Noobness revealing itself with baking

Chase

Recently I've had the same result with baking which is just blaaaah. The resolution looks weak on the normal map when applied and on the sheet itself. I've only gotten into baking as of recent and thought I learned all the necessary rules. Apparently not :poly136: For anyone that doesn't know, instead of explode baking I baked using the match material id option.

I don't know what these black markings are.




I think I know why this one's happening. It's cause I mirrored the chair, but not the shell so if I mirror the shell with the rest of the chair that should fix it.


The cage is so big because it's as far as I had to go to get the ray misses to go away. No idea what to do to have a closer cage at this point.


LP/HP Comparison




I was given the advice to maybe use an exploded bake instead to see if that will work. I'll give that a try too, but the weird thing is I was baking a hp horse to a lp and had the same issue in terms of resolution initially, but then it went away. Then it came back again and I didn't change any settings either way.

AlecMoody

Do you have "Use Cage" checked in the render to texture settings? There is zero reason to explode the mesh for this bake. Also, enable global super sampling. Lastly, it looks like your highpoly floating details barely have enough edge width to show up in the normal map. You can't bake details smaller than your texels will be.


If you want more help, post pictures of your highpoly geo, your UVs, and your render to texture settings.

Eric Chadwick

Also make sure the UVs are not overlapping. Move all overlaps 1 unit outside the UV square, then rebake.
http://wiki.polycount.net/NormalMap#UV_Coordinates

Chase

Alec - I used the matching mat id cause of the cushion seat and padding on the sides of the chair. Should I not do this or are you just meaning I don't need to explode the bake specifically so I'm ok doing the match mat I'd bake? What do you mean by edge width?

Eric - yep don't have any overlapping uvs so good to go there.

I'll post the hp, uvs and my settings when I'm off work.

EarthQuake

The biggest issue is that your many of details are just straight up way, way, way to small to read at the resolution you're baking the map at, and likely at any reasonable distance this object would be viewed at in a game.

Exaggerate those details, beef em up so the baker has something it can actually capture. Dont zoom crazy far in when you're modeling the highpoly, nobody will ever view it like that.

repete

Exaggerate those details

+1

Took me a while to realise this. Detail on a highpoly mesh wont always translate well onto a normal map, you really do need to exaggerate the details sometimes !

ZacD

Yes, you have to remember and keep in mind, you are modeling a highpoly model to be baked onto a low poly object. The highpoly does not need to look good and be accurate, the only think that matters is how well it will bake and it will make the low poly look good. Chunky details and thick edges are good.

Chase

I tried what you guys suggested in terms of the render settings, but nothing seems to have worked. I know the hp details could still use some exaggeration, but the normal map should had least still be coming out better then what it is. You can also really tell the parts that are taking advantage of the normal map are pretty much the sides of the chair so I'm not sure if that's ok that the other components aren't really benefiting from it. This is going to be image heavy....

Here's what the render settings look like as I'm not seeing anything I'm missing.





HP geo and LP uvs




And I'm having similar issues in other simpler bakes. I do have the back of the lp deleted, but the hp is still there. I thought that was the culprit, but it didn't matter if the back faces were there or not.

Eric Chadwick

Render To Texture shows (No Projection Modifier). You need one.

Chase

Yeah I just don't have that on tgis screen shot. I do have it so ignore that haha

Eric Chadwick

The only other thing I can think of, besides what's been mentioned already, is that it looks like supersampling isn't doing its job. You're getting a ton of aliasing, which supersampling should solve.

Can you post a Max file, with just a small subset of the original model? Delete everything but a small corner of both models.

AlecMoody

increase your padding from 2px to 64px and rebake. Also, make your cage close to the actual size. When you expand that far you are going to introduce projection issues. If you have ray miss issues, look at the red areas on your map and address those sections manually.

Chase

So attempt number 999 was increasing the padding, but it seems to have made the bake worse I exported the pieces into a new Max scene where I baked it again, and it looks a tad better. Why would I be having a better bake using a new Max scene?



The biggest issue is the cage and the consistent low res look of the normal map when it's applied to the model. I'm having issues moving the verts of the cage around while needing to maintain a condensed projection. Once I'm able to get the cage sized up better I'll only have the super sampling issue. From far away in my screen cap you can't tell there's a super sample issue and that it's just a projection thing I need to fix.

One thing I can certainly confirm is that using the matching material id method was the way to go.

Here's the whole hp and lp chair cause the Max file was going to take an hour to upload and I didn't know if having chunks would effect the bake.

Dropbox obj

AlecMoody

That's a good question. Have you reset xform on your lowpoly model? Also, is there anything weird in the low poly model's channel info?

Your edges look a lot better. At this point you just need to tweak your cage for ray misses and then make your details bigger so they actually render correctly.

Chase

I'll try reset xform. I always forget about that even though I have the modifier right in front of me ha. Is this a super sample issue or that the HP isn't exaggerated enough?

AlecMoody

looks like you need to either up the map resolution or make the details bigger. Whichever you prefer.

Chase

Not sure if resetting the xform did anything, but baking at a 4096x4096 map definitely did the trick! I assume I can just rescale down to a 512x512 map without any issues. Maybe run the nvidia filter on it but I saw Earthquake said it waant necessary cause you won't see any issues with the downsampling


Is this a cage issue as well?


Even though this is part of a portfolio piece and I know it'd be best if I exaggerated and made my hp details bigger, I think I'll chalk it up to experience for next time. I'll see if I have any further issues now with the horse bake and get back to you if I do. Thank you!

Eric Chadwick

Upping the normal map resolution 16x will fix it temporarily, but as soon as you go down to 512 the aliasing problems will be back. 512x512 is 64 times lower rez than 4096x4096.

If you want to go down to 1024 or 512, you'll need to rethink how you map the asset. You could tile the "s" shapes. Also you'll want to increase the bevel on them, make them stick out more.

A solution for the last problem is in the Technical Talk sticky Understanding averaged normals and ray projection/Who put waviness in my normal map?

Chase

Definitely don't want a 4096 normal map and you're right about rescaling it down. It was worse then the bake was. The tiling thing would work for the 's' shapes, but the fish is also affected whether I rescale the 4096 or just bake at a 512 size. I'm unsure what my options are at this point. I have the same dilemma with other parts of my carousel so it's an epidemic!

ZacD

You'll have to re work the highpoly.

Chase

Zac - I don't know what that that entails exactly.

When I applied a basic diffuse to the model with the normal map you can't really see the low res look. One of my friends said this amount of pixelation is normal and said you won't see it when you apply a diffuse and spec. Looks like he was right! I still have some other areas that are beyond my normal map remedial knowledge though.

It can't be the cage for these weird black lines and splotches because I barely have any ray misses.




On the subject of the cage, is there a way to save the cage so if I end up having to adjust the editable poly I don't lose the cage I just adjusted? Is that what exporting in the projection does? I'm also unable to use the gizmos when I select the cage by face and element. I have to select by face or element and then ctrl/click by vert just to be able to use the gizmos. Any reason?

Eric Chadwick

I think in that sticky thread either EarthQuake or Perna explains why editing the cage is generally a bad idea. It's really worth a read. Also will help you understand what's happening with the wavy dark areas along your curves.

Chase

I read that beforw but ill give it another go. Moving verts around is indeed a pain to have to redo every time. Any suggestions on the black mark errors?

Eric Chadwick

This looks like a viewport rendering error. What is your viewport set to... DirectX or Nitrous? What version of Max are you using? What shader are you using in the viewport to show your normal map?

Chase

Should be DirectX. I don't see Nitrous being an option in the Viewport settings unless that's in another area. I'm using max2012 and 3point lite shader. Someone suggested I try baking in Xnormal and see what happens then too, but then there's the issue with the cage and editing the cage.

How might I get a nice cage projection? Using the push amount in the projection can only get me so far until it's too big of a cage. That's when I need to push by individual verts so I'm not sure how there's another way. For this particular model the cage is usually still below the floor and other random areas like the sides where the fish is. So Do I just bake the parts individually and combine them into one normal map or is there another way to get an easier projection.

Chase

On a side note about using a tiling normal map. The floor of the chair is using a tiling wood normal map while the back rest is using a tiled cushion normal map. Am I correct in saying my only option is to detach the faces that use the tiling normal maps completely from the rest of the model because leaving them welded and applying the tiling normal maps would mess with the uvs? I have to scale the uvs of the faces where the normal map is applied so it would most certainly screw the bake up since those tiling uvs would no longer be in the uv space. I was just hoping to save my vert count by not having to detach the faces from the rest of the mesh.

iniside

It recenly poped up in my youtube watch list:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGszEIT4Kww
Awsome. A guy clearly explain fundamental of baking, worth looking, even if you know fundamentals.

Wendy de Boer

Your sampling settings are very low quality. Try these:

Chase

That video was great. Just reinforced things I knew, but always good to jog the mind. Baking with these settings didn't result in a different bake.

Really needing some cage advice there. With an explosive bake you can adjust the cages of each exploded part separately, but using this multi material id baking method doesn't allow you to adjust the cage easily.

This is the cage, and you can see the three different parts I'm projecting. The cage is really bloated in areas, but to shrink those areas down I'd have to select every part. I can do that by element I guess, but it doesn't help if I have to make changes to the model which forces me to lose the cage and need to redo those manual cage edits.


Any advice on this?

Eric Chadwick

Cage is too big. Make it smaller to avoid the pink-circled problem. Think about it... one side of the crease is grabbing some mesh from the other side, because its cage is overlapping the mesh on the other side of the crease. Decrease the cage length until it doesn't overlap the other side.

Chase

I know, I'm just wondering if there's a way to adjust the cage without having to constantly redo these edits. By edits I mean grabbing individual verts and moving them around. I've already had to do this cage editing procedure with the chair and it was really annoying to get the cage looking good, just to have to edit the mesh, lose the cage, and have to redo these manual cage edits again.

Eric Chadwick

No need to manually tweak verts in this situation. Just reset the cage (button in the Projection modifier) and then adjust the Push value so it looks good.

Chase

That's how I got the cage I have now. Using the push modifier only gets me so far until I have to adjust spots individually. The process of selecting those areas is quite frustrating though. If you look at the yellow model in the image you'll see the cage is way too big, but this was the size I got so that the horse was at a manageable cage size.

Eric Chadwick

Why not bake the green mesh separately? Then it can have its own cage distance. Or use the "exploded bake" method. Sticking with "material ID match" is biting you in the ass here.

joeriv

Push out your cage so it's fine for the largest piece.
Select the smaller pieces in element mode in the proj. modifier.

Ctrl + click on vertex selection (you have to do this because doing push/reset doesn't work in element/poly selection, it does nothing or applies that to everything, so always be in vertex selection).

Press the "reset" button, and give the smaller parts a smaller push.

Shouldn't take longer then 2-3minutes.

repete

One of the best vids I have seen to date on the subject

iniside wrote: »

It recenly poped up in my youtube watch list:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGszEIT4Kww
Awsome. A guy clearly explain fundamental of baking, worth looking, even if you know fundamentals.

Chase

Baking the pieces separately and then combining their individual normal maps into one did the trick. I guess there's certain situations where baking by material ID works, but this was not one of them. I still had to do some separate vert moving too though this might just be unavoidable. After getting most of my bakes done for this carousel I realized I forgot to triangulate everything before the bake *shrug* I've always heard triangulating before you export is a good idea.

Here's a much better bake. The hp accessories I baked still leave a little to be desired when you see them after the bake, but I don't have time to redo them to read better. Any suggestions for next time? I know exaggerating the hp details is the best practice, but any other advice?


I have a "rat's nest" when I exported to my carousel scene. I found an unwelded poly so I don't know if that's what a "rat's nest is".

Nosslak

The only improvements I can think of would be to make the sides of the details on the front of the horses less perpendicular to the to the lowpolys face. It would read a lot better if you did this. Also the mandatory bigger bevels on said front pieces.

The knees on the front legs could have probably used some more polys too as it looks like the normal map is a little wavy there.

Other than that it looks pretty good.

Chase

Yeah, making these accessories was a real pain. I had to model them on top of the horse so any sort of beveling would be a nightmare unlike how I wanted to initially model them. That was to model the pieces and then try bending them to the horse, but that didn't work. I just needed the best of both worlds. Thanks though Nosslak. This was my first complex bake. I'm still not liking the idea of having the cage reset on me after I bake and need to make edits to the mesh. Spending any amount of time on the cage to get a good bake just to have to add edge loops in certain areas to control bad shading or add geo, followed by redoing the cage is frustrating.