UDK 3 - Normal looks rubbish :(

TheAxiom

Okay so I've imported the normal as TC_NormalMap and I've tried flipping the green channel but no luck.

In UDK



In UDK with green channel flipped



In 3DS Max



Normal map



UDK nodes (as you can see I've tried multiplying it)



My smoothing groups are set to my UV islands. I feel as though my the normal map isn't recognizing the smoothing groups in UDK. I do have it ticked in my FBX export.

This is my import



And MAX FBX export settings

TheAxiom

I tried exporting it with one smoothing group and it's a bit better but this is NOT the right solution as it'll cause gradients on more complex assets. Please help!

JedTheKrampus

Did you try baking to world space and using Handplane to convert the map to UE3 tangent space? Because that would probably solve your problem.

TheAxiom

I've never heard of that to be honest. I've had no issues baking for UDK in the past and I'd rather figure out what I'm doing wrong with this asset before I start using other software.

JedTheKrampus

It's really easy to use and it's freeware. Just give it a try: http://www.handplane3d.com

TheAxiom

I'm using it now because no one seems to know what button I'm pressing incorrectly in Max. This adds time to my workflow but I don't really have a choice. Thank you for the suggestion though Jed.

Neox

What are your mesh importsettings in udk?

TheAxiom

I do have explicit normals ticked

Neox

Use handplane and ditch the explicit normals, in my experience this works best.
As with handplane you work synced to the engine.

TheAxiom

Aah so that's why it didn't look good when I used handplane, because I needed to untick explicit normals.

Works perfectly! Thank you guys!
What do I need to do with my smoothing groups when using handplane?

Handplane also seems to flip the blue channel in some areas

Neox

do you have overlapping uvs? or exported the wrong side of a mirrored/stacked uvcluster?

in theory synced normals are flawless, with or without heavy gradients, in practice the bitdepth (8bit per channel) and the compression will crush the theory, so if you can avoid heavy gradients with more geo or hardedges/smoothinggroups then do it.

TheAxiom

Neox wrote: »

do you have overlapping uvs? or exported the wrong side of a mirrored/stacked uvcluster?

in theory synced normals are flawless, with or without heavy gradients, in practice the bitdepth (8bit per channel) and the compression will crush the theory, so if you can avoid heavy gradients with more geo or hardedges/smoothinggroups then do it.

Oh I can't have overlapping UV's at all with this method?
Well that makes things difficult. I have to delete any faces that overlap then put them back on again after baking?

Why can't someone just tell me what I'm pressing wrong in Max. My classmates are baking stuff fine in to UDK.

Neox

you can move all but the original chunks out of the uvspace by one unit

repete

What FBX export version are you using in 3DS ?

I think UDK has some issues with 2013.1, 2013.2, 2013.3.

Try using 2012.2 and see if it helps.

JedTheKrampus

UV space reuse is a no-no with the UE3 tangent basis especially. You need an order-independent tangent space like Mikk for that to work right, otherwise you'll get like a 99% chance of some shading error or another.

If you must re-use UVs (which I would recommend in the case of an order-independent tangent basis, and which is otherwise situational) you should make sure that you only have one of the identical islands on the 0..1 UV space.