh file scene (The main node, should be 0) and then adjust your new mesh to fit where the old mesh is lying using Edit. Once thats finished, delete the old mesh and save the file as the new mesh's GND object.

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The Skinned flag under BSLightingShaderProperty I can find. Which flag is it under BSTriShape though?

 

Should the NiSkinInstance (in red, below) be removed? That makes the image on the right disappear. It also disappears when I crop to it, and doesn't come back in the ground mesh when I follow the rest of your instructions. (2nd picture is the resulting situation there, before the deleting the DwarvenHelmet BSTriShape.)

 

image.png.596ed90fb0342fba780514352c1e4df7.png

 

image.png.af9cf880b52c1e5dd54a43b7141078d3.png

 

Thanks for your help!

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With the image you posted, under Vertex Desc there is flags, VertexIUVsINormalsITangentsISkinned - click on the flag and remove the Skinned option. Its disappearing because its expecting a NiSkinData, when you deleted it. Removing this flag will remove the NiSkinData and treat it as an environment object.

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I hope you'll suffer my next question... I unset the two flags, save as another file, but when I open the new file, the helmet's nowhere to be seen.

 

image.png.814cfa376f752c16a10c8e46394f0822.png

 

If I ignore that and "right-click the mesh" (which I presume to be the BSTriShape "DwarvenHelmetOpen"), crop and copy/paste to the model ground object, it remains invisible there.

(What you see in the 2nd image, is the regular Dwarven Helmet whose ground object this is. I translated it up a little to make sure it wasn't covering the Open Dwarven Helmet.)

 

image.png.28145121b8b40d29536200a1339fc4e1.png

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That is sadly not the case.

 

Using the two .nifs attached, I do the following.

 

In DwarvenDD_helm_open.nif, BSTriShape DwarvenHelmetOpen:

- Uncheck Skinned in Vertex Desc.

- Uncheck Skinned in BSLightingShaderProperty, Shader Flags 1.

- Verify that Environment_Mapping is checked in BSLightingShaderProperty, Shader Flags 1.

- Save as DwarvenDD_helm_go.nif. (Mesh is still visible.)

- Close and re-open DwarvenDD_helm_go.nif. (Mesh is now invisible.)

 

In DwarvenDD_helm_go.nif:

- Select BSTriShape DwarvenHelmetOpen.

- Right-click, Block, Crop to Branch.

- Select BSTriShape DwarvenHelmetOpen.

- Ctrl+C.

 

In dwarvenhelmetgo.nif:

- Select BSFadeNode DwarvenHelmet.

- Ctrl+V.

- Edit BSTriShape DwarvenHelmet to Z-position -58, to move it out of the way.

- Clear BSTriShape DwarvenHelmetOpen, Skin. NiSkinInstance 10 now sits directly under BSFadeNode. The DwarvenHelmetOpen mesh is not revealed.

- Select NiSkinInstance 10, right-click, Block, Remove Branch. The DwarvenHelmetOpen mesh is not revealed.

 

DwarvenDD_helm_open.nif

DwarvenDD_helm_go.nif

dwarvenhelmetgo.nif

 

image.png.1c2c391bcaa1e6d01e1189dae04b3e79.png

 

The obvious difference in my eyes is that in the above picture, DwarvenHelmetOpen has 0 Triangles and Vertices, while DwarvenHelmet has many of them. But that is the case in the original file (DwarvenDD_helm_1.nif) as well, and the helmet does appear there, so it's yet another mystery to me.

 

image.png.033010008d8623851e012e423ce88966.png

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Ahh i see now, the mesh is corrupted. No wonder your having problems... Looks like it wasnt exported properly, Does it even work in game? Ill try to see if I can get it working and post the file here

Edit: Fixed  All you need to do is load the file I had you make (The one with no skinned data and cropped to branch) into Outfit Studio and re-export it. (Make sure to clear the smooth seam normals option under Mesh or you will get odd shading errors.) Then copy-branch that newly saved file into the original ground mesh and repeat from where I left off. 

DwarvenDD_helm_go2.nif

dwarvenhelmetgo_Fixed.nif

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Thank you so much for your continued patience @legacyslayer, it's all good now!

 

I'm unsure how the helmet mesh got corrupted. It comes from the Devious Dwarven Cuirass mod, which I am porting to SE. Standard procedure is running the meshes through NIF Optimizer, and that reported no errors. The helmet did appear in game -- just not in the inventory due to the missing ground object.

 

It's only one of the helmets in that mod, which is why I insisted on a procedure I could follow. Now I can also correct the other helmets. You know what they say:

 

"Give a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day.

Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life."

 

Thanks again, your help and insights are much appreciated!

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To summarize the procedure, should anyone else be struggling with this:

 

- armor.nif is the mesh for which you want to create a ground object.

- template_go.nif is a ground object which you will duplicate into a ground object for your armor.

- armor_go.nif is the ground object you will be creating.

 

Open armor.nif in NifSkope:
- Select the mesh's BSTriShape.
- Uncheck Skinned in Vertex Desc.
- Uncheck Skinned in BSLightingShaderProperty, Shader Flags 1.
- Verify that Environment_Mapping is checked in BSLightingShaderProperty, Shader Flags 1.
- Save as armor_go.nif.

 

In Outfit Studio:
- File, Import, From NIF... armor_go.nif.
- File, Export, To NIF... armor_go.nif.

 

Open armor_go.nif in NifSkope:
- Unlink skin instance by editing Skin to empty.
- Select skin instance, right-click, Block, Remove Branch.
- (if only 1 mesh) Select armor BSTriShape, right-click, Block, Crop to Branch.
- Ctrl+C.

 

Open template_go.nif in NifSkope:
- Select BSFadeNode.
- Ctrl+V.
- Select other mesh(es), right-click, Block, Remove Branch.
- Adapt position of new mesh and collision object.
- Save as armor_go.nif.

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  • 3 months later...
On 2/15/2019 at 8:25 PM, legacyslayer said:

Your welcome, Glad I could help! I learned how to mod the hard way, so I try to help as many people as I can

 

On 2/15/2019 at 2:19 PM, orgs1n said:

To summarize the procedure, should anyone else be struggling with this:

 

- armor.nif is the mesh for which you want to create a ground object.

- template_go.nif is a ground object which you will duplicate into a ground object for your armor.

- armor_go.nif is the ground object you will be creating.

 

Open armor.nif in NifSkope:
- Select the mesh's BSTriShape.
- Uncheck Skinned in Vertex Desc.
- Uncheck Skinned in BSLightingShaderProperty, Shader Flags 1.
- Verify that Environment_Mapping is checked in BSLightingShaderProperty, Shader Flags 1.
- Save as armor_go.nif.

 

In Outfit Studio:
- File, Import, From NIF... armor_go.nif.
- File, Export, To NIF... armor_go.nif.

 

Open armor_go.nif in NifSkope:
- Unlink skin instance by editing Skin to empty.
- Select skin instance, right-click, Block, Remove Branch.
- (if only 1 mesh) Select armor BSTriShape, right-click, Block, Crop to Branch.
- Ctrl+C.

 

Open template_go.nif in NifSkope:
- Select BSFadeNode.
- Ctrl+V.
- Select other mesh(es), right-click, Block, Remove Branch.
- Adapt position of new mesh and collision object.
- Save as armor_go.nif.

hey could you please explain what do you mean for :
- skin instance (dismemberskininstance?)
- what do do if there's more than 1 bstrishape,how do I crop to branch?
- what does CTRL+C do?

- what does CTRL+V do?
- what are the meshes I should remove branches from?
- what is the collision object?

Sorry,newb here,this is the only tutorial I've found on making go objects

 

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  • 1 year later...

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