aaron wrote:Hi Demi,
That's quite a reasonable request. Would I be right in guessing this might be for some sort of level-of-detail algorithm?
In answer to your question; I think L3DT can do this already. In the 'export map' wizard you've been using to save the .x files there is also a 'resize for export' option. If you enable this check-box and then reduce the map size by, for example, a factor of 8, you will be saving every 8th pixel (in each direction). Thus for a 1024x1024 map, you would be exporting a 128x128 vertex mesh file.
Is this what you want?
Cheers,
Aaron.
YES! exactly what I want Aaron. I thought about doing this.
Does it work by reducing x,y,z or just x and y?
Here is what I am trying to do:
I have a 8192x8192 map. I have exported it to .x files by making the map 512 mosaics which I reload one at a time in L3DT and export to .x. I have to do this because L3DT does not allow me to export a large map in mosaic except the HFF files. Also, I have to do this because I only have 512 MEG of RAM and I am running a 1.6 GHz P4. hehe yeah, way below recommendation but I have compiled a 31768x31768 with out an issue. Just took 6 days to do it. In Fact this map is a reduced output of that large map.
Ok so I now have 256 - 512x512 directx files which I run decimeter in Blender. The BIG issue is the decimation just screws up the edge of the squares so I have to reload them and line up the edge vertex. If the edge vertex are not aligned then my test character falls through the map and the joined sections just look HORRID!
This process is just killin me in time. It is taking 6 to 8 hours to process 16 blocks and I still have to fix the reduced polys because decimation screws up the mesh.
Now if I understand correctly. I could reduce the output to say 512 square or even resize it to 1024 and export 4 mesh files instead of 16 and then resize it in blender by a factor of 16 or even 32 and have something close to what I designed. Is this fact?
err I hope this made sense.
Thanks for taking time to answer.
Demi
P,S - OH,
I need to explain why I am splitting these so you can understand.
The game engine is limited to ~20k vertex a mesh. Not an issue to use 100 mesh but one mesh can not exceed 20K vertex. The work around is to make multipule mesh and join them.
I just made a 512x512 export and it looks like it will work. all I need to do is split is up and I am done. WOOT!