Glib, vertex normals and hard/soft edges can be independant when exporting, as an exporter could export one point for each of the normals of your vertex (when it's on a hard edge), but not actually export the vertex normal direction.
But yeah, I'd be pretty surprised if Unreal can't do that... would suck.
This is a great technique, we have a script that does this automatically on a model at work (with a face-size threshold to not select the chamfered faces), unfortunatly it can't be shared. =\
Sprung, as far as I know unreal (or is it actorX?) recalculates the normals so yeah this wouldn't work. However normal editing being such a hugely widespread thing to do (especially to piece up destructables, human body parts, pieces of cars...) I would bet that it is supported by basically almost every other engine under the sun...
Just like Xoliul I used the ASE export pipeline to test this in the release version of UT3. It's widely known that unreal doesn't support smoothing groups, and therefore certain normals, so this comes as no suprise to me.
superspecular soft edge script is the link to see my new beta script in action.
In the video i apply with a buttonpress the technique on an entire object with various shapes and chamfer sizes.
It will be released as soon i fix some issues.
Sadly i have not so much time for it actually.
deadlineproof, this looks good!
Can you select multiple faces and use the "Apply to Face" button? Or does it only work face by face, or on the entire object. How is the script determining which faces to apply it to when doing it on an entire object? I can't imagine it being able to always chose the right ones on a more complex model.
face area but it doesn't work in all cases so i'm studing something better.Now i'm using 2 models in one of them you have to delete all bevels ( by poly area + manually selcting deselecting )it works ok but it always skip some vertex.
Es in the video the inner cylinder is wrong because a face have badly oriented normal.
I'm preparing a more verbose version of the script to understand what behaviours it takes in those cases.
SyncViewS script does pretty much the same thing, except you have to do it manually on face selections.
Seems like it gives you more control, at least you know what you're doing... Not so sure about Paolo's script, but it looks like it'll only work on models that are fully chamfered at the moment, with Syncviews script you can still have hard edges and it will handle those correctly (not change them).
Too bad it doesn't seem to be available anywhere anymore, but in most cases I feel SyncViewS' script would be better anyways.
there are a couple of scripts that would enable you to do this on a face-by-face basis (setting normals to be perpendicular to their respective face) .. I think there's one by SyncView and possibly one by FunkyBunny?
Replies
But yeah, I'd be pretty surprised if Unreal can't do that... would suck.
This is a great technique, we have a script that does this automatically on a model at work (with a face-size threshold to not select the chamfered faces), unfortunatly it can't be shared. =\
Just like Xoliul I used the ASE export pipeline to test this in the release version of UT3. It's widely known that unreal doesn't support smoothing groups, and therefore certain normals, so this comes as no suprise to me.
In the video i apply with a buttonpress the technique on an entire object with various shapes and chamfer sizes.
It will be released as soon i fix some issues.
Sadly i have not so much time for it actually.
Can you select multiple faces and use the "Apply to Face" button? Or does it only work face by face, or on the entire object. How is the script determining which faces to apply it to when doing it on an entire object? I can't imagine it being able to always chose the right ones on a more complex model.
Es in the video the inner cylinder is wrong because a face have badly oriented normal.
I'm preparing a more verbose version of the script to understand what behaviours it takes in those cases.
I can't believe I didn't see this before. Thank you very much for sharing this technique deadlineproof.
I did a quick test with an old model and it looks way better with minimum effort:
If you read other people's posts you get the idea.
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?p=1199523#post1199523
Thought that procedure would be more complex than that, I expected some huge tutorial.
@Bal
Even simpler now, yay
Thank you very much Bal, that's exactly what I needed!
Under the epic Normal Map page.
from http://deadlineproof.com/superspecular-soft-edge-script before the site went down?
Super Necro.
Seems like it gives you more control, at least you know what you're doing... Not so sure about Paolo's script, but it looks like it'll only work on models that are fully chamfered at the moment, with Syncviews script you can still have hard edges and it will handle those correctly (not change them).
Too bad it doesn't seem to be available anywhere anymore, but in most cases I feel SyncViewS' script would be better anyways.
and: http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/scripts/poly-average-normals
but i might have mistaken the technique..
Seriously? It's linked a few posts above yours, and is also on the wiki.
http://wiki.polycount.com/VertexNormal#GetVertNormalsFromFace_MAXScript
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=75753