Normal Mapping Help

theStoff

Hello,
I am trying to practice my normal mapping by using zbrush to add detail then importing to maya so I created a simple character but my final work went horribly wrong. My character came out of it looking like it was stitched together. Also, when I import my obj file from zbrush to maya, the model was broken into parts even though it was a single piece when I worked on it in zbrush. I included images of my model below. If anyone knows what the problem is please let me know.

hijak

you gotta scroll to the bottom, of the tool sub menu, all the way the at bottom it should say export, open that up and turn off GRP. If group on it will export your obj as a ton of little subgroups and its just a huge mess.

and di you bake the normal map in maya or in zbrush.
also its hard to tell what those errors are, it almost looks as if there is not uvs or some really messed up uvs, cause all i really see is a model not really any normal map detail.
some more info will help.

theStoff

Alright, so I still have to try the GRP option in zbrush. I found the root of my problem though. The problem was with my UV map and the sizing. I forgot to resize it to fit in the top right section of the grid. I included an image of what I had below. (Also, I was baking within maya and not zbrush). I still have to see if this is the whole problem. I'll post with the new result. Thanks for the help hijak.

theStoff

OK, so I got the mapping working a bit better now but there are still problems. When I view my model within maya the map looks alright but when I render it there are wrinkles all over the model. If anyone knows what is wrong please let me know.

viewed in maya:


rendered:

PredatorGSR

You need to render with Mental Ray instead of the software renderer. Make sure that the shader node is set to use tangent space normals instead of using it as a bump map, it'll render as a bump map by default unless you switch it to use normal mapping.

hijak

you should read up on the normal wiki. But you cant render nrm maps in maya software render you have to use either the hardware render, viewport, or mental ray. Maya software will treat it like a bump map and just do crazy things.

theStoff

Rendering with mental ray worked excellently! Thanks! Just out of curiosity where can I learn about the shader node? Also, how do I change tangent space to normals?

On a side note I am having another issue with maya. When i try to use transfer maps it won't let me change the size of the envelope after changing it once or making it visible. Does any one why that would be?

Eric Chadwick

Let me google that for you