[TUTORIAL] Model Ripping Guide For Beginners (.BRRES Format) [Updated: 8/5/2012]

[Garamonde]

Noesis is the easiest and most effective way I have found to export the models. It's true that you can export to .OBJ in BRRES Viewer, but it's much, much preferred if you have a .DAE of the models as well seeing how BRRES format models have all their rigging by default.

Also, really? That's weird... I will update the guide detailing that then. Thanks for the heads up.

EDIT: Updated the main guide quote with an important note in bold.

[Garamonde]

Updated the quote yet again, this time adding a link to John2k4's icon and preview making tutorial.

[Garamonde]

Updated the Brawl link so it leads to the new project instead of my thread.

[Garamonde]

Updated again with a link to thegameexplorer's tutorial on fixing .MTL's for Blender users, and added that the latest version of BRRES Viewer can export perfect .OBJs. Also removed the link to the old version of BRRES Viewer.

[poe]

Can you do this on mac? I use windows to do it.

[Garamonde]

You should be able to. All the programs I listed should work for any type of computer.

(However I know that you already posted your Peppy model, so it's probably a bit late to reply now )

[Garamonde]

Added a few bits of info to the guide. Specifically in this paragraph:

Now after you save that, you're done aside from making the preview and icon. You can find the preview image here. In BRRES Viewer, go to Model, and uncheck Axes (or hit F3) to remove those colored lines, and center the model if you haven't already (you can turn the model around with your mouse, and zoom in and out with the mouse wheel too). Also under Model is an option called "Color". If you uncheck this, the model will become brighter (this does not apply to all models, but it works for Brawl models. Try disabling it if the model looks significantly darker than it should). Now take a print screen of the model at an angle you like and insert it in the preview image (making sure it fits in decently enough, it's okay if a little bit of it is cut off). Icon Maker V3 also isn't much different from V1, you can just pick between sprite, model and texture icons.

[Bastien]

thanks again for keeping this guide updated.
Could you add some info about animations, or it's out of the scope of the section/forum?

BRRES viewer exports PSKs and PSA nicely, but I can't find a way for Noesis to recognize the psk and psa together, e.g. if you double click the PSA, it shows the bones and the animation, but not with the corresponding
model, I don't know to export them all together, model+bones+animation (in .DAE for example)

[Garamonde]

Do you mean, if the model has its animation files and all in one? Unfortunately I don't know how to do that, sorry...

[Bastien]

No problem, I guess Noesis only accepts animations loaded in one file, like "MD2" as shown in this video
I didn't find much info about animation in xentax forums.

For people interesting in exporting models+rig+animations from BRRES viewer into another 3d application that is not UDK, there are PSK/PSA importers, like this one only for 3ds max.

Unfortunately the current PSK/PSA importer for Blender 2.6 doesn't seem to work very well (e.g, no weight for bones), but I found one old script for 2.49 that works great. Once the .blend file is saved it can actually be opened in 2.6 and above. Then exported into FBX,Collada,3ds,etc, which are the stable exporters of blender.
Cheers

Ps: which is the last version of BRRES viewer you say includes the .mtl when using "export all files,obj" ?
I had 1.3.1,Jan2011 but I see the MF link has that version too, still not exporting the .mtl file but maybe it's only an issue for Resident Evil DC models, because those are the only I tried.

[Garamonde]

I removed the link to the old version, so the only link you see there is the latest version that can export .OBJs. BRRES Viewer does not export .MTLs, but Peardian told me to re-export all my models from BV, that they would be fine that way because I had done all of mine with Noesis, therefore making every .OBJ in all my couple hundred submissions worthless. I don't think he has seen what people have been saying about it lately though. I want to ask him more about it, but he has not been on today. Last I talked to him about it yesterday or day before I think he was trying to say that BV's .OBJs don't come with .MTLs yet they work fine anyway.

[TGE]

What is BV?

[JETTERS EDIT: It's an abbreviation for BRRES Viewer.]

I removed the link to the old version, so the only link you see there is the latest version that can export .OBJs. BRRES Viewer does not export .MTLs, but Peardian told me to re-export all my models from BV, that they would be fine that way because I had done all of mine with Noesis, therefore making every .OBJ in all my couple hundred submissions worthless. I don't think he has seen what people have been saying about it lately though. I want to ask him more about it, but he has not been on today. Last I talked to him about it yesterday or day before I think he was trying to say that BV's .OBJs don't come with .MTLs yet they work fine anyway.

[Garamonde]

Made some edits and changes throughout the main guide, and removed the quote because I've edited it too much from the original post and it's become kinda silly to have there now.

Also as a note to those who may have missed the important note in bold: BRRES Viewer does in fact create .MTLs with the .OBJs it exports. Instead of using the "Export All Files" function, you have to instead export the models individually, as my guide explains. I had just discovered that I was getting .MTLs from individual exports. This should solve the problems you guys are having.

[Garamonde]

Updated the guide again to include something that I really should have the first time, in this paragraph:

Start off by opening BRRES Viewer and browse for the model you want and open it. Now you should see this tall window on the left, listing the model(s), textures, palettes, animations and etc.. This is called the file tree, and will be referred to as such from now on. You can press the enter key to center the model so it won't be on top, or use shift to move it back to its initial position. But for now you want to go to File > Export All Files. You will see a small window appear. Click the Textures dropdown and select PNG (you can also right-click on each texture individually and select Export (then choose the directory you want them to go) to make sure you get them all, but this is tedious). Leave the Models dropdown as it is, as you want to export all your models in .PSK format. You should click the Animations dropdown and select "(do not export)" if you don't want to include animations in your submission (you can include them if you want but most people don't and it isn't required). Very important: Make sure you check the "Create one folder for each brres file" box when exporting multiple files so that the files will not conflict and get mixed up with eachother. Now you have to go into the folder that had the BRRES file of the model you just exported. There will be a new folder named "exported". You can pull that out and put it somewhere else.

Specifically the part about exporting textures individually and the vital bit about the "Create one folder for each brres file" check box.

[Dazz]

Batch convert with BRRES Viewer

-Batch convert with BRRES Viewer-

Following Mighty Jetters tutorial written above, you can actually convert several models all at the same time, which will make submitting a full game's contents a whole lot easier.

First, in BRRES Viewer, open all the files you want to convert. You can select multiple from the open command, so open a whole bunch by select them all and hitting open - NOT ONE AT A TIME THAT WOULD TAKE YEARS.


Then select File > Export All Files...


A little window should pop up with a bunch of drop downs. Depending on how you plan to do everything, you can select various options. This screenshot shows the way I opt to do things, as it makes mass converting a lot easier...


Hit OK, and leave the window - it might not work if you're loading absolutely thousands of models, so maybe do this is a few times in batches of whatever works best for your computer.
The windows should appear to do things - just leave it. The bar at the top of the window will read "[Writing...]" until it is complete, at which point it will disappear.
Your converted files will all appear in a folder called "exported" in the same folder as the brres files.


Now the only problem is that all of your files are in the same folder - which is a bastard. Mainly when the textures are named randomly compared to the model's filenames. But if you select to give each brres file its own folder on that pop up window, that wouldn't happen...
There is a reason to have them all in the same folder though, if you want to batch process using Noesis.

Batch convert with Noesis

-Batch convert with Noesis-

Now open up Noesis, and check out your folder!
Make sure everything is working alright, by double clicking a couple models just to see they display correctly. You never know.


Now go to Tools > Batch Process


And now a window like this should pop up!


You can enter the files that you want the application to pick up, and what you want it to dump them out as. Luckily, because you chose to export the previous textures as .png, this will do the same thing.
Then you have to enter "-flipuv" in the additional parameters, AND DELETE WHAT IS ALREADY IN THERE, in order for the textures to appear correctly.
Select "folder batch" and then select the folder of .psk files!
Hit ok, and it should look something like this:


Click OK, and it'll start to process the conversion. Once it says that conversion is complete, you can then change the obj output extention to anything else, so now do "smd" (You also have to reselect the folder with the folder batch button, or it will just convert to obj again) and hit OK, wait for that to finish, and then "dae" (and once again, select the folder again) and OK.
Once you're all done converting, you can click cancel to now get rid of that window.

And there you go, you now have a folder filled with everything converted...

Batch Edit .dae Files

-Batch Edit .dae Files-

Now you have to edit all of the .dae files, so that the textures will load properly!
This is super fun to do, so trust me - open up Notepad++, and drag alllll of the .dae files into it. (If you sort the window by type, it makes it much easier to select all the .dae files)


Select Search > Find in All Files (CTRL+H)


Now a window like this will pop up


You want to find all the giberish you want to have removed from those texture lines (read MJ's tutorial for more explaination) - copy paste this part from the texture path in the document.
And since you want it replaced with nothing at all, you just leave "Replace with:" blank. Then hit "Replace all in all opened documents"

It should then say that it has replaced a tonne of occurances!


Now it's not over - you need to add .png on the end. For this, it's a lot more effort, because you need to do this slowly. Basically, put this into your replace window:


And hit "find next" - then replace. Do this for all the entries of textures, and STOP AS SOON AS THAT IS DONE. The text will jump a lot when you're done - and it should highlight the </init_from> after "Image" - this is your stop marker.
Save, and close that .dae - and that is finished! Continue this process for the rest...
This is the boring bit - but it's the final step! Once all of those are done, you're done! Loads of fully working .dae files

Now stick everything into the right folders (effort) and zip them up, and submit them!