We have over 4,000 quakeworld maps going back to 1996 and our aim is to go through
each map and generate screen shots for uploading to the maps.quakeworld.nu site.
In order to achieve this we need the help of the QW community and to do this
we have set up this site where you can help get involved.

You can see some examples added already at http://maps.quakeworld.nu/.

HOW IT WORKS:
step 1: You download a map pack of 5 or more maps and take screenshots. (this process is streamlined and very effective with our package)
step 2: You ZIP and upload the screenshots.
step 3: Server extracts and moves those screenshots to a "processed" folder, together with corresponding .bsp and .txt (readme's).
step 4: maps site will scan this folder on an hourly basis and add maps/readmes/screenshots to our database.
It will also automaticaly make galleries of the sshots you uploaded in different resolutions as well as a wireframe gallery.
step 5: Once a map has been added to the database we can now tag it using the administrator panel.
A map needs a "map author", "gametype", "game mode" and possible map group.
result: When a map has been tagged it is fully visible to anyone who wishes to browse our site.

The manual labour involved only pertains to step 1 2 and 5. So basically we fly around taking some nice screenshots
and in the other end we tag the maps with the appropriate info.

I'm looking for people that would be interested in this project that I can trust to do the work proper.
For now we only need people to create the initial data of screenshots. You can take as little as 5 maps and be gone,
or as many as a couple of thoussands if you are feeling frisky. But anywhere inbetween is fine

If you are interested check out http://maps.quakeworld.nu/stuff/guide/maps-guide.txt for more info.
But before you start downloading please drop me a line on IRC #slackers - ]SR[ParadokS to get access.
For obvious reasons we cannot let this project be "open" so anyone can upload random sshots.

Thanks in advance
ParadokS


People already contributing today:
ParadokS
Zalon
pleuraXeraphim
foogs
swiNgah
!phil
phrenic
Rikoll
megalodon

c'mon ppl, man up and help out for the greater cause. If I had no job and nothing much to do at days I'd do this dir. Time's sooo precious.

And many thanks to Spirit for the collection of files.

Why don't you have people use the original textures? You will end up with a (ugly, but that is a matter of personal taste) mess if you do it like this.

edit: And yay for this project finally being worked on again!

We don't use original textures because the retexture project is MUCH nicer? And they are a faithful reproduction of the original textures anyway. So I can't see how it could ever be more ugly than the old grainy and muddy textures.

I'm aware that some map makers have made their own textures that is not as high quality as as the retexture ones. Don't know how big the ratio is but a guess is like 90%+ textures of all the maps are original/retexture.

And yeah, thanks to Spirit and Deurk for letting us use their extensive maps archive.
And thanks to myself for having to extract and sort over 3000 ORIGINAL zip files from spirit's archive. Most dating back 10 years using readme files like !!!!READ!!!!.bat or maps located in /WINBLOWS/profiles/blah/Desktop/Games/Quake/stuff/new/*.bsp, it was a real treat!

A bit of topic in a way maybe, but: wouldn't it be better (if possible) to record the position/angles/FOV of locations people find interesting for screenshots instead of the actual screenshots themselves? That would make the effort more future proof against higher resolution requirements, new/different textures and new render options. ultimately, you could even let a server generate the screenshots on request, taking into account a number of user settings. Or figure out a way to have a quake plugin to make the screenshots at the client side, given that the map file download time is quite negligible nowadays (and quite likely even smaller then a few high resolution screenshots anyway).
If possible, of course

Yeah we kind of thought of that, with the tech available today.
For maps with 24bit texture sets we have to create a demo, so that the new galleries on same map have same angle shots.
For any other map we didn't think it was neccessary at this time. We simply have too big of a volume to create points for all maps.
And I don't think you need higher resolutions than 1024*768 for simply displaying the map in a few snapshots like we do.

However, that said. We do have automated wireframe screenshots that a tool is generating. It's possible we would like to have some ingame overview screenshot as well. By then it might be possible to simply browse the map in a browser, with a GL engine thingie. I've seen it done already for regular models, so who knows.

So far 129 maps done and we are starting to roll faster day by day, so join the fun!
You are missing out on some GREAT maps

That is definitely possible, and I was working on BSP support too. Unfortunately *no* browser in stable release supports the tech required for it to work out of the box, so I'm not really in a hurry to finish it. Then there is the whole legality issue, since you're basically distributing the map by doing this.

what about a little maps.quakeworld.nu button on the Quakeworld bar?

How does the server choose the points into which the final scoreboard camera is placed? Maybe those points could be used for that automated thing?
Anyway, I think you should keep it simple and rather invest the time into making sure the content does not get lost (again).

Yeah, please make the content available under a free license. Maybe even some dumps? Would be great!

Here's a script that will record a very small demo file which can be uploaded to the site for future updates.

bind x +rcd

// Texture Recording Script //
alias +rcd "record $mapname"
alias -rcd "stop"
// Texture Recording Script //

find a view you like in the map, hit x.

Upload this demo to the web site, have the option for users to download it and submit "updated" screenshots.
User downloads demo.
open ezquake.
type cl_demospeed 0
load demo
screenshot
close ezquake, upload screenshot

If you want to decide between a few different views:

bind x +rcd

// Texture Recording Script //
alias +rcd "record $mapname-$ssnum"
alias -rcd "stop;set ssnum 0"
// Texture Recording Script //

load map, go to a view you like and type
set ssnum 1
hit x
go to a second view you like, type
set ssnum 2, hit x, etc..

I could make this script a lot more complex, but I have to get back to work
Cheers.

Edit: I can think of ways to even have shortcuts to ezquake where loading this demo, ezquake will automatically do all this (double clicking demo = ezquake opens, loads demo, takes ss, closes). You can even probably do this automatically for a folder of demos to get more consistent looking screenshots.

Yeah, the one who takes the demo can say in chat something like "screenshot" when it's in the position for screenshot, then when playing the demo from the script you exec a config that sets up a msg_trigger taking screenshots automatically from the demo.

As I mentioned earlier, we are only doing demos for maps that will have 24bit texture sets which is what.. 1% of all maps?
Other maps don't need either updated screenshots or anything else.. except of course if they get a 24bit texture set added, in which case we will make a demo for that one

I guess we could have implemented a script to also record demos while taking these screenshots, but didn't think of that. And don't think it's really necessary.

And we have daily backups of the site + databases so we should not run into same problems as last time. At the moment our job is solely to get this very big amount of data added and processed so that we might be able to use it for other projects later.

Taking sshots is only half the job.. of phase 1
Getting the maps tagged proper is an even bigger job, and require the help of even more people that are interested in this kind of thing. I expect we won't be done before a couple of months from now.. but it's fine, it's worth it!

Hmm I was thinking more like an out-of-map overview screenshot, to assess the map layout. Kind of like wireframe, but with graphics.

are we going to use the texture-set feature that maps.qw.nu used to have? because if we do we definitely need a system with stored viewpoints or the screens won't match up for different sets. i like the ideas so far, i guess we just have to agree on a way to get matching shots from the maps.

also i was thinking that it might be a bad idea to use qrp-textures for maps that use a lot of custom textures, especially tf and ctf maps. it might be a good idea to go with the standard textures for these maps to avoid making them look messy. not sure about that.

already answered. I have already made demos (fixed viewpoints) for the maps we currently have known 24bit sets for. This will be a base of our collection and as more 24bit sets eventually will be discovered, we will create demos for those maps also. But since this is so small fraction of the entire map collection we won't bother making demos for 4000 maps when in reality it might not be needed for more than 30.

Para, I have about 2,800+ maps in my id1\maps folder. This probably includes many maps you already have, and many of the maps are TF maps. I don't have any zip/readmes of them - do you want them anyway?

On a side note, anyone miss jumping in a qw server and playing some FFA with people having custom skins? I thought that was really fun. I have about 1,600+ qw skins if anyone is willing to host them somewhere. Some of them are pretty damn clever, others are hilarious. Some are XXX.

ye i would like it. we are gonna finish this batch first, then i'll run your collection through and leave out any duplicates. Find me on IRC for uploading info.

And for those who are hesitant to join because you think "well what's the point of making sshots of these maps?" think of it as a bigger project. The sshots is only 1 part of it. Maps have to be categorized and tagged as well, so you can really better explore the archive.
The gametypes, authors etc. Don't be shy, it doesn't matter if u do 50 maps or 300.. any help is appreciated, and who knows you might like it

Every marathon starts with 1 step and we have already taken 3000 of them! (sshots, not maps . So join the fun of preserving one of the largest pieces of QW history!

Here are some skins hosted as well:

http://www.quaketerminus.com/tools/250Quake1Skins.zip

I used 'Voltron' in fodquake

Nice. Someone should host these =( They a gem from QW's past

Perhaps there are more helpful ppl at func_msgboard? Although they mostly are insterested in SP maps...

Yeah megalodon, currently we are only focusing the effort on multiplayer maps. We are collecting singleplayer maps, but won't start adding those until later, also Spirit got quite a nice SP map archive already.

Things are moving ahead tho, we have about 6 active contributors, and then a couple who havn't really gotten started yet. Currently 22% of the 4000 MP maps now have screenshots. When that stage is completed, we will start adding and tagging the maps.

It's quite easy to do, so everyone can contribute... Just slap ParadokS on IRC or msg him here.

Hey man, I'm already on the team! I already was.

I know, It was just because that the posts here made it sound like nobody was helping out, just wanted to encourage others to participate

Well, when I look at the statistic page, there could still be a whole lot more ppl helping out. It's still just a handful of volunteers.

Well....they ARE hosted. Check that url and you'll see where I got them...

I just submitted my first screenshot pack and I would like to encourage everyone to try it out. You can download really small packs of just 10 maps. It is a real fun thing to do and nice to see all those different maps people did ages ago. After seeing the same few maps over years in your gameplay enhancing setting with fullbright items, flat walls and stuff, it is a cool reminder what kind of atmosphere QW had in the beginning before all of those became normal. Just try it out. 10 maps wont take long and if you dont like it, you will not have lost a lot of time, but will have contributed a small part of the project. But chances are good that you download another pack.

What happened to this project? I remember we took screenshots from all maps and there was some temporary site online.