My scale gripe with this engine. Info Please

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Spooge

Digital Content Creator
Jul 9, 2000
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www.planetunreal.com
Maybe not Inf related, but I respect the information from this site more so than any others.

So, as I have biatched before...

What's up with the engine and it's larger than life scale (or should I say way too smalle scale)?

When I build static brushes in MAX (at real world scale), like door trim, tables, cars, etc., they import into the engine 2.5 times smaller than they should, either that or the player models settings are way bigger than before. I'm talking about both the game related engine and the Unreal Runtime that is open to the public for non game related visualization use. Know what I mean? Why are we having to increase the drawscale for all of our static meshes, far more than it was in UT?

AH? You bring stuff in all the time, you have got to know what I'm talking about. Anyone?
 

w00p

Windows at its best
I guess the only suggestion I would have concerning this, would be to build it as you normally would, then at the last step, before exporting, adjusting the scale so its X times larger and therefor looks right when imported into the 2k3 engine.

Also, check AH's deco's in UED for any scaling edits. Maybe he had the same error but went around it by trial and error, checking for the best setting, in UED itself...
Once someone has found the right drawscale to adjust max-imported models, he just has to publicate the scale and everybody can always use the same number, unaltered.
 

Fenris

[-I-]Fenris
Aug 4, 1999
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Hamburg,Germany
www.inforcers.org
The key is setting up the grid in Max correctly. It's mentioned in almost every beginners tutorial.

2.5 times DEFINITLY sounds like an inch-to-centimeter ratio, so I'd guess you ****ed up your scale settings for the grid.
 

MP_Duke

Banned
May 23, 2002
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Taken from the unreal tech site:

Models will lose some precision when imported. Specifically, X and Y coordinates are truncated to the nearest 1/8th (0.125) unit, and Z coordinates are truncated to the nearest 1/4th (0.25) unit.

This means your 3DS model is the truncated version. That is, if you have a 3DS model of a box with dimensions X=1, Y=1, Z=2 in Standard US decimal units, importing into unreal with the 3ds2unr tool would give you the mesh decoration of the box with dimensions X=8, Y=8, Z=8 unreal units. But since the default X,Y,Z rescaling in the script is X=0.1, Y=0.1, Z=0.2, you would get a box of dimensions X=0.8, Y=0.8, Z=1.6 unreal units.
 
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Spooger

New Member
Dec 16, 2003
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The only problem with the info from Epic MP_Duke is that when working with an imported static mesh from MAX is that we no longer use the 3ds2unr tool since it now takes ASE files directly. Is the 3ds2unr used at all anymore? I don't create deco's, Islington did all the ones in my older maps.

And Fenris, I'm not so sure that the grid issue is a problem when it comes to static meshes, they are not BSP brushes so the engine does not care about staying on grid, they are not calculated that way. But thanks to both of you for the input.

So far Freon has the only real solution unless I want to scale all of my MAX geometry up 2.5 times before I export the static meshes. I have used the Map scale feature in Unreal but I was a little worried how it would handle scaling a LAGE and complex map once I was all done setting it up, it would SUCK to build everything only to find out it chokes on a large map. I don't have the time and $ to re-import everything a second time from MAX at a scaled up value. That worries me a little.

My map/case is unique in that I don't know what they will want to do with it in the end, they may need to measure a distance while playing and have some accuracy. It's not a game play map so much as a visualization map for my client.

Regardless... I appreciate all of your input and feedback regarding this oddity, I only wish they had adjusted this issue when they released the runtime, knowing that it was not going to be used for gaming so much as it was for real life projects that needed a real time engine.

Any additional ideas are welcome, even opinions on what method is the less of two evils. This is a messed up problem for the non gaming market of this runtime. So I don't sound ungrateful, thanks many times over to Epic for offering it in this way to the community, it's made a huge difference for VR developers.
 

Fenris

[-I-]Fenris
Aug 4, 1999
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Hamburg,Germany
www.inforcers.org
Referring to the 3ds grid and not the UEd grid.

You THINK you have an object 50 units wide in 3ds. But depending on how you set the 3ds grid up that might easily be 20 or 125 units in Ued after import.

I am not sure about the UT specifics though as I do no longer work for it, only for 2k3...
 

Spooger

New Member
Dec 16, 2003
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My grid stays off in MAX, I type in all my units for geometry with feet/inches. That's not been the issue. But I appreciate the consideration though.