Creation Kit Crash Course

[phazer11]

So, been down for a while now due to vid card issues, laptop deciding to go up in electrical smoke (the repair shop replaced everything except the fans) then the laptop was reborn from the ashes only to have lung problems and die dripping solder from the mainboard and a partially melted hard-drive cage needless to say I sent it back in. Also been having migraines which render me unable to look at the screen (those aren't unusual though just frustrating on top of everything else).

 

Anyways TL:DR I need a crash course in Creation Kit to save my ass in one of my classes. I've been using computer lab hours to get my work done while I've been fixing my desktop and waiting on my laptop to be either repaired or junked (I do most of my work on the laptop since I can do my work anywhere and it's a pretty powerful little beasty, it's just not enough time (with lab hours) for everything though. Finally got my desktop back into a working state but have a week left and need to deliver an environment for a project. Normally I would do this all in Maya and texture it and such (which is what the professor normally expects). However with the timetable being what it is I couldn't turn in what I have and be satisfied; perfectionist that I am.

 

However I had a bright (maybe) idea for a solution. I explained to my professor about the creation kit and how it was used to make mods and show her some modest examples of what could be done with it and asked for permission to make an attempt to complete the project with the creation kit and failing that turn in what I currently have for whatever I can get for it. I got permission.

 

If you're interested in helping with this mad plan of mine here are the details of what I need to do.

 

The project is to create an environment for two scenes from a fairy tale (I chose a Grimm's Fairy Tale) anyways need to do a flat space environment which can basically be done solely in After Effects and then we need to do a Deep Space environment in a 3D program or somehow convey depth through the image (again pretty much has to be at least somewhat done in something like Maya, etc). In this case I've been allowed to try to make my deep space environment in Creation Kit, film it using the in game camera and edit the footage and do post-processing. Since doing that is virtually no different than importing a premade file from Sketchup Warehouse and doing the camera work in sketchup (which I would totally do if I knew the first thing about the camera system in Sketchup and could find some of the other assets needed.

 

The scene I need to create needs to contain a forest, the character will need to go from the forest and look up into a tower and the camera will then need to go into the tower or give a top down view of say the stairwell from the top, etc. It'll also need to be in a worldspace on it's own or something, preferably if not I'll have to deal.

 

Does anything think this is a reasonable project to do in roughly a week (admittedly not a full week I still have some work to do for my other classes but this is the worst off one). For someone with no previous Creation Kit usage? I thought it might be considering I didn't need to create any custom assets or retexture anything, or make a quest or do anything with scripts, strictly object placement and filming basically

 

 

So, if I haven't scared you off, I'd really appreciate any help you could give me.

[TechAngel85]

Haha! If you've never used the CK before to do these things, I can say you'd probably only get that done in a week if you copied the assets from already completed sources. The worldspace is easy. Designing it from the ground up is a whole different ballgame and doing that in less than a week...you best just copy assets that will work and then delete what isn't needed and make the small changes that would be needed.

[TechAngel85]

You could just pick a location in Skyrim that is already built and change it to what you need it to be. That would probably be the fastest way possible. It would be simple to make a plugin that simply disabled all the NPCs in the area that would interfere with what you're doing and then start changing the design to fit your needs. Doing this, most of the design work is already done. I say this would be faster, because if you create a new worldspace and simply copy everything, your landspace will basically be a vast openness that you'll have to build mountains around so that it's "closed off". At least will choosing a location already built, you can skip all that workload. Landscaping can be quite time consuming (especially for a perfectionist).

[phazer11]

Well I mean with the CK the assets are already there right? I just need to pick the types of trees and such. I'm quick on the uptake I'd like to at least try creating it by hand first that way when I show it no one will recognize it and cry wolf. Not worried about it needing to be "closed off" either really camera work should enable me to do what I need without you seeing what I don't want seen. At the very least I would need to edit an existing location, is there a way to change tree and grass type easily? Most of the areas I can think of off the top of my head don't have towers nearby or they have Nordic Towers nearby like Nilheim (whereas a guard tower like the Whiterun watchtowers are preferable) but not enough tree cover.

[TechAngel85]

Trees, shrubs, and specific flora have to be placed by hand. Landscape is simply painted on so you can set your brush radius to 10 and paint an entire cell in two seconds. The structures are usually in multiple pieces and have to be put together. You have to align them perfectly or you get issues like gaps and texture fighting. Doing this by hand will take a day to a few days depending on how detailed you want to be.

[phazer11]

Figured as much. Well should get started then, how would you recommend going about it, I think I have the kit setup properly in MO selected the vanilla ems. How do I go about the worldspace just tell it to make a new one?

[TechAngel85]

Basically. I'm at work so I can't say exactly, but you go into the worldspace menu, right in the list and click new. The CK wiki is your best friend right now.

[phazer11]

I have a worldspace but can't seem do anything but edit landscape, can't change terrain type weird. course it doesn't help that it keeps crashing

[TechAngel85]

Choose the terrain you want and right-click and hold to "paint" the landscape.

It is a buggy best, but I've only had it crash on me a couple times.

[MonoAccipiter]

In the GECK it's right MB to change the terrain type (texture) and left MB to edit the landscape height. Don't know if it's the same in the CK, but I want to help. 

 

Also, since you're working with a camera, you don't need to make the full building/mountain/whatever, just make the side you'll be seeing. Plenty of buildings in FNV are set up like this (in particular in the Strip where most buildings have huge gaps in the back which you can't see without being in the editor or using "tcl").

 

EDIT: Ninjaed. 

Edited April 21, 2016 by MonoAccipiter

[phazer11]

Ah will try the right mousebutton again then, read it soemwhere didn't seem to do anything. Anyone know what the pieces of say the Whiterun Western Watchtower or similar are? Having no luck finding them. I've just about constructed the forest minus terrain texture.

[TechAngel85]

They are:

 

ImpExtIceTowerShellStairs03_NoIce (top)

ImpExtTowerShellStairs01 (middle)

ImpExtTowerShellBase01 (bottom)

 

In this case type in this for the search:

 

ImpExt*TowerShell* 

 

For future reference if you know a location you want to copy from or just want to see what objects they used, then you can google the location and go to it's UESP page. The UESP is another new friend for the CK users. They list the "Console Location Codes" for all the Skyrim locations. Then, if it's an exterior location like Whiterun Western Watchtower is, you can go to the Tamriel worldspace in your Cell View window. Click in the Editor ID box and start typing out the name of the location. In this case it was WhiterunWatchtowerExterior. Doing this will take you to that location in the Editor ID box. You can then double click the location to bring up that cell. From there you can double click any object to get information you need to find your pieces.

 

EDIT:

Be sure your clicking the "Set" button in the Landscape Editor window after making any changes to the landscape settings. This applies or "sets" the changed settings. It isn't necessary to do it for all setting changes, but it is for some. It's just a good habit to get into clicking it every time.

[Guest]

So you decide to use the most painfully outdated and buggy editor in the games industry? Go and get UE4 and make an apartment. There are so many tutorials it is insane. You could probably get the framework done in a few hours and the scaling tools are top notch in terms of allowing you to reuse assets for different purposes. I have not tried UE4 yet personally, but UE has always been very easy to use, and has lots of tutorial asset packages you can utilise.

Edited April 22, 2016 by Guest

[phazer11]

Well at this point sparrow... but yeah if I'd thought of it.... maybe

Anyways, anyone explain to me how to bring in pieces of other mods? I'm currently trying to bring in the flags from this mod as I've made the tower and forest and now need the red flags from this mod. Anyway with both loaded I can place the flag in my new worldspace but it obviously doesn't stay after I save.

[TechAngel85]

Copy the assets (meshes and textures...being sure they're loose files) into your mod's folder and be sure it's active, open the CK and set your mod as the Active plugin. Then you should be able to pull them up from the object menu.

 

The way you are trying to do it will only work if you set the other mod as a master to your plugin and it's not desirable to work with a plugin file being a master to another plugin. That's what I have to do with Jaggarsfeld and it's just plain annoying. Since this is just a school project, permissions should be an issue.