Ship Interiors

[Kiblams]

I am curious; are the interiors of the ships beyond the cockpits in ED already modelled?

With the idea of walking around our ships being expected for so long now, you would expect FDevs to have at least mapped out the interiors as they were designing/modelling them.

Has anyone seen any extracted 3D models from the game files? This is not uncommon these days as technically minded fans enjoy extracting them to be 3D printed for their desks.

I would personally be very interested in seeing anything, even a some untextured renders would be awesome!

 

[ghostookami]

I often wondered that myself, since they plan on walking around ships did they already model the interior and its just off limits for now?

 

[Vi.king]

I was thinking about that too when I saw that screenshot from the cockpit of the new vulture ship which was from way behind the cockpit and not from the pilots position we usually see. So I was thinking if it is already possible to "walk" inside your cockpit

 

[Kiblams]

Good to see I'm not the only one, all we need to do now is to see if anyone has the knowhow to extract game files of if FDev could be kind enough to share images maybe?

 

[OamodSias]

The ships are designed around a grid system, which allows them to build accurately sized ships (including elevators in the big girls); I doubt there's anything in the game files as yet since we are a long way off from this feature; and it would be pointless to render an entire ship when it's not even being used. At present, the only thing being render is what you can see. To my knowledge, there's nothing outside of the cockpit (yet! *eager anticipation*).

They'll release images when it gets closer to the release of ship walkabouts I suspect.

 

[Weps]

I can't find it anymore, but in one of the dev videos I remember a developer stating (it might have been DB himself) that the interiors are indeed already modeled. This statement was made in the context of the scope of the game and to argument that a first person play mode is indeed within FDEV's plans.

While we have seen substantial evidence of modeled cockpits and ship interiors (take the Type 9 for example - there are a lot of screenshots showing the lower decks, the elevator and other walkways and you can see those even in the game to some extent), I don't remember seeing any render of other parts of the ship, such as the cargo hold. I'm not sure the game engine would even load that kind of information at this point, so even if it exists modeled somewhere, it may not be in the game files yet.

Edit: beaten to it.

 

[Kiblams]

The ships are designed around a grid system, which allows them to build accurately sized ships (including elevators in the big girls); I doubt there's anything in the game files as yet since we are a long way off from this feature; and it would be pointless to render an entire ship when it's not even being used. At present, the only thing being render is what you can see. To my knowledge, there's nothing outside of the cockpit (yet! *eager anticipation*).

They'll release images when it gets closer to the release of ship walkabouts I suspect.

In see your point, I guess I just wish they had done the work as it would be amazing to get a sneak peak.

Just a quick note on 3D graphics; they don't render what you can't see, if they did the games we play simply wouldnt run. (Back-face /occlusion culling etc.)

 

[nexxo]

Yes, the interiors are already modelled (this is why they have been taking so long!). There are a few videos of a player's ship exploding and during the few seconds that the player's disembodied viewpoint hangs in space, an Anaconda (possibly the one responsible for destroying the player's ship) flies through the location previously occupied by the player's vessel. Some clipping through the Anaconda's walls occurs, revealing a brief glimpse of corridors and rooms not usually visible from the Anaconda cockpit, not even if you turned around in the pilot's seat.

 

[Alien]

Yes, the interiors are already modelled (this is why they have been taking so long!). There are a few videos of a player's ship exploding and during the few seconds that the player's disembodied viewpoint hangs in space, an Anaconda (possibly the one responsible for destroying the player's ship) flies through the location previously occupied by the player's vessel. Some clipping through the Anaconda's walls occurs, revealing a brief glimpse of corridors and rooms not usually visible from the Anaconda cockpit, not even if you turned around in the pilot's seat.

I remember seeing this on Kerrash's stream during Alpha.

 

[tanman]

Yes, the interiors are already modelled (this is why they have been taking so long!). There are a few videos of a player's ship exploding and during the few seconds that the player's disembodied viewpoint hangs in space, an Anaconda (possibly the one responsible for destroying the player's ship) flies through the location previously occupied by the player's vessel. Some clipping through the Anaconda's walls occurs, revealing a brief glimpse of corridors and rooms not usually visible from the Anaconda cockpit, not even if you turned around in the pilot's seat.

holy moley that's amazing. can you post a link?

 

[OamodSias]

In see your point, I guess I just wish they had done the work as it would be amazing to get a sneak peak.

Just a quick note on 3D graphics; they don't render what you can't see, if they did the games we play simply wouldnt run. (Back-face /occlusion culling etc.)

[video=youtube;OiTRJpvbmhU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OiTRJpvbmhU[/video]

This is worth a watch too (if you haven't already):
[video=youtube;8yd-m9AR7mY]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yd-m9AR7mY[/video]

 

[Dannyc]

I was excited about the future video until I realised its basically a well devised PR stunt to sell the planet landing expansion to the board - Lets only mention it once amongst a few things at the beginning then lets really mention it in every other minute as we get to the end of the clip.. Its a bit tacky and clumsy.

Its a little odd they don't mention once why or how they think they are going to use these interiors - Its like they modeled them because they realised they could without using any resources or it would have much effect on performance because of the fixed view. Granted the works done if they do decide where to go next but it bothers me why they don't 100% know what they want to do with them (correct me if Im wrong Im just typing as I think).. I haven't looked at the Kickstarter age in detail but do they have a roadmap or plan of where they are trying to get too? (other than PR vids)

PS I do love the game.. Im just confused about what they want to do with it

 

[DaveB]

Even with a good grid system, they do have to be at least roughly internally modeled, even if the interiors apart from cockpit are optimized out of the in-game models we're flying now. If you are EVER going to make moving around inside the ships possible, you need to have that available before modeling the exterior skin. If you don't you risk having a situation where a ship "goes TARDIS" (yes, I've heard it called that) and is bigger on the inside in order to fit everything in. If we're walking around the pad and a ship is 100m long from nose to tail but it takes you walking 140m inside the ship to get from your chair to the rear bulkhead, people WILL notice. It gives the render pipeline a splitting headache too and leads to all sorts of horrible graphics glitches. At a minimum the layout of all internal compartments has to exist, even if all there is is a blocked off space labeled "Thruster Bay" or "Internal Compartment"

 

[JohnDieHard]

Its not just about the interior, to be able to move around the ships you also need to have first person animation sets of the characters motion, and Im guessing theres no point to doing that till they have established what else the characters will be doing in the world. It would entail a lot of work on the animation tree and then the anims themselves of all the possible actions the player can perform. To do it well takes time. Look how clunky X-Rebirth feels when you are in 1st person mode? No thanks.

 

[Kiblams]

Its not just about the interior, to be able to move around the ships you also need to have first person animation sets of the characters motion, and Im guessing theres no point to doing that till they have established what else the characters will be doing in the world. It would entail a lot of work on the animation tree and then the anims themselves of all the possible actions the player can perform. To do it well takes time. Look how clunky X-Rebirth feels when you are in 1st person mode? No thanks.

This thread isn't about walking around our ships, it's about seeing their internals, or getting an idea of how they are structured inside.

 

[Tinman]

This thread isn't about walking around our ships, it's about seeing their internals, or getting an idea of how they are structured inside.

This is what John Kelly (3D Artist) said roughly 1.5 years ago in a "Meet the Team" interview:

Some of our forum members are curious about how the ship interiors are coming along. How much of the cockpit and general interior will be fully modelled for initial release?

Currently we've only got one cockpit developed to a sort of Alpha stage in-game and that is modelled up to about 180 degrees around you, at some point we do hope to have a full 360 degree cockpit but it’s not a priority at this stage. A fair amount of the Cockpit is modelled though.

The rest of the interiors at the moment aren't a high priority. We have built some blockout pieces for them, but they're more of a focus for later on, once we have the ships in and stations all going and everything spit polished, that's when we're really going to start digging into the interiors and their components, but we're laying the foundations for them for sure.

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=7412

Since they don't have all the ships and stations "all going and spit polished" at the moment, well...

I'm guessing that this is what some people have seen when clipping through the models during graphical glitches is some of these blockout pieces rather than the fully developed version they are going to dig into later.

There are also these old concept images from back during the Kickstarter (scale might differ compared to current ships):

Other than that we haven't really been shown anything more yet.

EDIT: I don't think anyone has been able to extract the models from the game yet. They are using their own engine after all so it's probably not as straight forward to access them compared to other games using engines like Unreal/CryEngine/Unity.

 

[Kiblams]

This is what John Kelly (3D Artist) said roughly 1.5 years ago in a "Meet the Team" interview:


https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=7412

Since they don't have all the ships and stations "all going and spit polished" at the moment, well...

I'm guessing that this is what some people have seen when clipping through the models during graphical glitches is some of these blockout pieces rather than the fully developed version they are going to dig into later.

There are also these old concept images from back during the Kickstarter (scale might differ compared to current ships):

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d142/steveobhave/Shipinterior-1_zpscbed0421.png
https://s3.amazonaws.com/ksr/assets...e18b5b85634f6795e8dfacde_large.jpg?1352464273
http://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/_...-dangerous/images/d/d8/Anaconda_01_Inside.jpg

Other than that we haven't really been shown anything more yet.

That's great information, thanks! Shame it looks like it's missing for now at least.

 

[Yaffle]

I remember seeing this on Kerrash's stream during Alpha.

I can't find it, but buried here in the forums is a link to a youtube video where in the death sequence as described the player ends up in a corridor with a rusty door ahead of him, then it ended.

 

[JohnDieHard]

Yes it is, and Im saying the reason why we havn't been able to do so yet, is because it requires a lot of work on the character animation. You cant just fly around as a camera. Plus all the interaction necessary with interiors.


'With the idea of walking around our ships being expected for so long now..'

This thread isn't about walking around our ships, it's about seeing their internals, or getting an idea of how they are structured inside.

 

[Kiblams]

I can't find it, but buried here in the forums is a link to a youtube video where in the death sequence as described the player ends up in a corridor with a rusty door ahead of him, then it ended.

That's a shame, would have been nice to see!