ZModeler

you get a 14-days trial license upon submitting your computer ID in ZModeler account. Thus, you can try everything on your own for free.

Just as a warning, trying to edit PERSON models in ZModeler 3 is VERY difficult. Moving and rotating the bones is extremely difficult on person models and it's quite hard to get things in a proper position without distorting the model.

Either use one-step IK and move the child bone to control parent bone (make sure to enable "affect children" option in Move tool options), or use Rotate tool (toggle off "Pivot" at the bottom) and use Local axes so you can rotate joints directly.

Note, you can move skeleton up in browser window, or move geometry lower, so you will highlight bones with cursor instead of a mesh.

P.S. always set "Linear" interpolation for animation keys, as other modes will give different result than you will see in game.

P.P.S. I'll add a button for "IK" in top commands bar, so (when only one skeleton is avail) you can toggle IK mode quickly (and/or assign hotkey for this for even quicker action).

always delete objects in uv-mapper when you've done uv mapping them. this will not harm uv on an object, so delering them is safe and recommended.

I don't have gta or gta ped models to test, so i've used the model from ETS.

the left one is original civilman01.v3o

the right is a replacement model

something is wrong with my screenrecorder, so just three shots instead of a video:

but it walks and runs fine with standard animation.

Also, i'm not very sure about the TS idea about porting animations, I suppose EM4 uses it's own pre-defined set of animations, right?

you can load it in tracks editor. Have you watched the guide video? It's shown there.

Also, the animation files are a "set of animations", you should pick which animation(s) to load from the file you've specified.

say, it was piece of cake?

...in the game the model texture came transperant.

IN zmodeler its ok.

But in editor it came transperant.

Just in case someone has the same issue: the material is exported as transparent if you enable any kind of transparency on material in materials editor. For example, Alpha: Affected by Map/channel toggled on will cause material to be transparent (with no regard to actual affection map selection and a slider position).

Also, toggling Clip pixels with alpha less than will toggle alpha-test transparency on material.

Concerning the rigged models:

In zmodeler, disable skeleton's "setup mode" and move head bone aside. you should see the head and hemlet moving like the single unit. if they not, the weighting of "head" bone did not spread properly onto hat model. Enable setup mode again;

To fix this, set "head bone" as a "Current bone" and use Rigging\Influence\Paint to "spray-paint" weight over the head and hemlet. you can switch setup mode on/off to see when they come to normal "synchro" mode with the rest of head model.

Concerning the horse model - did you load it into zmodeler and saved? or it's an unchanged model started to behave like this?

It's very preferable to apply Rigging\Influence\Normalize tool on any rigged model that you have modded.

it's active now.

settings -> email -> submit. once you recieve acitvation e-mail, you will follow the link there and accout will be activated. If you don't get activation e-mail within several hours, you can press "notify admin" button there, so you account can be activated manually.

I can't import any models? Except if they are .z3d

"Free to try" still needs you

1. to create an account at https://www.zmodeler3.com/account/

http://forum.zmodeler3.com/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=5672

2. submit your platform ID into account to get a trial license

http://forum.zmodeler3.com/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=5673

3. activate license in account and apply license into software.

at least it's free to try

Just in case someone would like to try to add a hat to a Ped model, the steps are as follows:

1. import the model (make sure .vmo file is in the same folder as v3o), the model will be loaded with skeleton and should appear properly in viewports (not like you expect it to see in zmod2)

2. create or import a hat model.

3. attach hat model to Ped model

4. switch new Ped model into vertices level. Use Select\Element tool to select vertices of newly-added hat (all of them).

5. pick Rigging\Influence\Copy tool, hover any of selected vertices and click to forice it copy weights. it will (probably) copy weights from the head as it's the nearest rigged geometry.

Export and try in game.

I've used to mod the Animals\Deer01.v3o model, but Peds are probably very alike.

piece of cake. try zmodeler3

The filter is available in ZModeler version 3.0.3 build 1016 and higher.

http://www.zmodeler3.com

you should import a mode with textures. If you got model loaded without textures, an exported model will be white. Make sure textures are not packed/encrypted and can be loaded into textures browser manually.

Here's a video tutorial link to the filter review. It's just to make an overal impression.

The filter supports Import/Export of .v3o and .model files (.model files were not tested by me since I don't have EM2012). The animation is supported in EM2012-style, or literally only bone-rigged animation can be loaded and saved. The vertices morphing animations (widly used in EM3 and EM4) are not supported. In general, most of morphing tricks can be done with bone rigging animations.

The video tutorial shows a hard-rigging example, but demonstrates it via the soft-rigging techinque. In general, if you paint vertices weight with multiple bones, you can get the soft-skin blending this way, no problem here.

I might create one more video showing a simplier animation techinque when soft-skin blending and skeletons are not used. It's way easier and (probably will be) used in most of cases.

Characters and animals models modding is possible too.

Well, post your impressions, suggestions or just leave your comments.