G-Net: Player Models and Skins for Quake 2, by Ian Waugh

g-net FAQ

‘Frequently’ asked questions?

OK it should be more like ‘Questions that have been asked more than about er once, or things that perhaps might be asked, or just stuff that I wanted to say’ but that doesn’t exactly trip off the tongue does it?

Who or what is g-net?

g-net is the personal ego page of Ian Waugh. The site and all works contained within are of his doing. Ian Waugh a degree educated nsswm in his early thirties, lives in north London, works as professional (i.e. gets paid for it) analyst programmer working on various Oracle systems for a European ladieswear retail chain and has no life.

I’ve heard of an Ian Waugh about who writes for computer and music magazines and web pages.

Unfortunately that is some one else completely different, we are not even related.

There is a typo/spelling mistake/broken link or image on your site.

Oops sorry, email me with the details and I’ll fix it pronto.

Some of the pages don’t work right.

Again oops sorry, What browser are you using ? The site has only been tested in Internet Explorer 5. Version 3 browsers may struggle and Version 2 or below is a no no. Even if you are version 4 or above I know Netscape is much more picky about correct HTML than Explorer is, so I may of missed a tag off somewhere and Netscape won’t display. Email me with the details and I’ll do my best to sort it out.

Will you do a skin/model for me/my clan?

Basically No. Its a time thing, I’m a slow worker at the best of times, and an always working on personal projects and stuff. I just don’t have the time to do personal requests.

Will you do something for my web page?

Again basically no, again the time thing. Plus in the past I have done graphics for people putting sites together, but they never got used, due to the fact they weren’t liked ( if you don’t specify exactly what you want how can you expect to get it? ) or the people who wanted them mysteriously disappeared. I think I’m jinxed.

Will you work on my mod?

Depends. I have played a lot of mods and have come to the basic conclusion, mods live or die by their gameplay, not by eyecandy, which is basically all I do. The most successful mods are the ones that add something new and original to a game, not ones that are basically just a new look or more weapons, or rehash of an old mod from a different game. Plus the fact is that many mods just are not destined to ever be finished. I’ve seen too many ‘mods’ that are just a simple web page with a just tiny picture of one boxy level made from the game’s stock textures and a high poly untextured high poly model of a weapon. They often have huge ambitious list of features that will probably never happen and always are looking for coders, map makers, modelers, animators, skinners, people to make the tea etc. These mods just aren’t going to happen and I don’t want any part of them. Mod people, get some of your game actually running, use stock textures/models etc., If people can see your commitment and your new and original ideas, they will be able to think yes this is the next big thing, then I (and probably others) will come begging you for the task of adding eyecandy to your work.

Do you want a job?

Depends what you mean by job. My definition of a job is either freelance work with some money up front, or a more traditional monthly salary/health insurance/desk/employer provides PC and tools sort of deal thenYES, when can I start? On the other hand if by job you mean doing unpaid work for a demo of a possible commercial project then no (anything for commercial products must be paid for), if the job a ‘post’ in a non commercial mod ‘company’ or the like , then see the above questions about doing stuff. If you honestly represent a commerical company and want to work for you, please make me want to trust you. If I see player names, hotmail accounts, no (or a crap) home page, ‘l33t’ speak etc. in your email I get suspicious and will probably just delete it. There are to many chancers, dreamers, cowboys, dodgy geazers and weridos out there in internet land, if you really want me to work for you the please act professionaly and instill me with confidence that you are on the up and up.

Can I use your one of your existing skins/models in my Mod.?

Email me first please, I’m almost certain to say yes and just ask you to put a little note at the bottom of your read me file giving me credit for it.

Aren’t you being a bit arrogant, putting all of your stuff on a web page for all to see, but then refusing to do stuff for others, just who do you think you are?

I am not gods gift to art, the stuff I do doesn’t even qualify as art, in a dim light and at odd angle some small parts of the better pieces may be considered amateur illustration, at best. No they reason I refuse is not because of my ego, its just a time thing. Free time to work ( I’m a slow worker at the best of time) on stuff is precious to me, its is a finite resource, I can’t get any more of it. I still have to do work, eating, sleeping and have an almost non existent social life as well. So in that precious free time I do stuff for myself, close friends or family. If you want some of that time you better have really good reason, that’s all.

You have said no to basically any request for work, is there any way I can get you to do stuff for me?

I suppose I’m open to bribes, large wads of cash and/or sexual favours from attractive young women only ;)

How do you make a model/skin?

I really don’t have time to explain and I’m not every good at explaining stuff anyway. But fortunately several wonderful people who are good at explaining these thing have written tutorials and FAQ’s and put them on the web. Go to Cold Fusion and Wavelength for Half life tutorials and Polycount for pretty much everything.

Where can I download tools to make skins/models

Actually I tend to use commercial software for my stuff, (and no you can’t download 3ds Max from anywhere), but if this is out of your reach, several useful freeware alternatives have been created by good people, goto chumbalum-soft for the milkshape 3d modeler and various model viewers or the Polycount and check their list of tools.

I have tool ‘thingy’ how do I use it?

RTFM, buy a book or look for web tutorials.

Do you have ICQ?.

Er yes, But I don’t really use it much, I prefer thinking about what I say and emailing it to be read at the receivers convenience. My number is a secret.

Do you actually play these games you make stuff for?

Yes, far to much, that’s one reason I don’t get that much work done. I play as ‘Seburo’, mainly on the UK Wireplay service, but sometimes on other UK servers. I tend to change game every once in while and buy pretty much every FPS shooter that comes out. At the time of writing my game is the ‘Counterstrike’ half-life mod, but occasionally I play Quake III deathmatch or Unreal Tournement CTF. I’m an LPB and play rough, so come out fighting, bnut I might go eay on you if you use on of my models or skins ;)

So who is this Masamune Shirow bloke you keep going on about?

My hero. Manga artist extrodinaire. Author of Appleseed, Ghost in the Shell, Black Magic, Dominion Tank Police and Orion, and painter of many wonderful pictures. I’m not worthy enough to lick his shoes clean. I’m not worthy, I’m not worthy, I’m not worthy. Go here to find out more.

What tools do you use?

For graphics I mainly use Corel Photopaint 8.0, Inspire 3d 1.0 (it’s sort of ‘Diet’ Lightwave, with 75% of the functionality for 25% of the price), 3ds Max 2.5 and Metacreation’s Bryce 2, and Poser 3. I use Max for animation and UV mapping, but for general modeling and rendering, I prefer the Inspire/Lightwave was of doing things (I’m just going have to buy lightwave[6], feel that creamy lightwave goodness ). Other tools I use are various freeware Quake things including Nphernos skin tool, Quake II modeler, Jaw MD2, Half life and Quake model viewers, the skin view mod etc. Hardware wise, attached to my PC I have an A5 Wacom pad for drawing (get one!) and a plustek optic pro A-31 flatbed scanner (the cheapest A3 scanner I could find, but quality is not that good), and a usb MS intellimouse (3ds Max is so much better to use with an intellimouse) . For Web site development, including this one, I use the most powerful web development tool Microsoft produce. Ms Notepad.

Corel Photopaint ! Everybody uses Adobe Photoshop.

I started doing graphics on my PC with Photopaint 7.0, simply cause it was cheap and I don’t like paint shop pro. I’ve only ever tried Photoshop once, version 3, but I said ‘WTF is this Mac shit’ and left quickly. I currently use Corel Photopaint 8.0 (I don’t like what they did to the user interface in photopaint v9.0) and I’m happy with it, as far as I know (and several magazine reviews have also mentioned) is that there is nowt Photoshop can do that Photopaint 8.0 or above can’t, yes including layers and stuff, and Photopaint is better for paletted images and natural media work. If anybody prove me wrong on this point I’ll be gladly to go back and have another look at Photoshop, but since Photoshop costs a packet it had better be a good reason.

Are you a mongoose?

Only on Tuesdays.