A lot has happened in the past month on this project!
I am working very hard to both improve upon everything that has been seen so far -AND- actually finish. I think I will soon be locking this thread and starting a new one.
Here are some of the things currently happening on the project:
-The new UV mapping has made a BIG difference in quality. There are few seams now and all blends together well.
-New base textures have been redone for the entire model.
-Almost all face textures that will initially be included are almost done. This includes approximately 10 textures for each part (forehead, nose, mouth, chin, eyes, cheeks, eyebrows). I should finish this part tonight.
-I have completely re-written the way that I create textures that can be used on the model. Things are MUCH simpler now. Everyhing is pretty much done right from GIMP. This has really made creating textures quicker. This will also help if I choose to have others create textures for me. I would now be able to easily convert textures for use with 3DCM.
-I have completely re-written my coloring routines. Before, I would basicly turn my texture into a grayscale image and color it according to the skin/hair/etc. I now take into account color differences on the base texture. This offers a MUCH better look.
-I have completely re-written the way I have textures for different body parts blend together. I used to have some separation between each part that was just filled with the skin color. This is no longer necessary. The textures now all blend together nicely.
-This one is BIG. I have written code to generate normal and height map textures (I may still include specular maps too). The code for this is done, but it needs tweeked a bit. I have some further testing to do with all of this, but things look great so far.
The next thing that I will be doing is creating more texture options for the body. Once that is done, I will be working on creating a bunch of hair styles, then some basic clothing options. I then have to write my exporter. After that, things should be close!
If I am able to keep progressing like I have been over the past month, it will still take me a few months to get close to completion. I would love to say that things will be close by the end of this year, but don't hold me to that! One thing is for sure, there will be NO MORE major redesigns. That is what has been pushing this project back again and again (although I do not regret how much this has improved the quality of the output). I can now see a light at the end of the tunnel. It is full speed ahead until I get there
Ron
a.k.a WOLF!
