Need help with Texturing an Object

SoundStage

Hi,
I am not sure if this is the correct place to post my question, so please do forgive me if I have posted in the wrong section.

I have done basic modeling in 3ds max till now and never used textures before. But now I am doing a small project where I want to submit a weapon model to a game called Dota 2. I have tried my best and completed a very low polygon model for my project, and tried making a texture.
The problem is that when I apply my texture on to the object, I can clearly see that it has jagged edges on any side where the weapon is angled. It can even be seen on polygons that are connected. I tried applying colour well over the edges, to overcome the jagged edges, and it has worked to some extent. But I am not able to do anything for external edges.
I found this to be a huge problem after I rendered an Ambient Occlusion for my model. Almost all edges look horrible and I do not think I can proceed with my project anymore until I find a way to create a better texture.

What mistake am I doing? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Here is an image of how the edges look like after I apply the Ambient Occlusion on to my model.

passerby

show the AO bake with UV's overtop


also did you bake the AO with any Padding? and if so how much? and what is the texture size?

SoundStage

Here is the image with AO with UV applied. Btw, I used the Diffuse map from Material Editor apply the images.



Could you please tell me what Padding is? I baked the AO with default settings, if it helps.

Texture sixe for all the images that I used is 1024x1024.

passerby

i meant to see your UVlayout with the texture.

padding adds a border around the edges of UV shells when baking the texture and helps with mipmapping artifacts which could be causing your issue.

SoundStage

I see. Here is the UV layout. I chose border color to be the same color as texture that I am using.


As for the border, there is a border when I render out my UV as an image. But where do I find out the how much part?
Here is the image of the UV rendered.

passerby

ya the problem is you got no padding, i just opened both of those up in PS, and screened the UV layout over hte texture bake, and there is no padding at all.

so what is happening is at all of your UV seams, the black background of the image is bleeding in a bit.

i cant explain how to set padding for max, since im not a max user, but adding some padding such as 8 to 16 pixels, and changing the background colour of the bake to a more neutral colour will help out a lot.

McGreed

To set the padding in 3DS Max, press 0 to open the Render To Texture window, and under the Objects to Bake section, below the object list, it says "Selected Object Setting", with a padding option. Change that at least to 2-4.

SoundStage

Thanks for your help. But I am afraid that I still have not been able to solve the problem.

I increased the padding from 2 to 4 and tried baking the AO, and then multiplied the AO over my base color at 80%. And here is what I get.

This is the multiplied result.


Here is the AO result with padding at 4.

SoundStage

Should I try to increase the padding further? Or must I rework my model and increase its polygon count??

Hang10

When trying to view textures in the Max viewport make sure to go the preferences > Viewport tab > Configure Drivers > click the boxes with Match Bitmap and set the antialiasing to x4 or more.

Unfortunately I'm not sitting in front of it right now thats the best I can think of.

Also your UV islands are extremely inefficient, stitch those sides together on the shaft and you can also overlap the blade's uv's to make the texturing process easier.

Psyk0

After you optimize / overlap your shells, increase that padding to 24! The bigger the map size, the bigger the padding! Also when rendering out, do not use the preview window as your map, use the outpout map.

SoundStage

@Hang10: I have changed preferences as you have suggested. Thanks!
I particularly do not understand what you mean by my UV islands being inefficient. Could you please suggest me a tutorial or example from where I can learn the ropes?

Psyk0: Thanks for your suggestion. I always use the output file as template.

Hang10

http://cg.tutsplus.com/tutorials/autodesk-3d-studio-max/creating-a-next-gen-video-game-hot-rod-the-complete-workflow-day-6/

The above link brings you to a tutorial on unwrapping a hot rod but the techniques are applicable.

the whole series helped me a lot. They were made by Xoliul you can find these and other tutorials on cgtutsplus.com

Rik

Increasing the padding basically adds more texture space outside the wireframes of your object's UV space. If you fill the texture space exactly, then you run the risk of the UV lines showing up because they're unpainted. Increase your padding and overcompensate. There's no harm in adding more information, as long as you paint into otherwise un-used space.

Here's a texture map of mine for an amplifier model/unwrap that was posted a while back.



Also, it looks like your images are screen captures from max and not renders. Max will sometimes show jagged lines in my real time display but render correctly. Did you check if the renders are coming out with those jagged lines too?



Hang10 said that your UV islands are inefficient because of all the unused UV space you have. You need to use as much of your texture space as possible. That means unwrapping your object in whatever way that allows it to fill up as much space on your map while still letting you paint in whatever details you want (and keep the scale in mind, so that your level of detail is consistent).

I would still suggest you check out that tutorial. And if you're posting your wireframes and diffuse maps, do what I did in the pic above. In photoshop, put your Unwrap Layer ontop of your color(diffuse) layer, and set the blend mode to Screen. That way, we can see the colors with the wireframe laid ontop.

SoundStage

@hang10: Thanks for suggesting that tutorial. I am currently working on it to get up to speed in texturing.

@Rik: I didn't know where to start learning texturing. So I followed this texturing guide, http://media.steampowered.com/apps/dota2/workshop/Dota2CharacterTextureGuide.pdf, and tried to do as suggested there. Now I realize that that guide is for advanced designers.

So I will need some time to learn from the basics and do a complete retexture for my model, and will upload my work here.

SoundStage

I managed to get the Tex Tools from that tutorial link. But I am not able to get UVTools 1.6 mentioned in that tutorial. Is there any alternative plug ins that I can use? Any suggestions?