IntroductionAlright as you have already probably guessed it I finally decided to release a first alpha version of this tool. It is currently designed in a pretty classic way in terms of how it can be used. But it already allows you to create / load / edit / save everything from a vehicle. As this is an alpha version it will probably still have quite a few bugs or weird behaviours but I hope you'll let me know about them so that I can quickly fix them for the next release. EDIT: I have started working on the videos. One is already available on my dedicated YouTube channel here. InstallationTo install the tool you shouldn't have anything to do except extracting the provided ZIP file wherever you want. The you can run DriveBeamEditor.exe to start it. You may also need to download and install the .NET Framework 4.5. UsageWhen you start the application you will at first spawn on this page in an integrated web-browser (if everything goes well). As a little security matter I decided to require that the users log in to the forums to use the tool. So log in and then you should have the popups from menus Vehicle and Preferences open (parts has currently no use so it won't do anything). If you chose to remember your login information you won't have to enter it next time you run the tool. The reason why I did that was to keep the tool linked to these forums as much as possible instead of being distributed on some hacking websites or even websites where you'd have to pay to use free things like this. Once the tool ready you can either click the Toggle website button to hide the browser and show everything else. Or you can point your mouse to the Vehicle menu and either open a vehicle or request to create one. I will describe the different procedures during my next free time. When opening a vehicle the part selection window (on the left) will open automatically. There you can select a file then a part to open. You can also create new files or parts in the grid. That's also how you create a new vehicle after opening the Vehicle menu and clicking Save while having no vehicle currently opened. If you choose to open a part the main area will be maximized and you will be able to edit everything using the tabs. Editing also means adding and removing. The grids all work the same. To run the game from the editor you must open the right panel (by either moving the splitter or using the buttons on it) and click Run. If you had a vehicle open it will automatically be loaded by the game. Whenever you make some changes to the vehicle you can press the Update button on the game panel to save the changes and update the vehicle. Important notesIf the game path was not found when you started the tool your vehicle list will be empty. You should then open the Preferences menu and change it manually. When you need to get back to the editor from the game I suggest that you press Esc and then in the menu under Input you can click Press escape to close the exit menu that you popped in the game (basically that menu option sens an Esc key press to the game that's simple as that). In the preferences the Enable global modifiers option allows you to tell the tool that when you modify the global scales on a part it should apply to all others as well. This is the case in most cases but beware that there are some exceptions (like the Civetta Bolide). The Auto close grouping properties option tells the tool that properties such as group, deformGroup or breakGroup for example should be closed at the end of the sections that used some without closing them. By enabling the Copy all vehicle contents on save option you tell the tool that not only .jbeam files should be saved when you save to another folder but also all the other vehicle file such as the model, materials, textures, ... This is useful if you want to quickly duplicate an existing vehicle. Many controls allow you to select nodes from a popup list. If you checked Select nodes from current part only then only the nodes from the part you are currently editing will be shown. Otherwise you will get a lost of all nodes per part from the whole vehicle. You will also notice that I have integrated a PayPal donation button. Just know that I'm really not expecting anything from anybody. The button is there essentially there as a sign to prove that this is a free software. But feel free to use it if you want to support the tool . There is still a lot more to say but I don't really have the time right now. I will improve this topic and maybe even make another one in the future so stay tuned. I also already created a YouTube channel (currently empty) that I will use to post video tutorials. Thanks a lot to those who support me and helped me find my way through the vehicle data . Update alpha 0.0.0.11 and above Please check the other thread for Alpha 11 and above (this one was getting too messy). Update alpha 0.0.0.10 - Quick 3D update This is a quick update including the features I used in the video below: Creating the Flip Ramp from scratch. This includes the following changes: - added possibility to freeze the 3D cursor (use E) => you need to do this if you want to use a manipulator or you will always select the cursor itself ! - added possibility to rotate and move the 3D model (with a manipulator, don't forget to freeze the 3D cursor first) - added shortcuts for "Add node", "Add beam" and "Add triangle" (1,2 and 3 number keys above letters, use shift in Europe) - added possibility to copy resources from a vehicle to the folder of another one. Pretty handy when creating a new vehicle that needs the resources of another. As a tutorial I decided to make a video where I create the Flip Ramp from scratch. I just copy the resources from the original one using a little technique I added (described above). Update alpha 0.0.0.9 - BIG update (3D edition + fixes) Finally I can release this one. Was the whole evening on it again from 6pm to 2am heh. This is a major update that as I had already mentioned in this thread includes the possibility to create triangles in the 3D editor and also display 3D models of types .obj/.3ds//lwo (no collada support yet sorry ). I also fixed and upgraded plenty of little things in the 3D editor and added a few shortcuts. Let me know if you need more of them and which . Also I decided to stop forcing users to log in to the forums when starting the tool. And the donate button opens in the default browser rather than within the editor (for security matters I can understand). Here's the full change list: - fixed incorrect position of node ids leading to them staying after node deletion - fixed node deletion on mouse release causing the removal of two parts instead of one - fixed grid size not changing with the slider - added the possibility to display 3D models of some supported types (not collada yet) - added shortcut to change cursor type (V) - added shortcuts to change snapping (X, C) - fixed crash when creating first node using prefix - fixed flexbody buttons that could disappear sometimes - fixed auto-closing of group properties not always working - added definition of triangles in the 3D editor - added way to remove triangles within 3D editor - fixed beam control properties losing focus on input leading to impossibility to enter a value at once (focus was lost on every key stroke) - added possibility to select nodes from other parts when displayed (yeah node cursor lets you grab em too now !) - added possibility to add beams between different parts (of course you needed the ability to link nodes from different parts then, there it is) - added possibility to add triangles with nodes from different parts (same there) - added possibility to change value scale (still 10 times actual values by default until I can get everything working fine without having to do it) - added possibility to scale 3D model (I'm not sure what scale I should apply so default is 1 and you can change it on the fly with a slider if needed) - removed forced forum login at app start - changed donate button to open in default browser by default rather then within the applicatiion And the usual release screenshots: Illustration of linking a node from the chassis with a node from the body (on the Moonhawk). Illustration of showing a 3D model inside the editor (model from rmikebaker). That's it for this release. I now spend quite a lot of time on it (more than 5 hours a day recently heh) for free . If you like the tool and want to help rentabilizing it please don't hesitate to use my donate button or click this link for the same result. Thanks to those who helped me go further by providing information or material. For this release I want to thank especially: gmaksi83, rmikebaker, Nadeox1 Update alpha 0.0.0.8 - Critical update Alright this update is essentially aimed at fixing problems with loading vehicles that may contain some little errors. It will now warn you about what was found that seemed not correct with a precise message on where it is located. Also those errors now don't block you. You can still open your vehicle even with errors. The other important part of this update is about the 3D editor. You can now select colors & sizes for nodes & beams. But the biggest addition is the panel with all the vehicle parts. That panel allows you to select which parts you want to be visible. Yes you can now display multiple parts at once in the editor. And by the way colors are saved in config file so you get them back when you restart the tool. Here's a full change list: more descriptive error messages fixed vehicles not loading on errors fixed element properties not loading correctly when co-existing as a grouping property and inline property fixed maximizing views not working in 3D editor fixed ref nodes that couldn't be loaded when belonging to another part than the selected one added controls in 3D editor to change color and size of nodes/beams of different types added vehicle parts panel in 3D editor to allow displaying multiple parts And here's the most screenshot I got for this one: Update alpha 0.0.0.7 - Jbeam 3D Editor update A few but quite important changes in for the 3D editor in this version: added node names in 3D views (can be disabled on deman) ! added a possibility to prefix nodes (the number at the end will always be generated and unique, per vehicle part though) fixed the annoying repetitive bug when checking the nodes / beams controls after deleting a node in the 3D editor Node names: Node prefix: Update alpha 0.0.0.6 - Jbeam 3D Editor This is the one with... that little addition that I called 3D editor . Yes that's it. Now you can edit and add nodes and beams in a dedicated 3D editor which is still part of this same global application. Plus it includes a few little additional fixes. Here's globally what you can do with the 3D editor: of course load up a vehicle part inside of it of course save the 3D contents as jbeam contents add and remove nodes and beams with the mouse in the four classic viewports of a 3D modeling program do most basic things you can do with a modeling program (rotate, pan, zoom, change FOV, set grid snapping, ...) linking nodes with drag-&-drop directly creates a beam in the perspective view you can use an absolute (but snapped, absolute means it uses all the world space) 3D cursor or a cursor snapped to the grid only or a cursor that only selects nodes (very useful to link beams in the perspective view) you can paint nodes which sounds useless but...it could be useful if you use a large snap like 10 units and want to put nodes on the four corners of a square of 10 units use sliders to move the grid so that you can build stuff from all views without always sticking to the same plane Here's a global screenshot followed by a video that I posted on my dedicated channel (don't hesitate to subscribe ). Enjoy ! Update alpha 0.0.0.5 Quick update for a few missing things in the latest one. Cameras wouldn't save because the refactoring was not complete there. Also I added some more error handling on vehicle loading to prevent any deep data problem to crash the tool (like a missing comma). Which will result in the following from now on: Next thing I'll do is gonna be a video on "How to create a simple vehicle from scratch using Real-Time Vehicle Editor for BeamNG DRIVE". I will probably be using the flipramp in it. Update alpha 0.0.0.4 Here's a new update fixing most things related to data reading / saving and allowing to do more and in a better way: huge refactoring of data reading / saving essentially to allow inline properties some refactoring of the editing controls especially to allow removing values added radio buttons to choose between global properties and inline properties on all section controls (beams, nodes, ...) added flexbodies control added context menu to numeric boxes to allow setting NULL or MAX (or default value) all booleans can now be set to 'Undetermined' from a combo box to disable added part configurator working mostly like the in-game one Update 0.0.0.3 - now searching for game path in Windows registry if default one does not exist - when a vehicle has an error it is now available but a message box shows every error that was found (still needs completion though because not everything is tested yet) Update 0.0.0.2 - fixed app not loading vehicles when one had 'name.cs' is missing - glowMap function values were always reset to '0.3' New video Here's the first video of the series I will make for the editor. This is a global overview of the tool. Lets you see most of what you can do. WOuld have taken too long to have detailed each tab though. The following was the original content of this post that I kept for clarity and to avoid confusion to the new users Alright I needed to make a thread about this or I could end up giving up with it. So as I already briefly mentioned elsewhere I'm working on a real-time vehicle editor that should allow you to create / edit anything that can be made for a vehicle with the game reacting accordingly. The editor runs the game itself. No communication between both is currently possible (at least in a viable way) but it should be later as tdev replied to me in another thread. For the moment the editor can read most of the data. I used both the wiki and the existing vehicles jbeams to determine what is what and how it should be used. But I'm sure that when something comes out you will have plenty of remarks or additions / tweaks to ask for because perosnally I don't really know everything about how a vehicle works in BeamNG Drive. I know Ivankio is also trying to provide a way to generate jbeams but there it's from the 3D modeling software directly as I could see which I can't really deal with. He's providing creation features and I hope my editor will provide good editing / tweaking stuff. If everything goes well and I still have time I could also think of integrating LUA and script management features. Of course I wouldn't make a forum thread with only some text. So here is a screenshot of what this editor currently looks like: The vehicle structure will be presented in a better way in the future. For now nodes are editable and can be added directly in the grid. And node properties can be set in the lower panel. Properties will display the latest ones found if the currently selected node doesn't have one. Modifying the value on a node that doesn't have one will ask the user if a new configuration value should be created for the current node. Thanks already to Trumple who made the first editor that is still and will always work fine here: DriveEditor-Vehicle-Configuration-(-jbeam)-Editor-GUI He is the reason why I decided to dig into this and he's the one who provided the code that allows for parsing and saving jbeams. To be complete with the credits here's Ivankio's thread: MayaToJbeam-Visual-Jbeam-Editor-near-zero-typing Do not hesitate to let me know how it should be presented and what should be or not be in. UI overview - Part 1This is a short overview of what my main form could look like (naked from controls currently, only some popup menus). It's a design in progress and is subject to change. Please let me know if you like it or not. If any of you have good presentation ideas concerning the controls and even how the editing controls (nodes, beams, ...) should be designed don't hesitate either. Just give your opinion and I'll make good use of it. PS: this is pure WinForms, no WPF UI overview - Part 2Alright I can finally give you some concrete overview of vehicle edition. This video contains only the features that are fully functional. Many others are already in progress. Just be patient. What is already functional: open & save (save as) vehicles select vehicle file & vehicle part from grids add vehicle files & vehicles parts in grids modify vehicle part information modify vehicle part global settings (beam scales for example, I still need to make that unique and propagate the modification to all vehicle parts) modify & add / remove slots + define the parent slot define the ref nodes if applies by selecting existing nodes reviewing nodes in a grid + adding / modifying / deleting directly from the grid defining / modifying node properties The next video will include the game control. I didn't include it into this one because it's not complete yet. Will allow you to start or close the game and execute a few commands on it (like pressing escape to close menu or resetting car & LUA). Plus it will allow you to switch to debug mode to see nodes etc... Real-time interaction demonstrationAs promised this video shows how to start the game within the editor and how to interact with it. As an example here I simply opened the pickup and deleted a node from the front-right wheel. Then when pressing the Update button from the game control you can see the vehicle is updated immediately. The Update button actually saves all the files and then sends an input to the game to reload the vehicle in place (Ctrl+R). More to come...
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor thanks , this really helps the people who arent into typing in the note pad for hours . im sure its going to jumpstart this modding community.
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor Awesome idea! I love this, this would be a great deal of help and ease to BNG! Awesome job so far. Can't wait to use it myself. Did you just start this project or? EDIT: Awesome, awesome, awesome, wait did I mention awesome!? This is going to be a HUGE help to us modders.
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor Heh thanks for the replies that raises the motivation a bit . I can say I have just started in amount of time spent on it even if I started quite some time ago already now. It's just not too easy to find some time for this. The hardest part is to understand what YOU need and how I should present things so that they suit the right purpose. So do not hesitate .
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor I won't! I think this is going to be great. Is this going to be usable with Blender?
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor Oh, very nice - how did you integrate the Torque3D window in your application? - what language is this written in? What do you need communication wise? We are currently planning of a simple lua style RPC interface which provides the ability to call lua commands and get the results back.
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor This would be an extremely helpful tool, no more alt-tab and real time changes on the car! Everything you have put out have been awesome additions to the game, thanks again Greg. Great idea. A cool addition for the future maybe: when you click to edit a node in the GUI, if you could make the node glow or highlight in the debug screen on the vehicle. Would just make it easier to see exactly what you are editing.
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor It's written in C# under .NET framework 4.5. To integrate the game I made a control that can launch and integrate an application by using some 'user32.dll' calls (SetParent, SetWindowLong, PostMessage and MoveWindow). So that control actually launches the game. I made it launch it with parameters that get into the level immediately with a vehicle. Also had to modify 'scripts\client\prefs.cs' at start to set the game window borderless and windowed with a lowered resolution. I don't really like that part as it has to modify a game file at start and reset it back at close (which could be problematic if the application crashes). So there it would be good to be able to either launch the game with such parameters or with a parameter to specify a preference file to use. That would be very nice. Communication wise it would be nice to be able to communicate with LUA somehow. I can even integrate 'LuaInterface' for example in this app (already used it) and communicate from a Lua client with a Lua server but there you would have to provide me with such Lua code I guess (or how to code a client). But maybe there could be an easier way to communicate with the game too. I will also check if I can trigger keyboard events or other from the 'user32.dll' library. - - - Updated - - - This is a standalone application. So it is to be used post-modeling time. You can create your model with anything this is just gonna be an alternative to notepad editing.
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor Update I started working on the saving today and so far I've got the following parts saving correctly: information slotType slots nodes (with properties) The rest will not be too hard but just takes some time. I'm also still working on the game control and I can fire key events with 'SendKeys' without problem so I can reload a vehicle from within the editor and see it updated immediately on the game control on the right. - - - Updated - - - Quick question about beams... Can somebody tell me if doing this: Code: {"beamSpring":0,"beamDamp":0,"beamDeform":240000,"beamStrength":"FLT_MAX"}, is the same as doing this: Code: {"beamSpring":0,"beamDamp":0}, {"beamDeform":240000,"beamStrength":"FLT_MAX"}, meaning that any beam property can be alone OR packed into a group of properties. That's the kind of little critical things I need to know to make things right.
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor a) the input events are send via lua commands as well, so that would work with the lua sockets thing. b) the following is the same: Code: {"beamSpring":0,"beamDamp":0,"beamDeform":240000,"beamStrength":"FLT_MAX"} Code: {"beamSpring":0} {"beamDamp":0} {"beamDeform":240000,"beamStrength":"FLT_MAX"} (the number of {} does not matter, it gets merged in the end anyways. There are also the inline options (as dict as last argument): Code: ["node1", "node2", {"beamSpring":0,"beamDamp":0,"beamDeform":240000,"beamStrength":"FLT_MAX"}] good work
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor I figured how to completely save beams correctly and took care of "FLT_MAX" wherever it applies. Flexbodies done too just finishing them. I will probably request some more info about different points that might still remain too vague for me.
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor sure thing. If you cannot get hold of us, simply contact us via http://www.beamng.com/contactus/ please as we want to support you in this project
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor That's awesome news I,m reading here in this topic,and what a joy Beamng support it,cant wait to beam up my Challenger! Keep on sharing and caring,it makes the community BIG!
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor UPDATE I'm done with reading and saving nearly everything. I think I still only need to take care of hubWheels and hydros the rest is done. Here are shots of the class diagrams of both projects (business and UI) and as attachments the class diagrams for those who can open them and would be curious: Some things are to be deleted. Some may look strange to some of you. If you notice something weird please let me know. Not much UI yet only nodes are working. But I can already successfully add / remove / modify nodes on the grid and set / update node properties at the bottom. The game control that launches the game within the editor is currently not active but I got all I need for it in another test project (at least the base stuff). Not yet included fully in the editor. I've also attached an example of generated vehicle (all the jbeam files) with what is currently saving. It's named test but is a replica of pickup because I can already save as too. If you notice anything wrong let me know. Everything should be correct and well ordered but I may have commited some mistakes . These files result of opening pickup in the editor and saving as test. EDIT: I will expand the diagrams because they are currently collapsed so useless.
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor UI overview - Part 1This is a short overview of what my main form could look like (naked from controls currently, only some popup menus). It's a design in progress and is subject to change. Please let me know if you like it or not. If any of you have good presentation ideas concerning the controls and even how the editing controls (nodes, beams, ...) should be designed don't hesitate either. Just give your opinion and I'll make good use of it. PS: this is pure WinForms, no WPF
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor OH MAN. This is going to make Drive so much more awesome than it already is, if im getting this right, all the we will be able to stance cars? I'm not a crazy stance fan, but a little camber and offset is nice plus i'm sure there's other things this would be useful for too, im sure this wasnt just for making some crazy bosozoku style cambered out Covet's xDD
Re: Real-Time Vehicle Editor Looking very cool so far. I can't wait to use it because there's a vehicle I'm dying to make.
