ABC23DS.exe working?

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N0t_mINe
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ABC23DS.exe working?

Post by N0t_mINe »

There is a person over at the gog forums claiming to have abc23ds.exe working. I'm a little skeptical.

krouku:
I have just converted some *.abc models to 3ds format via ABC23DS.exe
It worked [in 3ds max 2014], but there is no proper scale and many (all?) parts are dislocated.

* cant post links? why? * see attachment *

And there are more bad news. Imported models doesnt have UVW coordinates :
Btw: I have extracted textures from original B2 rez file with Dragon UnPACKer 5 and all I get is that *$#!TY* DTX format. Is there any way convert those textures to PCX/BMP/JPG/etc ?

Thanks in advance.
And sorry about my English

http://www.gog.com/forum/blood_series/b ... code/page5
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Re: ABC23DS.exe working?

Post by nightsmoke »

Hey there.

This person was me. If you have any questions about converting abc to 3ds, just ask.
I can also provide few converted files (*.3ds, *.max) as seen on screenshots at gog forum.

Conversion is working somehow ...

Image

-ns-

And sorry about my Engrish
Last edited by nightsmoke on Sat Jun 20, 2015 04:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: ABC23DS.exe working?

Post by VGames »

Yeah but does this work with character models and their animations and also weapon view models and their animations?
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Re: ABC23DS.exe working?

Post by nightsmoke »

VGames: well ... it works somehow with characters. As I mentioned at gog post, many (all?) body parts are dislocated and UVW coordinates are missing (x,y,z = 0)

Image

Image

Image

Video: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1SYCZ ... sp=sharing
Download the video for better resolution.
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Re: ABC23DS.exe working?

Post by N0t_mINe »

Hello and welcome to transfusion nightsmoke.

My response to your initial post over at gog sounded a little cynical, I know, but please understand several modders have been wrestling with lithtech abc files for some time.

Here's a link to the shogo2 project forums, where a program called unwrap3d is discussed. Unwrap3d is a commercial app that can convert abc models fairly effectively, but not their animations. As you'll discover studying the thread, Mike, project leader for shogo2, goes on to make animations for some of his models with a blender plugin.

http://shogo.pentacle.nl/e107/e107_plug ... php?708.10

I'm not trying to disparage your hard work, in fact I'm curious as to how you did this as the abc2mds plugin caused many a headache.
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Re: ABC23DS.exe working?

Post by nightsmoke »

Hi there N0t-mINe.
Thank you for the kind welcome.
Let me introduce myself. I'm quite old guy, I work in game industry for about 10 years now and I love Blood since it came out.

But first things first.
I'm new to Blood 2 modding. Actually I'm working on my own Blood1 project right now. (Thank you BME for your help if you are reading this ,) And all I wanted not a long time ago was convert some Dtx textures from B2 to this B1 project - and convert B2 models to B1 voxels. (I'm really good with voxels, haha)

I was not able to open nor edit Dtx format. Then I have found ConvIm - Image format converter. It's really useful thingy!

The next step were B2 models. I used Dragon Unpacker 5(?) to get *.abc from B2 rez file. Then I have found LithTools and abc23ds.exe. I just typed "abc23ds.exe caleb.abc caleb.3ds" in command line, selected desired animation (see screenshot above) and voila! 3ds file was created.
I have imported the 3ds file to 3ds max 2014 via File -> Import dialogue. You can see the result over there ^.
This was all I can get. It wasn't perfect result, dislocated parts etc but I was surprised that animations were fine.
I have wondered why is this happening so I ask uncle google what I'm doing wrong. And there were many forum topics, that it is impossible to convert abc's models ,) So I posted my results to gog.
It was in my intention to prove that convert process is (sort of) possible even with animations.
So if anyone find my results useful .... I'm here to help to Blood community ,)

Anyway I'm not familiar with Blender or other 3D software. I work in 3ds max only. But I know Unwrap3d.
Maybe if we use both - 3ds max and Unwrap3d ... who knows ,) Maybe we will get this thing somewhere else.

And again .... I'm sorry about my English. I'm an old and tired dog. I can read and understand most of the comments/topics but my written (and spoken) English suck a$$.
Last edited by nightsmoke on Sun Jun 21, 2015 03:30 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: ABC23DS.exe working?

Post by N0t_mINe »

nightsmoke wrote: The next step were B2 models. I used Dragon Unpacker 5(?) to get *.abc from B2 rez file. Then I have found LithTools and abc23ds.exe. I just typed "abc23ds.exe caleb.abc caleb.3ds" in command line, selected desired animation (see screenshot above) and voila! 3ds file was created.
I have imported the 3ds file to 3ds max 2014 via File -> Import dialogue. You can see the result over there ^.
This was all I can get. It wasn't perfect result, dislocated parts etc but I was surprised that animations were fine.
I have wondered why is this happening so I ask uncle google what I'm doing wrong. And there were many forum topics, that it is impossible to convert abc's models ,) So I posted my results to gog.
It was in my intention to prove that convert process is (sort of) possible even with animations.
So if anyone find my results useful .... I other 3D software. I work in 3ds max only. But I know Unwrap3d.

And again .... I'm sorry about my English. I'm an old and tired dog. I can read and understand most of the comments/topics but my written (and spoken) English suck a$$.
First off, I have to say that if your results can be replicated, what you have here is a major breakthrough. I wasn't kidding over at gog when I said several 'professional' game hackers have failed to do what you have done. If it can be repeated, then you have certainly advanced the cause of several blood fans. If you're eyeing dedit, you might consider sticking with b1. Numerous technical issues have popped up with lithtech and modern windows, DOS powered blood1 is ironically the more stable platform for blood modding.

If you do continue with dedit (My bias makes me hope that you will) or choose to carve out some voxels for Blood1,I hope you'll stick around as we've got precious little in the way of modding threads here at transfusion.

And thanks again, it's a rare pleasure to see lithtech progress of any sort.

Don't worry about your english, we understand you.

EDIT:

Hope I didn't make it sound as if you had a lithtech project. Clearly your post is about extracting resources. Looking forward ti voxels based on b2 models. BD
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Re: ABC23DS.exe working?

Post by nightsmoke »

So ... is there anything that I can do for you guys? My vacation starts in three weeks ,)
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Re: ABC23DS.exe working?

Post by N0t_mINe »

nightsmoke wrote:So ... is there anything that I can do for you guys? My vacation starts in three weeks ,)
Wow, I'm not sure why the others are so reticent, but I have to ask, how open ended is that "anything" ? Your personal time is yours of course, but a statement like the above is practically asking for it. Not sure how long you've been around, though certainly you've noticed how silent transfusion has been. It might get me flamed, but I think there's little to lose by me asking for a new foundation for transfusion, possibly starting with the blood2 models, or, if not that, even converting the tfn models into something unity can read. You mentioned earlier that coding wasn't your focus. What if the basics for transfusion2 were laid down with all the maps and models? I know even this much would be a monumental work load. Still, considering the projects current status, I see no fault in betting the farm and inquiring.

*respectfully but realistically awaiting your reply*

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Re: ABC23DS.exe working?

Post by nightsmoke »

I have been around for some time here at Transfusion forums. Never registered. Until now ,)

Well ... there is a chance to convert ALL the models from B2 rez file with abc23ds.exe. Thing is "working".
(Not sure about Shogo or other LithTech games)

But there are things that need to be discussed about converting with abc23ds.
  • * Static model parts does(?) have proper scale. But part position in x,y,z is wrong.
    Not that much as you can see on screenshots and this video but still http://bit.ly/1e7QlCu (Btw: Z=up in B2 dedit?)
  • * Animated model parts doesn´t have always proper scale. Eg. Calebs cape, "weapon hands" and so on.
  • * Every pivot of every part is centered to this part. That is bad I guess.
  • * Converted models does have animations, that seems to be right. But this relates to models pivots.
  • * Converted character models doesn´t have skeletons (?) I don´t see anything related to this after import to 3dsMax
  • * Converted models doesn´t have any UVW/Unwrap information whatsoever. X,Y,Z=0.
  • * I have tried to mess around with ModelEdit. I have opened original bird.abc in it - didn´t change anything - just resaved.
    Then convert to 3ds via abc23ds. The result was different. See this: http://bit.ly/1NlDfxZ
  • * I have tried several ingame D3D rippers/injectors to get models from B2. With no success.
I´m not animator but if there is character model with proper skeleton in 3ds/obj/max format, then adding animation frames to this model is possible. And easy too.
Anyway I´m not sure what happens next. I have never tried 3ds2abc. Maybe i should ....

Anyway I still have a lot of work to do on my B1 Dark Times EP1 (see map section @ blood.freeminded.de), voxel/kvx stuff and hundreds of new textures/sounds for B1 ,)
But if there is chance that I can help you with something - I´m in. Sure I don´t have time to convert ALL B2 models right now. But I´m able to do some things in small parts over the weekends.

-ns-
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Re: ABC23DS.exe working?

Post by pettonton »

"abc23ds.exe" does not convert only to broken 3ds file.

Although it takes much time and effort...
open the abc file in the "ModelEdit.exe" of "b2-tools", and to capture every one frame using the "Dassault Systemes 3DVIA Printscreen",
and then convert it to a 3ds file , and appended them all.

it is possible to extract all of the animation of b2.

Unfortunately it has not been UV coordinated.
You need to UV mapping yourself.

Image

http://video.fc2.com/content/20151013uZmNusQe
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Re: ABC23DS.exe working?

Post by N0t_mINe »

Thanks again pettonton (are you nightsmoke?) I wish ,we had the human resources to organize a project to salvage the blood2 models. One day, if the community can reorganize itself, possibly around the eduke32 or darkplaces engine, your diligent work will pay off.
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