Problem with Normals

Mossbros

I've been having this problem with my normals after baking and using within 3dS max engine and the 3 Point shader.




As you can see the mesh looks horrible with the normal applied, this is what the normals look like in the UV, from what I can see obviously something up with the mesh but when inspected I cant find any problems with it, the one side is in its own smoothing group, the mesh has no unwelded verts in that area and only looks bad when the normal is applied.




Highpoly on the top, low poly on the bottom



Here's another screen to show what it looks like in Marmoset without normals applied.



The thing is I've tried baking out within 3D's Max using the projection cage and that returned better results but still that same issue on the back of the blade, I've used Xnormal with a cage from 3D's max and same problem and also I've baked in Xnormal after tweaking the cage within the Viewer and still same problems but sketchier.

Can anyone help me with this, I've followed tutorials made new meshes, redone UV's and so far haven't had any luck.

System

When using 3ds max render to texture funtion the most common problem is that you have to change the orientation of the green channel from down to up in the projection option.
Or you can just flip the green channel of your current normal map in photoshop.

Mossbros

I flip the green channel and the knife looks nicer but I still have the white artifacts when looking at my mesh, so I'm not sure if they are even caused by the normals.

Adij

Topology is bad and is possible that u have doublevert's

Obscura

Is it possible, that where the "whiteness" is, there is different smoothing group, or material ID?

Mossbros

Obscura wrote: »

Is it possible, that where the "whiteness" is, there is different smoothing group, or material ID?

The material Id's are all on the same number for that part of the mesh



After checking smoothing Groups I found that a few little parts were not on the same group, testing now to see if that solves my problem

Mossbros

After looking and fixing those smoothing groups then exporting a new normal map I was confronted by the same problem.

I opened the low poly mesh in marmoset and without applying normals this is what I get.



As you can see the mesh still has that damn error, I've checked the verts in that area and they are all welded correctly.

I will say that at an earlier stage within the modeling this is the same exact place where there was a plane intersecting the mesh so I had to remove the polygons and re make the mesh in that place using the bridge tool. After doing so I checked the areas using the weld tool to make sure that there wasn't any unwanted vertices.

The thing I don't understand is where these problems are coming from as I never had a problem with the mesh in this place.

Obscura

Delete those poly-s, convert to editable mesh, then convert back to editable poly, then re-bridge the holes?:S I dont know yet too what is the problem.What i can say, i can look into your model file if you send it to my email:/Do you want that?

Optinium

Reset xform/transform/scale then rebake. Is a diffuse map channel empty in marmoset?

Psyk0

Another major problem is the lack of details in the high poly model, there's nothing for the normal map to "detail", avoid 90 degree angles and at the very least chamfer those edges.

Mossbros

Obscura wrote: »

Delete those poly-s, convert to editable mesh, then convert back to editable poly, then re-bridge the holes?:S I dont know yet too what is the problem.What i can say, i can look into your model file if you send it to my email:/Do you want that?

Followed what you said, Re Uv'd the mesh and still same ol Problem but now only on one side and in a different place. :poly122:

Reset xform/transform/scale then rebake. Is a diffuse map channel empty in marmoset?

Tried that, Didn't work.

Another major problem is the lack of details in the high poly model, there's nothing for the normal map to "detail", avoid 90 degree angles and at the very least chamfer those edges.

Thanks for the tip, will add extra Geometry but I still don't think It will fix the problem I'm having

Mossbros

zelly wrote: »

When using 3ds max render to texture funtion the most common problem is that you have to change the orientation of the green channel from down to up in the projection option.
Or you can just flip the green channel of your current normal map in photoshop.

Don't worry I never ignore advice, I kinda don't know how I could improve the mesh flow without taking out the verts that I need in specific places. My topo was bad before and I scrapped it and started again with a completely new mesh as the the Silhouette was horrible.

If anyone could draw over a pic I would be more than grateful and certainly try that edge flow.

If anybody is willing that is, I've tried nearly 3 times.

Current Topo


Blank slate