Exported texture distortion in Mudbox

saija

Hi!

I'm having an issue where my textures (normals being the biggest issue) get distorted when I try to export from mudbox.

Here is the problem and how I have tried to solve it. I tried to gather all the possible information that might be useful, I hope the pictures make sense.

Lowpoly mesh and its UVs (all separated edges are hard, others soft):


Sculpted in mudbox:



Extracted normal map, very distorted:



Same thing happens if I try to extract ao:




The problem is already visible in Mudbox with those textures applied:



I read about waviness in normal maps, and thought that more geometry might fix the issue. So I made another arch from the beginning:





The problem is less visible, but still definitely there:



I also tried what happens if I rearrange the UVs so that the underside is attached to the front:



Problem remains:



Here are the settings I normally use. I have tried using subdivision and changing the search distance, but the same thing happens.



I have tried this in Mudbox 2011, 2012 and 2013 on three different computers without any luck.

I have been looking all over for a solution to this problem, but haven't found anything yet. I would greatly appreciate any ideas you might have to fix it.
I don't mind redoing the work from the beginning, but even that doesn't seem to be helping at the moment.

onionhead_o

looks to me your uvs are distorted. try running a unfold on the uvs and bake again. or you might have to harden edge on the uv border edge.

oglu

turn off smooth target model in the bake settings...

tristamus

I can't imagine this being anything else besides distorted UV's.

Run an unfold in Maya, or perhaps a different app like Headus, and then try again. Maybe try baking using xNormal as well.

Fucking awesome looking sculpts by the way, like them a lot.