Producing a Q3 Skybox

[dg1]

Hello everyone,

First time posting, long time lurker.

This is a question about converting my skybox that I've created in photoshop cs3 into the required *_bk.tga, *_lf.tga, etc.

I found a tutorial on youtube by David Ainsworth for a game called 'No Limits' and he showed how to create an image and then use a program called Pano2VR.

Pano2VR can create the left, right, up, down, back, front, pictures, however, the program distorts whats in the image near the top, bottom, and sides, so you have to work in a very limited area in your 6000*3000 psd file.

I read this article:

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3 ... _games.php

So using the 3dstudiomax r2 sounded promising, the only problem is getting a copy of that in this day and age.

Does anyone know of a program that will convert my picture into a cubemap? (I think that is the right word.)

I have spent hours and hours scouring the internet trying different things, but there doesn't seem to be any straight forward way.

I thought Pano2VR was going to be the one to do this, but it wasn't because it distorts the images.

Right now I'm at a loss. Any help would be appreciated.

I'd love to share what I create with the Quake 3 community so mappers can use these skyboxes in there maps.

Thank you,

DG

[D-Meat]

I'm in a rush right now, so I'll only give you a clue : use Blender to render (or actually bake) your cubemap on a UV unwrapped cube. If you don't understand anything, wait a little bit, I'll come back soon.

http://www.blender.org

[obsidian]

The old freeware version of HDRShop can convert a panoramic image into a cubemap.

There are also some Photoshop plugins that may work as well.

The 3ds Max method still works on modern versions, but it works best with an actual 3D scene, not if you just have a basic 2D Photoshop image.

[dg1]

Thank you both for your help. I've never used blender so I would need some direction there for sure. I'm willing to try anything!

I tried the HDRShop and I've been reading its information. I'm not sure, but it looks like I have to somehow create the image as a mirrored ball first before it can be rendered correctly as a Vertical cross? Right now I'm just getting distortion again when it renders the image as a vertical cross.

I'm also searching for some photoshop plugins.

That's where I'm at with this. HDRShop seems more or less straight forward except their tutorials don't say anything about what the format needs to be for the source image to render it correctly as a vertical cross. I'm sure once its explained I will understand!

Anyway, thank you both again for your help. I will keep working on this!

DG

[Rioshi]

dg1, try to rotate "up" image 90° counterclockwise and "down" image 90° clockwise. Also check if you assign all squares correctly. This cubemap converted from "equidistant" to "horizontal cross" using Pano2VR and works fine in Quake3:


OR just select "horizontal T" and set "pan" to 90°

[smiker]

Have you try terragen? You might save time with that awesome piece of software.