digman

This is from a artist and not a programmers view based off the 3.1 Standard version. The source SDK would give greater flexibility I would imagine. I am not comparing game engines here just what I like about Leadwerks 3.1 standard version. I am happy with the engine. Leadwerks does make areas easier for the artist which impacts it's future from a artist standpoint. Very easy to import assets into Leadwerks using the FBX format which Leadwerks automatically converts it's own format. Mipmaps generated or not per texture including normal maps. I think the Leadwerks tex files already have the mipmaps created but you have to check generated if want to use them. It is selected by default. Being able to choose flipping of the X or Y channels for your normal maps in the normal map editor window is a big plus... This does not have to be done outside the program. Recalculating your normals for some models using the model editor with the choice of two recalculating methods. Saving models as prefabs then instancing those models. Material per model is very fast to setup. Lights are easy to setup and change colors, strength, view range and what kind of cast shadows are used. Lua is easy for changing some things the artist might need with a few easy code inputs, like running your game in full screen mode to get a good look at your models plus changing the shadow draw distance quality (stages) for the real time Cascaded Shadow Maps. YouGroove has it right in that every game engine has it's strong and weak areas. The lack of current documentation hurts Leadwerks leaving a new user to search the forum or using the docs which are mixed up with 2.5, 3.0 and a tiny bit of 3.1 stuff. Being able to choose a couple of other DDS compression schemes would help as well. Right now, I believe Leadwerks uses the 8,8,8,8 ARGB uncompressed DDS format when converting your texture files. I will not go further as I will write a post about being a new user to the program and what my impressions are, the good and what can I think can be improved for the new artist user.

Without having the files I am just guessing but I know a NDA will not allow you to post publicly. Are the fence railings (not the post) just flat polygons or do they have true depth... Check your model for duplicated vertices and merge or remove them. Also check for flipped normals... You might have done the above already but did not mention this in your post. Could it be a light bleed problem?

Steam Indie Version, Lua scripting only Standalone Version, C++ and Lua That is the major difference between the Indie Steam version and the Standalone version plus Standalone without Steam has no Steam support meaning no workshop...

The quality setting you added only effects the shadow when you run your game. It has no effect in the editor window. Under the tool panel (main menu) Options/Video/Lighting Quality, set it to high. I was told that this effects the shadow quality in the viewport. Also if your first range setting under the light tab for the point light is set to a higher number it will also effect the shadow drawing distance in the viewport. It has no effect on the shadow when running the game that I seen so far. This is what I found to true by my testing, so I would test it yourself as well. Of course your result could be different but it's worth a test.

The uploaded file is a 2048 x 2048 file and not a 1024 x 1024. Nothing is wrong with the tex conversion... 8,8,8,8, ARGB will produce an appox 21 mb file size with mipmaps from a 2k image.

Ok, I going to jump in here and say what I think is happening... If Leadwerks is using 8,8,8,8 ARGB DDS for image conversion then all images are converted to 32bits with the alpha channel plus there is no compression, no lost in image quality. What you see is what you get... That means if you have an 8bit image with no alpha it will be converted to a 32bit image with the alpha channel plus no compression. 8,8,8,8 ARGB scheme from my understanding is the 4 channel uncompressed DDS file format. I would imagine that the source code that is also sold would give you the ability to choose your own DDS compression scheme but of course I am guessing here. I downloaded the 1024 x1024 image file you posted. In Leadwerks after the conversion the Leadwerks "tex" with mipmaps was 5.6mb. Photoshop with the Nvidia DDS plug-in using 8,8,8,8 ARGB for the image conversion to the DDS file it was 5.6mb with mipmaps. I can not tell you why your are getting such large file sizes with the same image.

You are coming along great there... Wings3D is very good at creating larger modular game assets. The uncluttered workspace and the limitations really work to your advantaged here. The only thing I see is what appears to a small triangle section that is a non-planar polygon. The triangle section is by the vertical boxes. What I mean by triangle is that the area in question is modelled in a triangular fashion but crossing two axis. It appears to be a quad polygon and not a real triangle polygon,

This is a good read about users upgrading from 12.04 LTS to Ubuntu 14.04 to run Leadwerks when 14.04 becomes the supported Ubuntu version for Leadwerks, I would think not in the too distance future. 12.04 LTS (Long Term Support) user will not receive the notice to upgrade till July when the first point release happens. The software updater will not show you the updated 14.04 according to article till July. I found that to be true. Now you can do it from the terminal right now but I rather wait till the point release happens in the summer. I would think that some bugs will be found and squashed too. This could as well be a moot point as you might still be able to run leadwerks on 12.04 till then and I have no idea when Josh is going to make the jump to 14.04 for Leadwerks. The above is my personal choice and in no way reflects the choice of others or Josh's plans when he will make the switch.. http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2014/04/upgrade-ubuntu-14-04-12-04

The moderating team... Admin can not recieve a pm to or Josh either. This is not a problem as they would be overcome with too many pms.. One moderating member as not been on since June of 2013 and the other in about 5 days... By mistake I put this post here when it would have been better in the blog... So if the Admin or Josh sees this post, you made remove this thread... I will repost my stuff in a blog... Last post my by me in this thread...

I found where to create the blog, though it is not under my user name but under Community / Blogs. I have ask the Admin to remove this thread...

No Manage blogs under my user name that I can find. Yes that would be a better area to post this kind of stuff... Maybe you need to be here awhile before you use a blog... Sometimes that is the case to avoid being spammed...

Ubuntu 12.04 64 bit... Standard 3.1 (non-steam)... Now I am not having the same problems as Guppy, which does not mean he is not having problems. Since the update everything appears to be function normally on my system. The scrolling problem with the middle mouse wheel was reported earlier and yes that is still the same. Josh said it was disabled but it still is not completed disabled.

I thought I make a thread where I will put things I am learning about the Leadwerks engine for art assets. This is just a test on using the displacement and normal map shaders together on a higher polygon model... Too many polygons for a game. The man bust is 22,000 quads polygons of course triangulated by the game engine. I'm going to retopo him to more of a game level amount of polygons and then compare the difference...

Newest Linux update Standard (non-steam) 3.1, Ubuntu 12.04 64 bit. On my system all keys work accept for the "+" for zooming back in... The middle mouse when clicked and held both pans and zooms at the same time which is not the expected behavior. It should just be panning Zoom in and out from the top menu icons work as well...

No problems in Ubuntu 12.04 64 bit so far... All is well in OZ... Like my other comment at the forum... Updater worked correctly. Then when I started to run a map, Leadwerks said I needed to update my map which was done through the Project Manager... I just updated "MyGame" and two files were updated.

Doing some more forum checking, I came across these two threads on setting a light quality in the App.lua script. This really did help the rendering distance (extra stages) for the directional lighting when running the map. The rendering distance now is good for what I need and it also fixed some light bleed issues inside of some model hallways. My walls are plenty thick...LOL so no worries there.. Cascaded Shadow Maps, I have been reading about today, very interesting.. I added the below to the App.lua script. self.world:SetLightQuality(2) I will give both threads, You as a user read them and decide if you want to use the two settings possible as Josh made a few comments about their use. http://www.leadwerks.com/werkspace/topic/9061-incorrect-lightning-shadowing/ http://www.leadwerks.com/werkspace/topic/9266-light-bleed-at-csg-intersections/

Josh, thanks for the quick reply.. Increasing the light quality helped a little though the effect is still there. It's just good to know how the directional light works... I will use the spot light by changing the settings under the light tab to be more like a sun which I have done in other software...

I putting this here as I do not know if this is a bug or I am just missing something or is the shadow rendering distance hard coded? When I put a appox. 35 meter (appox 115 feet) brush wall in the engine.The shadow for the wall only goes a certain distance and does not traverse the whole length of the wall... My setup New Map. Two brush objects, one for the floor, one for the wall. appox length of the wall and floor 35 meters... default directional light moved to create the shadow. ( static and dynamic) I place the fps player at the 30 meter mark on the floor using the grid. Run the map and the wall shadow is not rendered to the end of the wall. As I walk backwards it continues and more of the wall shadow disappears. Question, am I missing something here, maybe something added to the lua script?, The FPS player script? Under the light tab, range as no effect, infinite has no effect under the appearance tab... Scale has no effect... Linux 3.1 Standard, Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, 64 bit. Any help here, I would be thankful for or if it is a bug this post can be moved there by the Admin.

The most simple way that I found to quickly get a skybox. Create four separate brush cubes enclosing the scene. Apply the skybox material to each cube.The cubes can overlap each other, no seams show. I am using the word cube here in a generic fashion, The cubes can be rectangular as well. They do not need to be the same in height and width. You just need to enclose your scene by overlapping the brushes (cubes) Assets /Materials / Sky / skybox_texture.mat The skybox_texture.mat uses the sky.shader. I would imagine there are better ways with manual scripting or the postprocess shader that appears to be coming down the pipe but the above is so much better than black.

"I disabled mouse wheel scrolling in the asset browser because it was unreliable" I found that you can scroll down using the middle mouse wheel but not scroll up so it is not completely disabled http://www.leadwerks.com/werkspace/topic/9247-linux-mouse-scroll-wheel-doesnt-work-in-asset-browser/ Map tested on: 07-AI and Events.map. Ubuntu 12.04 64 bit ---Standard 3.1 version.

No corruption of that sort as shown in Guppy's image using 3.1 standard in Ubuntu 12.04 but still here is the problem I encountered when I tested holding down the left mouse button and using the scroll bars. When Scrolling the ""objects, assets, scene, terrain tabs also appear and disappear in the assets windows pane. The normal tabs stay where they are but you get this ghosting effect of the tabs appearing/disappearing as stated above in the assets window pane. Can not take a screen cap, happens to fast. Once you stop scrolling the effect goes away. Map tested on: 07-AI and Events.map EDIT: I corrected some information it was the object, assets, scene and terrain tabs not the other ones...

I confirm this bug as well. I noticed it the other day but too busy to report the bug. It is 2:30am now but I will be back tomorrow with the steps you take to reproduce this bug... When it does happen you have to use the System Monitor to kill the Leadwerks process... EDIT: I lied here are the steps now. Version Leadwerks 3.1 Standard, Ubuntu 12.04 Linux 64 bit, 1. Open up Leadwerks. 2. Create a new scene. 3. Use a brush to draw out a floor. 4. Under the Prefab heading choose the FPSPlayer and place in scene on the floor. 5. Deselect the player. 6.Switch to the Scene tab and then select the Appearance tab. Now select " Player under "the main Root heading" "Do not have the player preselected" Bingo::: you get the dialog box that pops up but can not close and locks up Leadwerks... Use System Monitor to kill the Leadwerks process... I had to lock up Leadwerks 3 times to make sure I got all the steps right. ouch... LOL...

@YouGroove... Thanks a million. That is where it is hiding under the assets folder revelled by right clicking on the fbx model...

That is the only general SDK available information I found so far but I am new and just slowly working my way around but trying to find information before I post here.

EDIT: The information below is incorrect. YouGroove was so kind and made a quick tutorial here in his relpy post. I been studying this myself, If appears that you need the source SDK using the Phygen tool to create a collision object based off your model. A ply file is automatically created upon import for you when using the SDK version but the Phygen Tool can give you more control. In the 3.1 standard version when you right click on a imported model or an included model under the scene tab "save as shape" is greyed out. Only non - compound rectanguluar shape brushes can be saved as a phy file. I am very new to using the Standard 3.1 version so if I am incorrect please correct my information... http://www.leadwerks.com/werkspace/page/Documentation/le2/_/user-guide/models2/phy-files-r501