Topic: Discussion on Models

[Starfox1701]

Considering the disparity in planet and star size it may well be best to keep various classes to different scales. I would recommend 5 scales Large stars, small stars and large gas planets, small gas planets, rocky planets, Dwarf planets and asteroids.

[[UFP]Exeter]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Class_M_planet

lists planet classes in the various ST series.  There are multiple gas giant sizes/classes. 

We do not need to list them all, but my thought was we used them to indicate the size and classification.  Then we can use the appropriate textures on a standard spherical model and scale the entire model to the class specified.

Easier that a new model for each type of planet.

[[UFP]Exeter]

Some information on the DDS format.  If we use the compression, the decompression algorithm will require royalties, not sure how much.  If we do not use the compression, the DDS format is actually larger than the PNG format. 

Also having random issues, I can read the DDS format for textures but when I try to load a DDS image just for display, this does not work.  For the moment DDS will be ok on models but PNG for 2d images.

[[UFP]Exeter]

I am able to read the old mesh data from SFC2, but I have not figured out how to make the bitmap data work

[JanB]

If it's high quality models you want: I've collected a lot of those for SFC3 (ships and stations), converted quit a few from Bridge Commander mods myself. I've also polished them up (fixed textures that were a bit off, added break models, UI images, proper hardpoints, added illumination textures), because most mods just seem very unpolished and have fugly models/textures I wanted to make mine stand out in that department. Some of the models originally had 2048x2048 textures that I scaled down to 1024x1024 to shorten mission loading times and because you don't see the difference in SFC3, but I can help you find the originals on Bridge Commander Filefront. I have quite a lot of high quality space backgrounds as well. The space backgrounds are all mine so no futher permissions are needed, for the models you might have to contact some of the original modelers, or at least credit them.

You can use my work as long as you credit me in your ReadMe somewhere, it's pretty much all collected in one download, my SFC3 Upgrade Mod:

http://www.moddb.com/games/star-trek-starfleet-command-3/downloads/sfc3-upgrade-mod-30

If you need an excuse to put more minor powers ships in your game, you could use the system I use in my mod: every empire (except the Borg and Ferengi) have allied minor powers (for example the Tzenkethi and Tholians for the Romulans and the Breen for the Dominion) and access to a few of their ships. This also helps you "fill up" those empires standard fleets if you don't want to invent (or worse, kitbash) a lot of ship classes that were never seen or mentioned in canon Trek lore (in my mod the Dominion and Cardassians don't even have 7 stock ships of their own, the Dominion heavy cruiser is the Breen Warship, the Cardassian dreadnought is the big Son'a ship from Insurrection).

[Captain Adam]

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