Painting in Mudbox Question
polycounter lvl 6
Hi everyone,
So i'm trying to paint my model in mudbox. Im trying to add highlights on my model, and i've seen people do it in tutorials. Any idea why mine is doing this jagged/pixelated lines? do i need to add more subdivisions? i have 5,000,000 polys (subdivision level 7) right now in my model. I would think thats a lot already. I tried changing the texture resolution to 4000+. That seemed to help slighly, but the image is with the highest resolution selected.
So i'm trying to paint my model in mudbox. Im trying to add highlights on my model, and i've seen people do it in tutorials. Any idea why mine is doing this jagged/pixelated lines? do i need to add more subdivisions? i have 5,000,000 polys (subdivision level 7) right now in my model. I would think thats a lot already. I tried changing the texture resolution to 4000+. That seemed to help slighly, but the image is with the highest resolution selected.
Replies
Second, a game model is going to have blurry pixels when you get up close to it. Just a fact of life. It looks like you're up close. However you can reduce the blurriness somewhat with a good UV layout: mirroring, overlapping, and good packing.
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Texture_Coordinates
Third, you shouldn't be painting highlights on your model. Unless you are developing for a game engine with poor lighting (like some mobile engines) or no lighting at all. But for all other game engines and platforms, you shouldn't paint lighting into your color map. Maps for good lighting are specular, metalness, gloss, roughness, etc., as well as normal maps. We have some info on those map types here:
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Texturing
This is kind of what im going for, which is why im trying to paint highlights.
I can post the UVs as well if requested. I'll try what i was suggested.
try to turn it off in the prefs... and set the brush sample area to 1... also in the preferences in the paint tab...
I tried this just now and it didnt change anything.
I've now also tried a softer brush with the paint brush and it helped, but not in all areas. some areas are getting the pixel edges and other areas aren't.
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Normal_Map_Technical_Details
Also that image example looks like it is using lighting to create those highlights... so normal maps and pbr maps are needed instead of highlights painted into the color map. You can certainly try it your way, but you'll get poor results.
So in games like league of legends and world of warcraft.. the highlight is done with lighting? i've seen some tutorials where its hand painted.
Also i'm looking into handplane or xnormal since i want to use UE4. Which do you recommend for baking normals? I want whats easier and practical to use.
If the highlights move across the model as the lighting angle changes, then they're using masks. These masks are called gloss, metalness, specular, etc.
Xnormal is a good baker, and practical. Handplane is a converter only, you have to bake a map first.
What tool are you using to make your models? Maya and 3ds Max both have good bakers.
Hi Eric,
I'm using Maya for making models, and then sculpting them in Mudbox. After that i've only tried baking the high poly detail onto a lower poly model within mudbox, then bringing into maya again. The results were horrible so i scrapped it and now i'm trying another model. What you're saying somewhat makes sense. I havent tried xnormal yet. So far only mudbox normal baking.
Yeah good idea. I'll post my model when i finish it. I'm working on it as we speak. Do you know if it's better to model environments like a rocky road in maya/mudbox or to use a terrain editor in unreal engine 4 for that?
https://docs.unrealengine.com/latest/INT/Engine/Landscape/Editing/Splines/index.html
Do you have any image references for the kind of road you want to build?
You know how unreal engine 4 they have the terrain editor and you can pretty much paint all the awesome terrain you want and even scupt it. For something more like this :
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(Which in another thread you linked me to hand painted page which was really useful. I'm not really sure how to use my hand painted textures like you would sculpt and paint in terrain editor using my own hand painted textures.
You also linked me this : https://docs.unrealengine.com/latest/INT/Resources/Showcases/Stylized/index.html
Which may be what i'm looking for. I'm just not exactly sure how to get started. I've never really worked with a game engine before so it's really confusing how developers go about doing this.
The only way i can think i can make my own levels kind of like super mario galaxy/sonic adventure battle/ conkers bad fur day, is if i create each individual level in maya. Is this the most convenient way to make these types of levels? wouldn't you technically have more control of how the enviroment looks if you do it this way?
Like for example, how in super mario galaxy the levels are all floating meshes. Instead of terrain made on a surface.
http://d28xlskrkqci73.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/Super-Mario-Galaxy-2-Screenshot-2.jpg
I'm sorry for the really overly complicated question. I'm trying my best to learn. Hopefully when i attend ARC in Sacramento, California i'll have instructors who know much more. Then i'd have to bother you less ;p.
Mostly this is done in the game editor, using pieces made in Maya or Max.
Larger landscapes are often made using terrain tools in the game editor, and decorated with pieces made in Maya or Max.
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Level_Design
Which is more often used for more stylized games like Nintendo titles or Rareware titles? Thanks this really helped. I'm taking a ton of notes.
Okay for the most part i finished a rough sculpt of my model. So where do i go from here to make this game ready? I keep seeing words like retopoly and i'm not exactly when i should be using that. The way i would be doing it is bake the detail onto a lower poly model.
I've yet to try to texture it because i don't know where to begin for something more stylized. It seems everyone else does their hand painted stuff in photoshop, but using mudbox seems more convenient for texturing. I also just downloaded the demo for 3d-coat to check it out.
Levels foe those games look like they're modeled by hand. I'm almost positive they're not using height-based terrains. Once you try making something with terrain tools you'll see how it works.