Few days ago tZork and me were talking about entities in NetRadiant (and GtkRadiant in general), that the entities we see in the editor are not very intuitive and they are pretty ugly too.
So I've decided to change this, and if you like it, it *might* end up in NetRadiant too, if divVerent accepts my patch.
On this very picture, you can see the actual problem: entities are only dull boxes, with different shades of colors. Not to mention, some of them share the same color:



So I've decided to make models for them. I've stayed at the box shape (I'm too much used to it, and those boxes give me a pretty accurate point where the center is ), but I've made some ASE models, and in gimp I've textured them in Web2.0 style (that's the trend nowadays ) :



These are actually func_pointparticles entities (that one requires patch in Nexuiz SVN too btw). I've decided to make 4 different types, plus a 5th in my mind that I was just too lazy to make

The poll is about, wich one do you like the best? The first one in the far, is obviously the old entity. The second one in row has the text "func_pointparticle" text on all of it's side, and a logo on it's front face (so you can see the angle in 3D view). Drawback: you can only see where it looks in the 3D window.
The second one has an arrow, but it doesn't have the logo.
The two last ones are the same, but they're 60% transparent.
The 5th would be the transparent arrowed AND has logo on all sides (that'd b my fav I think ), but I'd like to ask all of you mappers what you'd like to see in your editor. Sure, this adds a little more work for your pc to render, but those models are really low poly, and I don't think that it'd hurt performance on todays' computers anyway.
So please, tell me your opinions, and vote!

ps.: I'll do models for eg. spawn points too, a stick man with a gun in it's hand or something similar.

For some reason I can't seem to vote on the pool. Either way my vote was for none of the pool options actually, since I believe the best way would be if each entity had a model and texture rather then that classic cube. For example, a light entity would have a model and a texture like a bulb instead of that round sphere, while a target_speaker a speaker model and texture and so on. Would probably be a bit more difficult to make but yeah that's just what I think if it is possible...

yay, looking good.

Maybe different color boxes or text though so you can tell the difference at a distance.

Brutail- lose the extra detail on the end of the arrow. It's unnecessary imo.

Better keep the arrows as is for performance reasons.

On another note: func_pointparticles is meant to be a brush entity that spawns point particles at some random point inside the brush in random intervals. So you can't simply use a model to render it.

The changes are nice otherwise...

Drawback: you can only see where it looks in the 3D window.

+1 to all C.Brutails models, which have no such drawback. Models with this drawback would be annoying.

Great that you're doing this C.Brutail!

I'd suggest using different colors for the boxes,too (e.g. all func_ boxes are yellow, all info_ boxes green etc.).
I like the symbols. Make them bigger, so that you can tell faster from the distance what entity you're looking at.
To have more room for the symbol you could use abbreviations for the entities (F_PP for func_pointparticles or F_SD for func_stardust etc LOC for info_location and NLL for info _null or similar etc..) You'll still be able to see what exactly the entity is by opening the entities window.
And i think that arrows on the boxes only make sense for entities that use directions.

Will you do entity-models for the weapons too ?
please

Strahlemann, if you use netradiant, or copy the entities.def from Nexuiz SVN, you'll be already able to see the weapons as they're ingame

Progress

I've removed the feathers of the arrows, but the arrow itself is still there.
info_* entities now form an i letter:

C.Brutail wrote:Strahlemann, if you use netradiant, or copy the entities.def from Nexuiz SVN, you'll be already able to see the weapons as they're ingame

Do you think you can also do that for flags and dom points? And every other entity you place in Radiant that gets seen the same way in-game (already has an in-game model)? Otherwise awesome work with everything else

I dont like the transparency its hard to see. How about the original colours with logos/labels?

(sorry if anyone else said that, I've not read every post)

Progress:

I've tried to make the info_player_* entites this week, but Radiant ASE exporter hardly failed (produced deformed faces and abnormal ones). So I1ve tried to figure out how to use blender
This is what I've snapped together in a few hours: (don't laff! )



I have to say, blender has a quite odd interface (orly?), but after some trial and errors I've managed to build the stickman, I've snapped it to grid, and scaled to the right size (FYI: the basic cube in blender is exactly 2x2x2 quake units large).
Exported to ASE, it looks like this:



W00t, almost 69 qu! (around 68.8, if I'd have to make a tip).

But now I'm stuck. Could somebody tell me how to texturise it? I've found it out how to uvunwrap it, but I need two materials: namely, the model will be covered in two textures: the whole body plus the pedestal it's standing on will have text eg. Red Team on it's upper face (other faces will be covered by the same red texture as the whole model).
So: how do I apply more materials to the model in blender 2.46 ? Because once that is done, I'm almost done with the info_player models.