For those who have experienced texture problems with FPSC using Cinema 4D, here is the work around.
You will need :
UVMapper (Free) - http://www.uvmapper.com/
Milkshape (Demo will work fine) - http://www.swissquake.ch/chumbalum-soft/
Any respectable 2D imaging program
The Entity Creator Tool ( There are a few buzzing around the forum )
1. Make your object in Cinema, using polygons. Make sure it is one Mesh. No need to triangulate yet as that will make UV mapping more complicated. When you have created your entity, whether it be a simple box or complicated structure, select it, and export as .OBJ (Wavefront)
2. Open up the UVMapper, import your exported .OBJ object. Your model will be presented in its UV state, it looks a bit like a flattened wireframe version. This is what you will be painting over later to add the texture, so what you need to do is unwrap the mesh so each area has enough space to work on. go Edit > New UV Map > Box, then push OK. This will give you a (terribly) basic mesh to start with. Try out different Maps to get a more even result.
3. Resave the .OBJ, file > Save Model. untick the Export Materials checkbox then click OK. This applies the new UV data to your .OBJ Model. Now export the UV map as a .BMP ( File > Save Texture Map ). If your UV Map was a 1024 x 1024 Map (the default), then your texture needs to be exported at the same size, so enter 1024 in the Width and Height boxes and click OK.
4. Open up the BMP image Map in your imaging program, paint over it with your texture, be fancy! Save or convert the new image as either a TGA or DDS. In the working example i used a DDS. (Need a utility which converts BMP to DDS for free? Try this > http://www.mnwright.btinternet.co.uk/programs/dxtbmp.htm ).
5. Back to Cinema, open up the new OBJ object. Here we add some finishing touches before we send it to Milkshape. Go into the polygon selection tool, select all the polygons (Edit > Select All), then go Structure > reverse Normals. The Normals need to be facing outward, and UVMapper has a habbit of turning the models inside out. If your normals are correct anyway then there is no need. Finally, triangulate you model (structure > Triangulate). Now export the model as another OBJ Wavefront file.
6. Open up Milkshape ( the demo is fine too). import your OBJ file, select it, then straight away go file > Export > DirectX 8.0. In the export options untick Animations and Lock Root Bone. export the file, it should now be a .X file.
If your models appear pitch black in Milkshape - it means that your normals are still reversed, it seems to be an inherant problem with Cinema, not sure if it's all versions though. If this happens to you, go into Face Selection mode in Milkshape and select a polygon on your model, go Edit > Select All. with all polygons selected go Face > Reverse Vertex Order. Your model should now appear normal with shading. The normals are now fixed.
7. grap your .X object and your TGA/DDS texture and use the entity creation tool to turn them into entities. hopefully, when the texture is applied to the object in the preview window of the Entity Creation tool, you should see your finished model. Then check it out in game to make sure everything works fine.
It's a lot of fiddling about i know, but the bottom line is it works. Any questions or problems, please reply. Long Live Cinema!
