as base for this tutorial i take firewolfs amazonian battleship
1. create a sur model based on convex objects (boxes, cylinders, spheres)
the object does not have to fit the original ship 100% ... make it as simple as possible... it does not matter if the shapes do not fit 100% since in case of fighters the ships are too small to notice a difference between sur and cmp
also make sure that the objects dont get regrouped in ms3d
dont use materials
if you create concave objects the sur wont work
2. rename all groups (Group01, Group02, Group03, ...) -> I actually do this for a better reference
3. select all groups
4. use "weld together"
5. export the model as .3ds
6. open the .3ds model in lithunrap
7. "optimize the model" -> under tools (full optimization)
8. save it back to .3ds
9. open a "new" ms3d file
10. import the .3ds (now you will notice that the model is displayed black -> depends on your ms3d version)
(the steps with the unweld and the 3ds are needed in order to remove all unneccessary info from the sur model (such as texture information or double vertices) since the sur has to be 100% clean before it can get exportet
11. not its time to export the sur (i used the sur exporter 1.1 for this example but 1.2 should also work)
make sure you export with size 1 (and if i remember right make sure it has a shield bubble -> i dont have ms3d installed atm but i remember that this is important)
in this pic you can see which settings ive used:
12. now you can view the sur in hardcmp (press S) and can check if it really fits to your ship including the shield bubble
13. the ship has now a sur but ingame it wont work yet
open flmodeltool , open the cmp and open the sur
14. now resize the sur matching the size of the cmp (do that 2 times -> in some cases the resize does not work with the 1st try)
ATTENTION: when you resize it then select "scenery"
(this step does not only resize the sur, it does also rename vmesh groups and that is required to make the sur work)
15. save the sur and play - coz now it is working
