ive tried everything and my normal map just isnt working XD help pleaseee!!! :(

mageypoo

so the lp and the hp match up perfectly and all that. ive followed so many tutorials about xnormals and cages to the letter but this is still hapeening XD anyone??


every edge is a hard edge and ivs are all split along those edges. could it be my uvs?

Clark Coots

I see some horizontal artifacts in the middle of some of the shells, that is odd. I'm not 100% on that, but looking at your layout here are some things I would improve that may clear up any artifacts, especially along edges if you straighten your UVs.

mageypoo

OMFG i wasnt expecting help like this thank you so much XD!!!!!! your amazing that you took the time to label my uvs like that!!!!! also would you worry about the amount of seems on a model like this??

Clark Coots

The amount of seams is fine. You did it correctly by splitting the UVs where there are hard edges on your model. I just realized something else, inbetween about 0.55 and 0.6 in the V axis are those polygons edges hard as well? You said everything was hard edges, so if that was the case you'd have to split those UVs too to avoid small artifacts. To make your life easier if the angle between polygons isn't too drastic, you can have a soft edge there and not have to split the UVs.

mageypoo

oh awesome!! ty!! yh i heard that if its around 90 degree angle then make it hard edge. when u get these weird shadows (below) is that another sign to bassically make the edge hard?? no those edges where soft edge cause of their angle. also would u bother triangulating mesh when exporting to xnormals? cause a lot of people say to do it then a lot say not do cause xnormals triangulates it anyway. sorry for question overload ty for taken time to answer these questions XD. amaze me how little they told me in uni lol

musashidan

It's good practice to triangulate before baking and to use that same triangulated mesh in-game. The reason is because every engine has a different method of triangulation and because the data in a tangent normal map is calculated to a specific mesh topology any change in topology(triangulation) will lead to artifacting.

mageypoo

aahhhh awesome thank you these replies are soo quick its amazing!!

musashidan

Also, one more thing to note: rather than thinking of "I need a split where there is a 90degree corner", it's more that you should think in flat surfaces. So you might even have a UV split on a transition between a flat surface and curved surface with a much lower angle than 90.

mageypoo

awesome i think i get that

mageypoo

XD why am i struggle so much?? my hp and lp are in the exxt spot and all that. haha so tried splitting all my uvs are they to.... clustered ??




and these black lines? are appearing there was a bit more improvement  when i split all uvs

THANK YOU!!

Clark Coots

I suppose next thing to check, is looking at the HP vs LP in those areas where the black lines are showing, your bake settings, and what program you're viewing the model in.

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rohMizuno

it feels like like a ray distance issue to me, did you tried using a cage,  or increasing the read and frontal distance?

Joopson

I'll ignore the creepy doppelganger stuff right above me and say, did you check the high-poly to make sure nothing is screwed up with it? And none of your UVs are overlapping or anything weird like that? Beyond that, really not sure what it could be.

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mageypoo

loving all these replies thanks all!!! where is this back face culling option?  i used cage exported from maya and through xnormal 3d viewer. eerrrmmm increased ray distance didnt do a lot .   redid my uvs so they r all straighten out didn't do much although improved it bit better XD. and high poly is all good to. XD  this is crazy!!!! bahah at such a loss.

mageypoo

 if anyone wants to take a look at the the files and see if they can come up with a solution would love it haha. would owe u the world XD!! help me polycount your my only hope!!!!!

mageypoo

chances of two people with meat as there pics on the same topic is crazyy!! XD

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rohMizuno

I was never meat.

mageypoo

XD

mageypoo

ITS THE CAGEEEEE!!!!!!! i just tried to bake without a cage dont no why i just tried to now XD and it bakes basically perfect apart from the seems that r showing due to the lack of a cage!! ive tried cages from maya and cages from xnormal using the 3d viewer and they both create horrific results. any suggests peeps??

kanga

I had problems with cages in Max. The problem was that I had to inflate the cadge a wee bit motr before export.

mageypoo

omfg its such a simple thing and i went over everything for like a week XD all i had to do was make the cage biggers as u said bahaha

mageypoo

although now i have these things going on.....??

musashidan

Can you upload you high/low poly meshes as separate .fbx files? I can take a look if you like.

mageypoo

thank soo much!! is it stupid that i dont no how cause it says the files r to big and they are compressed?

musashidan

Dropbox is a good option. The files shouldn't be that big. Lowpoly especially..

mageypoo

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/q0hph43579i0hab/AAD6mjmIcSWciwmD-tLMEJVZa?dl=0

musashidan

I'll have a look after work. I'm in a time zone far, far away...........

mageypoo

Awesome!!! whatcha  working on atm??

Joopson

Just a heads-up, mageypoo, I'm only seeing the _lp file in that link.

musashidan

3 things I noticed immediately upon opening your file:

1 - Your scale is tiny. The pillar is only 1cm tall - you should always model in real-world scale.(Marmoset TB operates on a 1m scale by default)

2 - You haven't reset your transforms - you should do this regularly when modeling and especially before unwrapping/baking.

3 - Your UVs are inverted where you are seeing the shading artifacts in the last image - make a habit of checking for flipped/inverted UVs when unwrapping    as this affects the baking process.

If you fix those 3 issues your bake should be fine. As a sidenote: a lot of this messing about can be avoided by just using a synced/non-averaged baking workflow.

Your smoothing groups are empty but this is a Maya>Max .fbx issue.

And lastly........@joopson is correct. The HP wasn't uploaded but is unncessary as it turns out.

mageypoo

Awesome  thank soo much cant thank you enough let u no how i get on

mageypoo

i cant find a decent tuorial on how to flip and spot inverted uvs when i click them they match up please say thats the wat to tell if they r correct or not haha thanks again

musashidan

The UVs are just a representation of the geometry coordinates in 3D space(XYZ=UVW) so the geometry faces don't have a 'physical' connection to the UV faces. Flipping a geo face will not flip its 'twin' UV face. In Max there is a feature called 'select inverted faces'.

I don't know the equivalent in Maya. Perhaps a Maya user here will chime in.(or check the Maya documentation)

mageypoo

awesome so is that feature select inverted faces how u find out if uvs r flipped/inverted cause i have no idea how to tell what uvs r inverted soz for all these noob question turns out uni didn't teach me alot XD so your basically teaching me more than they ever did hah

musashidan

mageypoo said:

 for all these noob question turns out uni didn't teach me alot XD so your basically teaching me more than they ever did hah

3D training + 90% Uni courses in the world = $-scam.... Sorry, no offence. Just joking. I've never trained 3d/CG at uni/college but I've heard a few horror stories.....

Yes, the feature is basically just to let you know which UV faces are flipped/inverted.

mageypoo

XD it's a so true!!! And this uni was UCA Farnham which isn't apparently like one of the best uni with one of the best game course. The teachers where/ r horrific XD!!! It was all lies XD!! Basically taught are selves. can't believe how long I have properly suffered inverted uvs XD.

Btw I did the display on maya and all normals and faces r facing the right way none r inverted it's  crazy lol. No idea what's happening haha.

mageypoo

Also turns out I was on utube this morning looking for tutorial And I went passed a sword tutorial  your on utube didn't realise it was u

musashidan

mageypoo said:

Btw I did the display on maya and all normals and faces r facing the right way none r inverted it's  crazy lol. No idea what's happening haha.

Not your geo face normals. Your UV faces. See post above.

musashidan

mageypoo said:

Also turns out I was on utube this morning looking for tutorial And I went passed a sword tutorial  your on utube didn't realise it was u

Oh, that is a VERY old Xnormal tut from a while back. Things have changed a bit for me since then. I am planning a full Normal mapping 101 course in the near future.

mageypoo

XD thought they would show somthing off some where haha.  omfg cant wait for that!!!!!! do u no any good tutorials for me and my current predicament haha so as i dont keep pestering you. im like keep asking to get tips from actual professionals

musashidan

Don't worry about asking Q's here. That's what the forum is for. As long as you show you're putting our advice to practice and learning/progressing with your issues, people are happy to help.

You shouldn't need a tutorial to fix your current predicament. For basic stuff like this, and whilst learning Maya, you should always have the Maya documentation at your fingertips. You're 99% of the way there. Just flip those inverted UV faces>rebake your maps>result!
Your low/high match well in your image above. Your low geo is fine. Your UVs are done.

In the Maya UV editor click the 'Shaded UVs' button.

To flip UV faces select(from UV editor) polygons>flip.

mageypoo

im gladd ty!!
amazing your sooo help full its insane ahah!! so had few reds they flipped back added a cage which makes it all bake perfects!! the onlyproblems are these annoying shadings

mageypoo

playing around with cage is making them better so i think that it omfg!!!! musashidan you beautiful patient man!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! thank you!! and every one else who helped cant tell u hpow much i aprreiate it!! ill porbs b back later with anther probelem