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Arma Reforger Blender Plugin Tutorial: For vehicles and weapons — Transcript

by steffenbk1 · 4,220 words · 658 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:01Okay. So, I wanted to share with you
0:03guys a little bit of an update on the
0:05Arma tools uh I'm developing. You can
0:08find it on my GitHub where you can
0:11download this. It's just one zip file
0:13that you can uh import to your Blender
0:16and have access to this. Uh so, a little
0:20bit about recent updates compared to
0:22this is that now the weapons and vehicle
0:25plugin is uh now one of the same inside
0:28the armor tool. So you could just switch
0:30between cuz it's it were generally the
0:33same just naming scheme when it come to
0:35bow most different. So and now it will
0:37take account for that if you work on
0:39vehicle or or a weapon. Now you just go
0:42quickly through the options area uh that
0:44you can have. So we have a clean mesh
0:48option where you can take uh the mesh
0:51you have and just um streamline it a
0:53little bit bit more for uh the game. So
0:56for example, this uh vehicle I just
0:58found on Sket Fab. Let me just take and
1:03do this first. Uh all the parts are
1:06separated. So we can just Ctrl and J
1:08join that. We can see [snorts] we have
1:10about 154,000 faces
1:14uh on this vehicle. So let's click the
1:17cleanup mesh. Uh just leave it at
1:19default. You can play with this as you
1:21want.
1:22uh and just uh but the default should
1:25work fine. And now we reduced it from
1:28from 150 to 70.
1:31Uh so and uh not depending of course on
1:36the model but uh not any noticeable
1:40loss on this one at least as far as see
1:43looks fine. Uh so yeah uh and then we
1:47can also create LODs from this. can
1:49select how many you want and I'm just
1:53going to click okay on this and so I can
1:55show you that it makes uh it will create
1:58then two other models LOD types with
2:03various um quality to them. So this one
2:08is the original 70 and this one is 29
2:11and this one is 16.
2:14You can probably see a little more
2:17gradient in detail on the wheel. Uh but
2:20yes, so that's just some simple simple
2:24setups. Uh you can also create the
2:26vehicle physics
2:28uh collider. So if I do this from the
2:32the whole body, it's going to be not
2:33look too good of course. So it's
2:36preferably that you divide it first like
2:38the body and wiggles and do this
2:40separately. But I'll try and show that
2:42later on.
2:44And then fire gio is a just more
2:47detailed version um of the collider
2:53and and it will also I'll show it later
2:55but it will also set the layer inside
2:57the arma tools and we have some wheel
3:01collisions. I'm going to show that a
3:02little bit later and center of mass just
3:05just yeah little collider there if you
3:09need that. Um but yeah the main feature
3:11of this is the separation component.
3:15So what what it does is if you click on
3:17your mesh uh first we need to create an
3:21vehicle amateur.
3:23Let's do that. And then if you select
3:25the mesh and uh tap control and you go
3:29to edit mode. Then I'm going to select
3:32example the faces of the wheel here.
3:35After that I'm going to just
3:37back side.
3:39What we can do now is uh hit separate
3:42component and we can choose just a
3:45component pipe just a prefixed name for
3:47it. So let's just have it as wheel and
3:50then it will you can of course select
3:52some options here but you can add the
3:54socket uh and the bone and inside here
3:57it's uh various few features uh and you
4:01can see that the um the prefix name is
4:03going to be v
4:06underscore so you don't have to type
4:07like v something something you can just
4:11straightly type it same as here if you
4:13type this like I wanted to say window
4:16instead and have it on custom.
4:20It will give the same name to all the
4:23socket and bone components in this one.
4:26But uh if you want to for example this
4:28to have something door instead of window
4:30in the same, it will do that. So it will
4:32then skip this one and go and give the
4:34window name to this one instead and keep
4:37this as door. But that's going to keep
4:39this as blank and keep this at the
4:42wheel. And then you can also select the
4:44world directions. Um oops
4:47world directions for it
4:51like it
4:53um and change that however you want. I
4:56want to have it in y plus um
4:59direction cuz I want it to face
5:01alongside the y- axis. Uh you some more
5:05uh
5:07more axis points like uh roll or like
5:10pitch. I can show that later with the
5:12wheel. and also a prepar option. If you
5:15already know that you want to parent
5:17this wheel to something, you can select
5:19that bone here. I'll try and show that a
5:22little later too. But if I just do this
5:24now, it will make the wheel. If you look
5:27at the top right there, uh underscore V
5:30there. Uh so it was called window body.
5:33So that was wrong. So just separate
5:36window wheel. There we go.
5:40Wheel one. the vc wheel one and now I
5:44can click on the on the bone and we can
5:48go to post mode and you can see that
5:51it's connected
5:53there
5:56and yeah so this just streamlines this
5:59process so you could do it for
6:01everything you need and same with the
6:04add bone socket to object if uh I want
6:07to for example if I already had this
6:11wheel uh disconnected from the mesh the
6:15main mesh without having given it a a
6:20bone or socket. I can we can do that
6:24on this button. So if I do this and just
6:27separate it without sockets or anything,
6:29it will just be its own um mesh. Uh it's
6:34already parented to the amateur so it
6:37will stay there but you can of course
6:39and join it if you need but uh we can
6:42then add bone sockets uh to the
6:46uh to the to the measure. So just click
6:49the mesh and then you will get the same
6:51options as you do with the separate
6:53body. Then should be connected here like
6:58so. Yeah like before.
7:02Then I can just see it got probably name
7:04wheel two because we already had two
7:06wheels. So now yeah wheel one
7:10one. Yeah, that's just how the naming
7:12convention. So a little bit of manual
7:14tweaking it's got to be done. Uh you can
7:17also when you have the um object and go
7:21to edit mode again and have faces
7:24selected, you can click on the face and
7:26just directly add a socket to the to the
7:31the face you have selected. So if I find
7:34where's the seat
7:37see it and I will just add that you will
7:40get the tip on the middle of the of the
7:44face. That's very useful for when you
7:47have something that's not directly easy
7:50to access like article. So if I have
7:53this selected all this, I can just it
7:56will add a socket in the center
8:00like so. Uh show
8:05for example.
8:08Yeah. Um and then you have add bone.
8:11This just adds the bone wherever that
8:14you can place wherever you want. It's
8:16simple. Uh you can align all the bone in
8:20a a direction. So if I actually make the
8:23bone and I can go to edit mode, I can
8:28here and I just rotate it, make it a
8:30little larger just to showcase it like
8:34so. And uh we have since we are already
8:38in edit mode I can just click that align
8:42bone and then you can align it in a in
8:44an axis. Uh so I want it to my plus
8:48and then it just does that for you. So
8:50if you have multiple that points the
8:53wrong way cuz I think the general
8:55consens consensus is that you want your
9:00you want it to point in the y same
9:02direction. Uh later on I try and explain
9:06why I think that would be a benefit if
9:08it does when it comes to adding the
9:12mesh. Uh but yes and if we have if we
9:16have this bone and we do not have it
9:18assigned to anything and say we have uh
9:21this this canister on the back. Uh if I
9:26didn't say this this is just a model
9:28from sketch fab I found. So it's free
9:31just search wheel jeep on sketchab and
9:33it's the first one that pops up and I
9:36will separate and call this tank
9:40tank.
9:44Now that's separated. And then we can
9:45click on the bone um click the amateur
9:49or any of the bone. Click edit uh assign
9:52to
9:55No, sorry. Uh wrong. You click the mesh
9:58and assign that to the bone. I can do
10:01that. And we have the custom one uh that
10:05that we made, but it has not updated. So
10:07let's just go out and in of object mode.
10:10There we go.
10:12should
10:14should update. Well, it did not I get
10:18that. Oh, sorry. Sorry. I'm confusing
10:19myself. So, I get this that the name
10:21tank the bonus custom. So, if I go here
10:24again
10:26custom there uh edit mode select faces
10:34and assign custom. Come on. Go. Now, it
10:39should be connected.
10:45Yes.
10:50Yes. And then we just have parent all
10:52meshes and uh parent empties if you have
10:55something that's not connected. Uh
10:57another feature uh I have is the manage
11:00vehicle presets. Uh this is somewhat
11:04useful I believe. Um, I've used it
11:06myself a bit, but um, what it does is if
11:11we have if we're going to have, for
11:14example, this card and we want to use
11:16the same bones and same uh, sockets
11:23uh, for
11:25our our vehicle. And this is what I
11:27think alluded to um previously that if
11:30you align the bones the same direction,
11:33I found that it's easier to actually
11:36just put your mesh onto this one cuz if
11:39you name them the correct things as
11:42here, uh as I show a little bit later,
11:44you can try and get it a little bit of a
11:47quick fix in um will automatically
11:50update it for the animation graphs and
11:52and yeah, kind of do a little bit
11:56perfect for you. Uh, but we're not going
11:58to use this one. We would rather use the
12:04um the wheel is cheap and that's already
12:08in the game. So, let me just
12:11find a Yeah, this work. Let me just do
12:15that right now.
12:18Now, I'm going off a little bit of a
12:20tangent here, but um the idea is that
12:24you can then uh
12:30give one sec.
12:35Duplicate
12:39the mesh thing.
12:42Okay. So if you just I I usually just
12:45screenshot all of this and put it in an
12:47AI. So you get the list and then you can
12:50put it in Blender here like the bones
12:53and the sockets and just uh separated by
12:56by comma in between. So v wheel two
13:01comma blah blah blah and then hit okay.
13:05then it will start a process where you
13:07can uh systematically divide all of the
13:11correct bones or sockets that you have.
13:15So for example, this if this light were
13:18to be my
13:20be my
13:23uh mesh door left or I can actually do
13:25that instead.
13:28Say this is my my door. If I had one, I
13:31can just separate. You get all the you
13:34get the component type and custom name
13:36and all that already prefixed and can
13:39add the socket component if you want. If
13:41I do that I get the door left and
13:47on there I forgot to take the Y position
13:50but whatever and it will then cycle to
13:52the next next one will be uh the door
13:55right and then you can do that one or
13:58skip it. Okay, I don't have a door.
14:00Okay, I have a hood. Okay. Skip. I have
14:03a trunk
14:04of Yeah. whatever you can set up. So, it
14:07just easily to go through um your
14:13your process there. And then when you're
14:15done with the bones, it will go to the
14:17to the sockets.
14:20So, yeah. Uh could be useful. I've used
14:22it a little bit myself, but uh to each
14:24your own. So, now uh let's try. So
14:28that's a little bit quick of an overview
14:31about the about the tool. So let me just
14:34try to quickly use them to somewhat get
14:37it into the
14:39into the into the game here to showcase
14:42what it can possibly do. Uh so let's
14:46start from this beginning. get my
14:50my um my jeep and get a little model
14:55into
14:57our reforger with using the tools. If I
15:01get the jeep back in here, I can take a
15:05join all this.
15:08Then we can scale it to around here, I
15:11think.
15:13And then we are going to apply all
15:17transforms.
15:20And then go to tools and clean up the
15:23mesh.
15:27We go and then we can
15:30get vehicle create amateur.
15:35So now we can start uh dividing the
15:38wheels first. So I can just show you
15:40that if you name have proper naming it
15:43will keep them when you swap the mesh.
15:53Oops.
16:01So and separate. Let's call this. So if
16:06we go to here and check what's it called
16:10the base one it's a wheel L01
16:14wheel R1 and it's going to be like L2
16:18and L3. I'm not going to do the full
16:19suspension thing. I'm just going to show
16:21you the process here that you can use
16:24and go back to Blender
16:29custom
16:31wheel
16:41add. We do not need this socket world
16:44orientation.
16:46And again, I forgot to click on the
16:48highlights here. Sorry. And There we go.
16:52That's created. Let's see the other one.
17:08All the nuts there bolts.
17:15And it's going to be L2.
17:21Go. And since you're already on the
17:23number two side, let's
17:30separate
17:33this to R.
17:48and one.
17:53Yes. So now we can just do a little text
17:56uh test export
17:58and check it out and find the
18:02folder you have. Let's call it um
18:06Willie.
18:09Yeah.
18:12um
18:17as model and we open it and import and
18:21enable getting reimp import.
18:24And let's check our boats are here
18:29on the right. And if we go now into the
18:33world editor
18:35and we just pick a map
18:40soft and we take the vehicle
18:45prefabs
18:47vehicle field and then we duplicate it
18:52first
18:54like so. So now if we swap the mesh it
18:57should contain the wheel positioning
19:03and as it's
19:05built I called it
19:08like so
19:10press play now
19:12it should have the wheels
19:15already set.
19:18So now we can go back to the
19:23bender. What we can also do now is just
19:25since we're already using the in-game
19:28wheels, we just delete this.
19:31So yeah, and uh now we can also uh since
19:35we kind of need a seating position if I
19:37I'll show you guys. Um we got to create
19:40a
19:42a um collision box. I've noticed that if
19:45you keep it at 50,
19:48it's something about how armor the tools
19:53uses the convex that I've set up. Uh if
19:58it was above like 150 or 100, I think it
20:02didn't register the collision here box
20:05here. I'm going I'm just going to do the
20:07the whole mesh now because I'm not going
20:09to divide the whole thing. But what I
20:11would do is like divide the whole body
20:13and only have the uh collision on the
20:16body itself.
20:18Uh so it's much cleaner and doesn't get
20:22the wheels and stuff cuz the wheels are
20:24going to have their own uh own um
20:28collision. Anyways, so if I now export
20:31this, we should see a
20:34a collision box pop up.
20:38And there we go.
20:40It's got a box there and should have uh
20:43yeah a layer a vehicle.
20:46Simple. Yeah. Okay. And just end the
20:50world. So
20:52you can see it. And then now we should
20:56be actually able to test it cuz you need
21:00a collision box for it for it to work.
21:04And I see just we have to do one more
21:07thing. Uh there's a spare wheel on the
21:09wheelies. We're just going to remove
21:11that for now. We don't really need that.
21:16There.
21:19And there. And if we go into this now,
21:25I don't have game master in this one.
21:27Let me load another level.
21:31We can have
21:37cuz right now I can't find the
21:40entry point with all the
21:44looking around cuz it's not set up uh
21:46properly. Of course, we're missing the
21:49bones and all that. So now if I go into
21:53put it in, you can see that the seat is
21:58of course not where it's supposed to be.
22:00So what we can do now under
22:05And we can
22:07pick the seat and we can
22:11create a socket call it driver
22:15underscore
22:18idle
22:20and that's a reference to the seating
22:23position
22:25here
22:29idle.
22:31And then we just uh make that. Okay.
22:35And what we also can make now is a
22:38driver get in.
22:42Let me see. Driver add socket
22:48get in.
22:52Let's place it there
22:55and then we can export it.
23:00Let's see. If
23:04it's reimpported,
23:08then we should see driver get in there
23:11and our sitting position should be at
23:14the correct. I see some adjustments need
23:17to be made either the size or the
23:19seating position. But yeah, that is how
23:23you can do it.
23:26So
23:28yeah, that is a very quick overview of
23:32how to use the separation tool. And the
23:37issue I think that you might come into
23:40if you try to just do this straight away
23:41is that the when you go open the
23:44animation editor, uh what I believe the
23:48issue might be is some components do not
23:53have the same
23:55X or XYZ coordinates.
23:59Uh so you see this one points along the
24:02y- axis
24:03and this one
24:07see sensitivity. You see you see the
24:10green arrow is like the y- axis they
24:12they point in various different
24:14directions. So when you do this uh just
24:17keep in mind that you might have to
24:19fiddle a little bit about with the bone
24:23um direction. Uh or or as well you can
24:26go in. Let me see if I could just I
24:29don't have duplicated this.
24:32But yeah, the consensus is that you
24:35should make it from scratch. But if
24:38I believe all they were all of the axis
24:41were pointing the same way could have
24:44just worked by just
24:46giving the same names in your in your
24:48mesh. But yeah, hope you find some
24:51enjoyment in this and I will see you
24:54guys later when I have another update. I
24:57actually forgot one last little thing to
24:59show. Uh we can also just show the
25:01animation part. Uh for example, the
25:04steering wheel. We can do that. And
25:06let's select the steering wheel
25:10like so.
25:13And then we can take separate and we
25:17will make what do they call it in the
25:20game again?
25:28Steering wheel.
25:31Steering wheel. Okay. So, uh, open that
25:34again.
25:40And we will, here's the interesting
25:43part. We will preserve the angle,
25:47but we will keep the Y-axis. Then I see
25:51it's
25:53might work. So if I take this in post
25:57mode now and I
26:01take low,
26:04we can
26:06be able to turn it. Yeah. Okay. So we
26:08can turn it, but as you see it's not
26:11quite correct. So we got to redo that
26:13one.
26:15Also
26:17we should also probably select this
26:25let's try now C separate keep it
26:31rotation axis that we can do
26:37okay I think we got too much actually
26:43cuz I only want Mark
26:51this.
27:03Yeah. So I just selected all the the
27:05wheel components and separate adding all
27:09direction Y plus and preserve angle on
27:12the default and we should get something
27:14like this.
27:16Now as I can see from the get go we can
27:19do a little bit of editing on the bone
27:22to make it bit more
27:24correct to where I want it and then
27:28check it out. Uh, so you go over here
27:31and local
27:33just turn it.
27:35It's not properly a line, but I'm not
27:37going to fiddle with it too much. So,
27:40what we can do now is in animation, just
27:44go back to this and animation and we can
27:48open up our editor.
27:54There we go.
27:57Here
28:01if you open my second tool it's also in
28:03the GitHub AR NLA and vehicle I call
28:08this
28:10wheelies
28:12and then we are going to create an
28:14action steering
28:20steering
28:23create and then we can go here and we
28:26can Then need also the
28:30action. There we go. Uh, press I
28:37go to pulse mode first and press I to
28:41create the first action. Now I'm frame
28:44zero. So I want to move that there.
28:47Just move to say
28:5020.
28:52And then I can
28:55just like this.
28:59I can do this.
29:07This
29:12should have
29:14animation for the wheel. Let's take that
29:17to 15. Actually,
29:20we can just move
29:23this a little bit more. Space it out.
29:27Yeah, something like this. And what do
29:30we now? Uh, let's see. This one is also
29:33very
29:35very spread out.
29:38Is that uh
29:44two things?
29:51Yeah. So, we're going to drop this one
29:53down like so.
29:56It's 40 frames.
29:58It's fine. And then we can go here and
30:02we can go to animations.
30:05We can take the one we open on the
30:08wheels and duplicate it. Right.
30:12Change it to the
30:15just drop it here.
30:17Just call it
30:20anim. and
30:23test
30:26duplicate and it should automatically
30:29open the duplicated
30:32animation workspace.
30:35We can open that. Open this. And if we
30:39go now to the animation set and we check
30:43out the steering,
30:46see the steering is there. Uh we have to
30:48swap out our model. So go back to work
30:52space properties. We can find an R uh
30:57asset.
31:00There we go. What you're going to see
31:02now, of course, it's that steering
31:04animation is not going to work or
31:08at all because first of all, I haven't
31:11imported the the new
31:15the one with the steering bone. So I can
31:17just show this
31:24Let me pop in I think. And you can see
31:27the steering is like totally on the
31:29wrong axis.
31:31So let's change this to first. Let's
31:34see. Back to Blender. Have uh
31:39have the open the editor table. Have
31:44that selected.
31:46And then let us export it with the
31:49infusion tool. Export animation.
31:54And then we'll find our animation here.
31:57Add. And then steering
32:01zone. I see
32:04change save location
32:07and then select location.
32:11I see that the
32:15Okay. So, this have happened a few times
32:18before, but for some reason on my end at
32:22least, uh the TS TX txa uh export
32:27presets are just not always there. So,
32:32see TXA. Yeah. So, export they are
32:36there. So, let me just open it again.
32:44Okay. and the
32:47give me one sec. Yeah, so I just had to
32:50uh redo the
32:52export path. Not sure what happened
32:54there, but just have to go into add-ons
32:57and settings and redo the export path.
33:01Uh so now it should work. And animations
33:05animations.
33:07Yeah, we have that selected now.
33:10And uh we do the infusion export.
33:15takes it and we find steering
33:20uh we can call it steering but just
33:22steering here and then we select the
33:25steering amateur
33:28okay then it's uh exporting
33:33that's the for so let's try and change
33:36this then so we can just unsign these
33:39two steering main steering extreme
33:43And then we can find the new one. And
33:47steering
33:50just one
33:56was the in
34:00steering design
34:07and then we find the steering. There we
34:10go. Just
34:12pull that up there.
34:14like so.
34:17Then we have the little bit wobbling
34:19steering, but the correct steering at
34:21least.
34:24So,
34:26we stop this
34:28and we save
34:31and open
34:32load it.
34:42Uh I don't think it actually.
34:47Yeah. So we forgot to
34:50of course change the animations
34:53animation set because we made an
34:54duplicate one. So we have to go here
34:58and
35:00change this one
35:03is
35:10equal.
35:17There you go. That should be better.
35:28Now we have the steering.
35:34So what's left is like the suspension
35:37stuff and of course a little bit more
35:39finicking. But yeah, so that's uh one
35:42thing I haven't figured out quite yet.
35:44Uh it's my issue here. As mentioned,
35:47when you change the name, you should be
35:50able to just plop them in here, but uh
35:53you have to work a a little bit around
35:56the animation graph editor here. So, if
35:59I go here, for example, to chassis and
36:03suspension,
36:07and I haven't set it up now, of course,
36:09but you have to do a little bit work
36:11here, so that's yet to be figured out.
36:15But yeah, hope this was uh helpful again
36:18and see you next

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