3DSmax render setup for pixel art style
polycounter lvl 8
Hi!
I have a question regarding pixel art rendering from 3D models with textures, from 3dsmax.
I am aware that going this route instead of painting everything in 2D compromises quality.
Does anybody know the best way to get a textured model rendered as an approximation of pixel art?
Are there any methods/plugins besides not having any Anti aliasing on the render output? Toon Shader + no AA?.
I've honestly never experimented with this stuff :S
Thanks!
I have a question regarding pixel art rendering from 3D models with textures, from 3dsmax.
I am aware that going this route instead of painting everything in 2D compromises quality.
Does anybody know the best way to get a textured model rendered as an approximation of pixel art?
Are there any methods/plugins besides not having any Anti aliasing on the render output? Toon Shader + no AA?.
I've honestly never experimented with this stuff :S
Thanks!
Replies
For now I've been limited to Scanline + Ink N Paint + no AA + light tracer.
No AA seems to destroy the ink effects, with AA you see black lines, without AA they disappear. Although thats not so bad. But I do want to experiment with MR instead of Scanline as I can have more options.
Here is a very early test, I only had old untextured APC on hand so obviously it looks kinda flat.
Edit: Here's a result with a textured bottle:
The only thing that Mental Ray could offer over scanline is maybe adding a mental ray AO shader to your material? It could help give you more definition of the pieces.
For the most part when you do 3D pixel art you spend a lot of time creating and defining the diffuse material and more or less burning in the lighting so all the pieces read like they should. Applying a flat material to something isn't really going to do all the work that a properly defined, well painted diffuse will.
http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/scripts/pixeled
I doubt it will help much because I think its strictly 2D and not 3D voxel based, but there might be something that converts 3D to voxels which could give you some better results too?
turn off texture filtering in the viewporta and Bob's your uncle basically. the simpler lighting setup will probably work to your advantage.
This is probably the type of thing that is easy to draw from scratch in 2D in the first place, that's what I get for being a pixel art noob I guess. My workflow to get to this point is not that bad, but still kinda stupid.
I'm also just using Standard mats, not really seeing a real advantage from InknPaint
http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=74.msg736603#msg736603
What I figured out in 3dsMax:
Scanline
* no anti alias
* texture filtering
* in 3dsMax global settings > render > disable dithering (causes noise otherwise on your render). Also check: don't anti alias against background just in case.
after that I wrote a AIR script that generates a outline effect around all pixels that don't have transparent values. It also adds a sharpen filter (convolution matrix) to punch out the pixels that are opposing each other in color or contrast.
Test result from a different game (not treated for this style)
With a proper treated texture this looks pretty nice actually
http://www.wayofthepixel.net/pixelation/index.php?PHPSESSID=96bv7qnqs14dn2kq0lhcdmfn23&topic=7291.msg112649#msg112649
Here's a sprite sheet render plugin:
Sprite Render by Geoff Samuel
I use default 3dsmax lighting, orthographic cameras, and (as others have said) no antialiasing.
If your object or character has holes in it (like a tattered cape or shredded wings), or a bumpy surface (like chains), you might be tempted to keep your model low poly and rely on an alpha channel for the texture. But 3dsmax automatically antialiases those texture holes, even if antialiasing is turned off. You can circumvent it by turning off Filter Maps, but it may look crappy or too jagged. I've found it easier to just model holes or other things I'd normally leave for texturing.
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?p=1656406#post1656406
some of the results
At times we had to tweak a little bit the highlights in the texture so it would come down as a visible full 1 pixel thickness same for the other details.