All posts by Dave Noonan

Release News, Software Release

3DSimED 3.1l

21-11-2017 16-42-56

New: Forza 7 Support. Earlier versions of 3DSimED could import Forza 7 models with the Forza Apex Import Plugin but version 3.1l has many improvements to help import Forza 7 car models. The plugin understands the new pcfamily and base sub-folders of media, has improved diffuse texture handling, includes an option to import the blur wheel materials and will read more swatchbin texture types.

New: Wavefront .OBJ export plugin.

New: F1-2017 _model Import Plugin . This allows individual models to be imported but requires game ERP archives to be decompressed.

New: Tools ->Expand-> Single ERP Archive/Batch ERP Archive. Decompress individual or folder tree of ERP archives.

Enhanced: Added rF2 shader “car body paint with damage”.

Fix: Forza 7/Apex/Horizon 3 Import has better handling for missing materialbins and should not crash if files are missing.

Fix: Models with deeply nested objects could crash 3DSimED.

Fix: Wavefront .OBJ import could not import quoted texture map names.

Fix: TDU Import would corrupt some meshes.

Visit the download page for new version.

Release News, Software Release

F1-2017 Import Plugin Update

This is an update to the F1-2017 Import plugin included with 3DSimED 31k – it will not work with versions before 3DSimED 31j.

The following issues are addressed in this release:

  • Opening some tracks could cause the plugin to terminate.
  • The classic cars were not using the classic tire objects and textures.
  • The higher resolution texture maps (mipmaps) were not used if the original DDS was in DXT1 format.

Go to the Download page.

Software Release

Importing F1 2017 Models

Version 3.1k 3DSimED and later can import models from F1 2017.

To import F1 2017 models F1-2017 (*.erp) must be selected as the import file type.

Importing Cars. To import a car you must browse to your F1 2017 game and look for the f1_2017_vehicle_package folder within the asset_groups folder. Inside the f1_2017_vehicle_package folder there is the teams folder with all the cars, select the car, and then the wep folder. The wep folder should have the car’s erp file to select and import.

Note: to import a classic car browse the f1_classic_02_vehicle_package folder.

11-09-2017 20-49-35

Importing Tracks. Within the game’s asset_groups folder find the environment_package folder and then the tracks folder. Select the track and find the wep folder. For each track there are two erp to select from, one named <track_name>_2017.erp and the other named <track_name>_classic.erp, select one of those and the track should be imported.

12-09-2017 12-36-48

Release News, Software Release

Forza Apex/Horizon 3 Import Plugin

This is an update to the Forza Apex/FH3 Import plugin included with 3DSimED 31j – it will not work with earlier versions of 3DSimED.

The following issues are addressed in this release:

  • Objects with identical titles but different disk files would load incorrectly.
  • Importing a modelbin with all LOD would fail.
  • Sub-meshes instanced more than once could be scaled incorrectly.

Go to the Download 3DSimED page.

Release News, Software Release

3DSimED3.1j Released

New: Forza Apex/Fh3 now includes secondary texture maps such as specular, bump, and ambient maps

New: 3DSimED Materials can reference texture maps not used by the Material’s Shader this allows extra texture maps to be imported and exported.

New: Export FBX will reference specular, bump, ambient, opacity and cube maps allowing the maps to be imported to 3DS Max.

New: Export Collada has option to copy textures to the same folder as the exported .DAE. Spaces in the texture filenames are converted to underlines to ensure the names match those in the Collada DAE.

New: Export FBX includes option to copy textures to the same folder as the FBX. The full path to the textures still has to be included in the texture names to ensure that 3DS Max can import the textures.

New: Texture Map conversions now has the option to remove trailing GUID strings from texture maps names (this is particularly for Forza import because the swatchbin filenames often include a long GUID string).

Enhanced:  Forza Apex/FH3 The use of ‘#’ has been removed from imported materials and texture map names.

Enhanced:  Forza Apex/FH3 The positioning of wheels, rotors and calipers improved.

Enhanced:  Forza Apex/FH3 LOD handling improved.

Enhanced:  Forza Apex/FH3 LOD revised material detection, resulting in higher material resolution.

Enhanced: Tools->Split Objects The objects created are smaller with less vertices.

Enhanced: Tools->Texture Browser->Batch Convert. The limit on the number of files that could be selected has been increased.

Enhanced: The Material Edit Pane shows textures missing for the material shader with a magenta border.

Fix: Primitives->Add TSO could fail to find texture maps referenced by the object.

Fix: JPEG grey-scale images were incorrectly decoded.

Fix: JPEG files could not be converted inside the Texture Map Browser.

Fix: PNG files written by 3DSimED had reversed red and blue.

Fix: Some cars imported from Forza Apex and FH3 could have zero sized tires and wheels.

Fix: Dialog windows with multiple floating point input windows could corrupt the values if one of the inputs was negative.

Fix: Assetto Corsa fix for ksMultilayer_fresnel_nm shader MultA variable.

Visit the download page for new version.

Software Release

Working with Forza Apex car models.

Version 3.1h of 3DSimED can import car models from both carbin and modelbin formats.

Preparing For Import

Before importing is is very important to have decompressed the .zip archives which store the resources for the car models. The quickbms program does a wonderful job of extracting the files but, there is a problem. When used to process a folder tree of .zip files, the folder tree created by quickbms is not correct.

To overcome this limitation batch files and a Powershell script can be downloaded: ForzaRecurseUnzip.zip

  • The simplest option is to use the batch file unzipCars.bat. This batch file skips the tracks which, at present, cannot be imported with 3DSimED.
  • Open the batch file in an editor such as Notepad and change the source (game folder ) and destination folders so they are correct for your system (in Notepad you would use the Edit->Replace function).
  • If you cannot find the source folder you should make sure that hidden files are switched on in Explorer and then look for the WindowApp folder either in C:\Program Files\ or the root of the drive on which Apex was installed.
  • In Explorer, with the shift key held down, right click on the WindowApp folder and open an Admin Command Prompt. From that command window you should be able to see the full folder name for the Forza Apex installation.
  • The second batch file, unzip.bat  will decompress the cars and tracks.
  • The Powershell script will generate a batch file, this is useful when the Forza Apex content has changed or to unzip another set of .zip files such as those from another Forza title.
  • At the time of writing, the permissions to execute a Powershell script are switched off by default in Windows 10. A quick search will reveal how to enable permissions .
  • The Powershell is intended to help out please feel free to improve it and offer it to to others

 

Importing Forza Apex Car Models

With the Forza Apex resources decompressed and in the correct folders it should then be possible to import .carbin and .modelbin.

  • The .carbin files define a car while the .modelbin files are the components of the car.
  • The .carbin files contain addition material definitions so even when editing a single component for a better result open the .carbin and then isolate the object to edit it.
  • Many materials in Forza Apex appear to use procedural shaders and do not have diffuse texture maps. To help with compatibility  with other sim formats, solid color texture maps are created as the diffuse texture maps, for example, rgba#020202ff.dds.

Below is an example of how a Forza Apex car model should appear in 3DSimED3. The file imported was MAZ_70_B1280_14.carbin

MAZ_70_B1280_14.carbin

Working With FH3

Forza Horizon 3 files from a dump can be unzipped easily because there is no encryption but the filenames look very strange.

A Powershell script and example batch file can be downloaded here UnzipFH3.zip , the script and batch file use 7-zip to unzip.

After unzipping the files will need a renaming utility to process the filenames and when finished the layout and names should resemble those from an unzipped Forza Apex.

Apex/FH3 Materials & Textures

The files from a car folder are not enough to correctly import a .carbin. Many of the materials (.materialbin) and texture maps (.swatchbin) are located in the cars\_library folder tree.

The image below is the result with only the car folder:

FH3 1965 Cobra only car folder

With the full set of files this is the result:

FH3 1965 Cobra Full file set

 

Release News, Software Release

3DSimED3.1i Released

Version 3.1i includes improved support for rF2, and adds Forza Horizon 3 Import.

Studio 397 have included a few new shaders in their release of rF2. These shaders are now supported by 3DSimED3 it should be possible to export models using these shaders. However,  please understand that as 3DSimED3 remains a D3D9 application you will not see the same quality rendering in 3DSimED as in the DX11 rF2.

FH3 Woody Ford

Support has been added to import Forza Horizon 3 cars. Also, for both FH3 and Forza Apex Import the user can now choose the LOD to import.

Note that 3DSimED3 cannot automatically detect the difference between Apex & FH3 Carbin so please make sure the correct format is chosen from the drop-down box on the Import dialog.

Visit the download page for new version.

 

Software Release

3DSimED 3.1h Released

Version 3.1h is released with support added for Forza Apex car import. Complete cars can be imported (.carbin) and individual components (.modelbin).

Apex 2017 Ford GT EcoBoost

Please note that tracks and track objects cannot be imported.

Clone Object has been added to the Object Instance Edit Pane.

The rendering of cube map shaders has improved, drag rotating a drawing should be faster,  Import Collada DAE support is better and more Forza Apex SwatchBin formats are supported.

Windows 10 users have had problems on AMD graphics hardware due to changes made in the Windows driver, 3DSimED now has less screen tearing than before.

There are also fixes for exporting to PNG, corrections have been made to the order of the SearchPaths in scenes and to the bone positions in an rF2 .GMT when a pivot point has been set.

Visit the download page for new version.

Release News

3DSimED 3.1h

New: Support for importing Forza Apex car models, both .carbin and modelbin can be imported. Only cars or car components can be imported, tracks and track objects cannot be imported. Note that although most Forza Horizon 3 car modelbin can be imported the carbin files cannot.

New: Clone Object has been added to the Object Instance Edit Pane. This function creates a new object which is copy of the presently selected object.

Enhanced: Drag rotating a view should be faster.

Enhanced: Import Collada DAE has been improved with support for texture and normal coordinates defined within the Vertices tag.

Enhanced:  Improved support for Forza Apex SwatchBin bitmap files.

Enhanced:  Rendering of shaders with cube maps improved.

Enhanced: DX10 BC5 and DX9 ATI2 formats are now decoded as normal maps.

Fixed:For AMD cards there is a fix to reduce the screen corruption which can happen when drag rotating a view with newer versions of the AMD drivers . To completely remove screen corruption switch to Software Mouse XYZ in the function Display-> DirectxX 9 Options.

Fixed: The Search path order defined by SCN files was reversed.

Fixed: Exporting to PNG could crash.

Fixed: Exporting to rF2 bone positions were incorrect if a pivot point was set.