Smooth curved pipes Created 13 years ago2011-07-30 12:31:33 UTC by Bruce

A technique I invented for perfectly smooth curved pipes. These are not models. It's not final, with better textures and a bit more math you can make it look even better.

And how about posting the method you used, not just a picture with the final result?

First I want for more people to see it and guess how it's done.

Stretching texture?

Also, black outline (func_illusionary method)?

Maths is always good for mapping, it definitely helped with my Rube Goldberg map. And that definitely looks good. I dunno how you did it. :0

I did a method somewhat similar I think on my Aquatos map, my friend said they looked like models at first.

You've gotta start explaining what your topics are about, you cant just make a topic, say look this is a smooth pipe and that's it, you did the same thing with the water effect not explaining how you did it or what it really is.

i have heard that u can make such epic stuff in QUARK editor

Wow, you are discussing about ancient software :).

The curve structure itself is made manually with vertex manipulation out of tetrahedrons with help of arches of different dimensions as reference for it to be mathematically correct. The cylinder itself is 8 sided. The curve is out of 4 parts. One curve like this have a total of 64 outer triangles. And as you can see it is really smooth enough. Each of the 4 parts of the curve is separate func_wall so they don't cut each other and don't increase w_poly. These parts also have zhlt_noclip 1 parameter so they are non-solid, like func_illusionaries, but they do block bullets and leave marks on them exactly the same as being solid. Every single face except the outer visible triangles are textured with NULL. So it doesn't create a lot of unnecessary clipping information and thus is very efficient. I use low poly CLIP brush for it to feel solid. Now all the magic is the texturing. The essence of this technique is that those curves are not affected by world lighting at all. All the faces are lit equally and this way any lighting bugs are impossible. The lighting is done already on the texture. The texture is simply one texture of flat curved pipe. I simply flattened the whole structure to the thickness of 1 unit, applied the texture, then expanded it again to it's real shape. This way the texture on the steep sides become a bit stretched but this can by fixed by a bigger resolution texture.

Nice ninja edit, you jerk.

I agree, you guys need to stop jumping on his dick first chance you get, if he wants to gain some interest before he writes up a dozen or two lines of description then let him. He did the exact same thing with the 'realistic shadows' tutorial that you guys loved so much.

Personally, I think its a good idea to first check for interest and than show how.

NEW METHOD TO MAKE SMOOTH CURVED PIPES !!!

I'm just writing this post for this thread to appear on the main page because I want for more people to see it. I mean otherwise it will be gone forever because TWHL is almost dead and few are checking the forums...

Post tutorials man, and rmfs, don't just brag, no fair.

I mean otherwise it will be gone forever because TWHL is almost dead and few are checking the forums...

When I go to bed, I check TWHL first. When I get up, I check TWHL.
It doesn't seem dead to me, just low activity!

Make a video tutorial on this an post it to youtube. Use CamStudio(it's free) to record your screen.

Will wonders ever cease?

The lighting is done already on the texture.

I would have NEVER guessed that's how you got it so smooth-looking and nicely seamless!1 (even without the sex texturing, that brushwork is also 1st-class work)

Never seen anything like it, VERY nice sir! =)

Dragos's tutorial to-do list:
-Realistic Water Caustics in GoldSrc
-Smooth Curved Pipes And You

Dragos wins this round of the TWHL pissing contest. Nice work.

You know what I would have done?

Move to source. That's what I would have done.

Is any one else finding this complicated? Personally, I'll stick to GoldSrc, with my custom-coded prop_statics and custom modelled pipes.

Also, half-on-topic: Does anyone else make brushwork nosings for each individual stair? I simply make a 2x2xX block with the top outer edge chamfered with the clip tool. Then I just make all the nosing brushes one func_wall. It looks a ton better, and, so far, I haven't seen an impact on the actual game.

It's actually a very simple(yet very elegant) solution to the problem of lighting complex stuff without visual errors in goldsource. I can see using dragos's method to relieve headaches on many things for GoldSrc mappers.

Your stair idea sounds very intriguing as well! Would love to look at an example map of that as well! =)

Ingame shot of the nosing:This is just a quick demo-map, with terrible default texturing.

my custom-coded prop_statics

Drools.
Do want.

You see, it's easy to model pipes but models are lit incorrectly in GoldSrc. However I know a way to fix this. You would recreate the basic structure of the part of your map where the pipe would be, make exactly the same light sources as in your map and put the pipe in exactly the same place too. Then you would render the scene and simply bake the shadows into texture itself. Then you would need to make the model unaffected by world lighting at all. This can be done with env_render. As far as I know it is possible to bake textures in Blender, but I'm sure it's possible in pretty much any professional modelling editor.

The advantages of using this method would be better texturing and possibility to make the pipes very tiny and still smooth.

The small advantage of making pipes out of brushes with my technique is the ability to leave bullet holes on them.