Normal Map creation Questions

Ladygrace

Hello all.
I am looking at trying to make some small game assets for a small game project at school and i am running into issues creating normal maps. I am using X normal to generate normal maps for my items. But once i have created the Normal map i get very sharp edges as shown in the picture below.

So i am wanting to know if it is because i don't have enough detail in my low poly, or am i doing something wrong in X Normal, or is it an issues with my uv mapping?
Object space maps work wonders but it is the tangent map which is the issue.


Also i am using Maya if that makes any difference.

Thanks in advance


Image of the normal Map

Bartalon

Looks to me like you have hard edge normals where they should be soft. A more correct configuration of your low poly normals is to have everything softened with the exception of your UV shell borders. You'll need to re-bake after adjusting your edge softness in order to see proper results.

You may also want to make sure that those UV shells are properly stitched. This is easily avoided by working with Texture Borders (UV seams) toggled.

EarthQuake

^^ Yep that looks to be the problem.

You should also probably use more sides to the cylinder, unless this is a very small object, 8 sides is never going to look properly round if you can get close to this. More at the mid-section at the very least.

Your uv map has a lot of wasted space as well.

Ladygrace

Thank you both for the feed back , i used the soft edges and it looks alot better but like you said i need more sides which i will be doing later today.

As for the seams etc i will have to read up a bit more. Also there is alot of wasted space as there is more to the item but i was just focusing on the main part for a start.

Thank you very much again