Project Agamemnon Omega-Class Destroyer (Babylon 5)

[n122vu]

After many starts and stops with other addons, tinkering with ideas of other Babylon 5-related vessels, I've decided to turn my focus on updating Jason Benson's Agamemnon. During the course of development of the EAS Cortez, Jason gave me full blessing to update any of his addons I wished to. So Agamemnon will be the next one. I have several updates planned, least of all will be simply getting the DLL compiled (which is already complete, running smoothly in D3D9 with full UMMU support and main hab section animation working). Not only will I be tweaking many of the ship's performance parameters, but there are several visual upgrades I plan to implement.

For a better idea of what some of these visual upgrades will include, check out this video.

I'm drawing most of my inspiration from these clips, such as flashing yellow beacons on the antennae surrounding the hangar bay, red marker lights on the other antennae, specular reflection, etc.

My spare time is still very limited, so project updates and release info may be few and far between, but the project is very much underway and will be alive until completion.

If anyone would like to assist in any way (textures, mesh improvements, etc.) let me know and I will coordinate with you.

 

[SiberianTiger]

Mega-cool! :thumbup: Sorry, can't help much with development, but you have my endorsement anyway!

(will it be able to warp through an animated jump point?.. :idea::hide

 

[n122vu]

(will it be able to warp through an animated jump point?.. :idea::hide

I would eventually like to get there, yes. I'd also like to add that capability to the EAS Cortez, since part of the function of the Cortez in the B5 universe is jump gate construction. However I haven't the slightest idea how to implement it.

 

[n122vu]

Work has begun on visual improvements to the Agamemnon mesh, in parallel with work in the code.

- Engine exteriors have been changed to a darker, less 'cartoony' color.
- Adjustments to ambient and emissive values for several materials to 'darken' the overall look



Engine exhausts have been implemented, though still being tweaked for size and position. Gravity section rotation also working, speed has been adjusted to attempt to match that seen in the show.

Once I get a few things tweaked, will upload an 'alpha' for quick testing and feedback.

 

[Izack]

That's looking right attractive. :thumbup:

Consider custom exhaust? A red-colourised version of the default texture would make it that much cooler.

 

[n122vu]

I've been looking at the footage from the show (mainly the clip in the first post), and there's not much exhaust to be seen. Simply white glowing engines that brighten when thrust is applied. That's the effect I'm going for at this point.

 

[werdna]

Work has begun on visual improvements to the Agamemnon mesh, in parallel with work in the code.

- Engine exteriors have been changed to a darker, less 'cartoony' color.
- Adjustments to ambient and emissive values for several materials to 'darken' the overall look



Engine exhausts have been implemented, though still being tweaked for size and position. Gravity section rotation also working, speed has been adjusted to attempt to match that seen in the show.

Once I get a few things tweaked, will upload an 'alpha' for quick testing and feedback.

This strikingly resembles the Leonov from 2010: The Year we make contact.

 

[Izack]

This strikingly resembles the Leonov from 2010: The Year we make contact.

That was the inspiration for the B5 people. :thumbup:

 

[n122vu]

Here's a quick vid of some of the visual improvements. Unfortunately after YT conversion, some of the red marker lights are hard to see.

 

[jedidia]

veeery nice. How big are the chances that this baby will get a normal map for d3d9 client support?

 

[n122vu]

veeery nice. How big are the chances that this baby will get a normal map for d3d9 client support?

Thanks. Not sure. Don't really know how to make normal maps, but I can take a look. Once I am comfortable all main functions work (UMMU EVA, dock-dock transfer, etc.), I can definitely give it a try.


**EDIT** Decided to play around with normal maps. Not bragging in any way, but I like what I see so far. Need to edit specular on some of the mesh parts to get full picture, but I like the way its turning out. Images soon, possibly another clip.

 

[n122vu]

Here's a shot of the Agamemnon with the added normal maps in D3D9. I'm glad I decided not to wait until code was done to work on this. I'm quite pleased with the result. Thanks jedidia for the suggestion!

 

[jedidia]

Hmmm, looks like it needs some cutting down on the bump, but lots of potential. do want! :tiphat:

 

[n122vu]

Thanks. This was just a first pass to get them implemented. I like how it turned out, but there are some viewing angles at which it does just look like too much. Uploading a progress video to YT which will show this. Will post when complete.

---------- Post added at 11:50 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:08 AM ----------

Latest video showing normal maps:

 

[Interceptor]

Awesome! n122vu:thumbup:

 

[n122vu]

Thanks! Definitely going to do some work on the normal maps, but not for a few days. I need a break. Need to get back to mining and crafting for a bit and get rid of some stress and frustration on BF3 and MW3. Of course, MW3 just leads to more frustration that I then need to again take out in BF3 :lol:

But I digress...

Definitely getting excited about finishing this one, hopefully in much less time than the Cortez took. I already have another 2-3 ships waiting in the wings, as well as probably Babylon 5 Station.

 

[n122vu]

Did some tweaking on the normal maps. Definitely a better result I think.

 

[MaverickSawyer]

:jawdrops: And people say that Orbiter is dying...

 

[n122vu]

It's alive and well, growing more every day.

Another shot of normal maps on the bow of the ship.

 

[n122vu]

Going to turn my focus back to the code over the weekend. Having some weird, sporadic bugs where as soon as I load a scenario with Agamemnon in it, either the mesh disappears, the sun and all other meshes disappear, and/or I get the debug message that UMMU 2.0 is not properly initialized in my code.

None of these happen every time, only periodically.