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Error Fixing Tutorial - {NcS}~Rm (Ryan Mauldin) - visit us at www.clan-necrosis.com - Error checking is one of the harder parts of getting a map to compile correctly. If you don't know how to fix the errors in 3ds, you will never be able to play on your map. Errors in tool compilation are the barrier between 3ds MAX and (Guerilla and Sapien). This is a 3 part series split up for length of the videos. All together the videos are about an hour long... which is around the most time you should spend fixing modeling errors in any map for Halo CE. Maps with over 300 errors generally mean you are modeling incorrectly and should develop a different style of creating your maps. I've seen over 2000+ errors on a map before and just trashed the map. However, even these kinds of maps can still be salvaged. It takes around 1 hour of debug/error checking to fix maybe 120 or so errors. So choose your time wisely. I hope watching this tutorial enables you to get more maps out that wouldn't before... because of errors. Many of the cool things we do in maps don't make it because of errors, however I have developed a method or style of looking for them that I show you in this tutorial that never fail me. Let's just say I have spent probably more time debugging and error correcting in maps than I have actually making them. In this process I have learned correct modeling skills and hope you will too. Also look for my other video on Optimizing... It will help you "get" target welding, selection welding, and what optimizing actually is if you don't know.

The model used in this video was made by {NcS}~Fu ... Clayton. We were playing on that map the same night I finished the tutorials. It's cool and comming out soon. It will have a different name as well.... lol. Also I made several mistakes in the tutorial I hope you laugh as well... I did when I went back and watched it. I am also sorry about saying um too much... It is hard to think on the fly and talk and explain what is going on or what I am looking for at every waking moment throughout the video, and the last thing I have time for is correct grammer. The video is realistic in that I never looked at the errors we fixed together before hand. So bear with the um's. lol.

Things to watch for and error correction techniques.
1.) Open Edges... - One big triangle touching many smaller triangles (by edge not by corners).

2.) CANT SEEM TO FIND THE ERROR - Hide surrounding faces and either look for...
a:) backfacing triangles (1 or two triangles drawn with the normals
facing outward instead of inward towards the board (just delete them)).
b:) uncheck ignore backfacing and select "thin air" near the problem
areas. You will sometimes grab a transparent line which 3ds treats as
a triangle or face. Watch for these they are common and 3ds doesn't
even show verts for them. The first time I found one I questioned it's
existence. Now If I can't figure out what is wrong with the area it is
the first thing I check for. They drove me crazy now I'm just used to
them and straight out delete them. (Hours of time here not knowing...)

3.) Look for overlapping triangles... They will show up glitchy looking and flashy in 3ds. They flicker and you can find them easiest by selecting one of the faces and looking for the other faces appearence through the face you have selected. If this happens delete one of the faces, and either draw a new face correctly in its place (counter-clockwise) or vertex weld to close the gap. (It may be fine to leave it alone if there are no open-edges.)

4.) When dealing with open-edges... Vertex weld to optimise if possible and avoid creating new faces. If optimization can't be done. Select the largest face on the problem edge, delete it and redraw smaller triangles in its place.

5.) (Not shown in this tutorial) - A single triangle can have at most 3 triangles touching at "EDGES". Not talking about "BY VERTICE"... we can have many triangles touching this way sense they usually lie on the same plane. However If you find that you have more than two planes intersecting at an edge or connected at a single edge, it is more than likely an error and Halo can't process the collision geometry for those during runtime (in-game).

6.) ladders and special material groups do not apply to the sealed world rules (water, fog, etc.) so error correction with these is usually done by fixing the texture, not the model.

P.S. Dont be afraid to optimize... you usually fix errors in the process... watch my tutorial on optimizing as well.

Hope you enojoy my tutorial.
Thanks for watching,
{NcS}~Rm

Videos in this 3 part series...
NcS_Rm_ERROR_FIXING_1of3.wmv
NcS_Rm_ERROR_FIXING_2of3.wmv
NcS_Rm_ERROR_FIXING_3of3.wmv