[Maya] Smoothing groups problem, weird looking artifacts

Ne0nfire

Hi guys I need your help.

I applied a smoothing group inside of maya on my character and
on the screenshot you can see the result I get. I did use google and forum search,
but I can't find the reason for this problem. Smoothing group ankle is 180°.

vskdharmasena

Hey i am a noob but try this this kind of thing happens to me too.turn off two sided lighting and see if any normals are flipped.
thanks

Bal

There are no smoothing groups in Maya (only soft and hard edges).
Try Normals > Unlock Normals, and if there are still any hard edges, Normals > Soften Edge.

Ne0nfire

Thanks man, it worked!

Ne0nfire

Ok, I have another problem which is a bit different but maybe you know the answer.
I baked the normal map with xnormal and the resulting normal map looks weird.
Also if I apply this weird looking normal map in maya, it just looks horrible.. why?