- Dec 21, 2007
- 284
- 38
Hello all,
I'm coding up a tool that will be a supplement to Hammer. You'll be able to load in your vmf files, edit them, and the save them back out, and then continue on your merry way in Hammer. If all goes well, I might start adding in more and more functionality from Hammer, and it could end up being a Hammer replacement. I plan on releasing it to the community when I have it in a functional state. It will still require Source SDK so I can hook into their DLL's for texture/model loading and entity data, etc...
Right now I'm basically focusing on editing displacements, because in my opinion, working with them in Hammer sucks. I'm creating a level that is mostly displacements, and it is a huge kludge, because it takes about 20 minutes to get each face how I want it, and its very easy to screw things up accidentally. I can think of many ways to improve the UI and manipulate the mesh and how to implement them. e.g.
-Vertex movement based on mouse-press time, rather than mouse movement
-Manipulate an entire row of verts
-Finer brush control (radius, softness) (e.g. hard circle or gaussian)
-Smooth function
-Noise function
-Smarter subdivision
-Decrease/Increase power factor while maintaining shape
-More lenient sewing rules
So what bugs you about Hammer, and what would you like to see in an improved vmf editing tool? I'd love your input so I can add features that would be beneficial to the greatest amount of people.
Keep in mind that initially, I will only be focusing on editing displacements. I'll move on to general geometry later.
I'm coding up a tool that will be a supplement to Hammer. You'll be able to load in your vmf files, edit them, and the save them back out, and then continue on your merry way in Hammer. If all goes well, I might start adding in more and more functionality from Hammer, and it could end up being a Hammer replacement. I plan on releasing it to the community when I have it in a functional state. It will still require Source SDK so I can hook into their DLL's for texture/model loading and entity data, etc...
Right now I'm basically focusing on editing displacements, because in my opinion, working with them in Hammer sucks. I'm creating a level that is mostly displacements, and it is a huge kludge, because it takes about 20 minutes to get each face how I want it, and its very easy to screw things up accidentally. I can think of many ways to improve the UI and manipulate the mesh and how to implement them. e.g.
-Vertex movement based on mouse-press time, rather than mouse movement
-Manipulate an entire row of verts
-Finer brush control (radius, softness) (e.g. hard circle or gaussian)
-Smooth function
-Noise function
-Smarter subdivision
-Decrease/Increase power factor while maintaining shape
-More lenient sewing rules
So what bugs you about Hammer, and what would you like to see in an improved vmf editing tool? I'd love your input so I can add features that would be beneficial to the greatest amount of people.
Keep in mind that initially, I will only be focusing on editing displacements. I'll move on to general geometry later.
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