Anyone who has worked with Custom models, be they imported from a GMod GMA file, downloaded from mods.tf, pulled from some other source or created from scratch, have run into this problem at one point. The model is invisible and shows bones only when bones are selected in in the Motion or Graph Editors.

The usual cause for this is that the model is either in the wrong folders, is not named properly or both.

There is an easy way to find out exactly what is wrong with the model and this can be done usng SFM itself.

This is the Default Layout setting for SFM. Most new to the program don't know that the screens are configurable and that in it's default state is a real pain to work with. So, I'll show you how you can make life a little easier on yourself by setting up a new workspace.


First, If you cannot see a tab that says Console, you need to make it visible...

The Console window is vital for troubleshooting..

Click Windows, then Console to open it.

Now that you can see the Console Tab, either behind the Primary View Port or as a stand alone window, we can drag the Tab and place it where ever there is a white square while dragging it. ( I prefer Mine to be on the right and visible all the time.)


You could stop here , but I will show you how I like to have my SFM environment set up.



So this particular Layout gives me all the crutial screens I need to work with in a resizable enironment. Just remember to go into the Windows - Layout menu options and save your layout as one of the available User Layouts so you don't have to reset it everytime you start SFM.

If you have ALREADY spawned the model into SFM, you're going to have to Close SFM before going further. Save your session, and quit SFM.
The reason for the restart is, once a model is loaded into SFM and the error reported, the model and the error is cached into the SFM Cache file and will not be reported again unless SFM is restarted and the Model Cache is emptied. All you'll get as an error is, "Failed to Load Model" if you try to load it again without the restart.

Now,
1) Restart SFM
2) Create a Session, but DON'T load a map
(if you load a map, it will clutter the Console window with errors and other data and may make finding the cause of the problem hard to find. We want to keep the Console as clean as possible.)

Note: Some ppl like to Clear the Console before moving on to the next step to get rid of any clutter that is there from the session start. You can do this by typing CLEAR in the Console command line.

3) Right Click the Animation Set Editor
4) Select Create Animation Set For New Model
5) When the Model Browser opens, start typing the name of the model into the Search Filter


6) If the model isn't already selected, select it in the browser but don't spawn it.
7) Click Cancel in the browser and look immediately at the Console Window for Errors, they should be red. If the window is too small, resize it.
8) The errors being looked for are Errors about your model that say something like
MdlCache: Failed to load .VVD data for {path\filename}.VVD
or
MdlCache: Cannot Find .MDL for {path\filename}.mdl
Like this


This is telling you EXACTLY what is wrong.

Copy and paste the error into a Text Editing program because you have to close SFM to fix the error.

In my case, it is telling me that SFM can not find the data it requires for the model. Here's the trouble shooting step and how to determine what is wrong.

Once the cause is found it's just a matter of correcting it.

In my case, I go to the model folder the model is currently located in Move or rename the folder to where or what it needs to be, drill into the folder and change the 3 model files required by SFM (the .VVD, .MDL and the .DX90.VTX) names to what they need to be. If you have a .PHY, .SW.VTX and/or a DX80.VTX file in the folder, they should be deleted. They are not required by SFM. If you want to keep them, they need to be renamed to the proper name as well.

In my case, I just had to rename the FreddyK1 folder to FreddyK (it already existed in the ptejack folder), then rename the 3 model files from FreddyKugger to FreddyK.


Once fixed, the should be visible in both the Model Browser and in SFM.

If the model still is invisible or you don't see the errors mentioned here then you've missed them and they may buried in a lot of other stuff in the console.

To see just what the errors actually are follow this process.

1. Close and restart SFM, create a session but don't load a map.
2. Type Clear in the Console window.
3. Right Click the animationset Editor and Create a new model
4. When the File Browser opens, begin typing the name of the problem model into the search box
5. When the model appears, select it, but don't spawn it
6. Close the model browser without touching any other model and look at the console
7. You should see the can't load or find .VVD or .MDL errors you missed.
8. Use the guide to determine where the .VVD, .DX90.VTX and the .MDL belong.


Here is the Fixed model. It is now visible, but has texture problems. That's something I'll cover in my Broken Textures Guide.

https://gtm.you1.cn/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1226795892