Hy there everyone, i am sorry to post another normal map thread.
But as the situation is i have some real problems with them.
So here is the case, at realy simple objects normal mapping goes fine, and same when i helping out with organic stuff.
But i am more of a hardsurface guy, and have mostly done weapons for normal mapping.
One of my problems is, that modo does not have smoothing groups.
So what i have tried is splitting the mesh at where the hard edges are and i have splitted those in the uv map aswell, setup a cage and still i get horrible normals maps.
I have also tried without splitting the mesh at hard edges, still gets problems.
I have read and watched some many topics and tutorials about normal mapping, but i never seam to get it right, so it would be realy nice if someone has done some of this in modo before, and would offer some help
I know my text might seam a bit cluttered, they tend to end up like this:poly121:
Replies
I don't use modo so I can't help much, except to point to the first link after a Google search for "modo smoothing"
EricChadwick: Yeah, bit of a bad title, about the modo smoothing link thats what i have tried.
MightyPea: Will post it soon
PredatorGSR: I forgot to add that i use xNormal, since modo does not support cages.
But yea, without posting normal maps, models, and the normal map on the game model, its hard to say what the issue is, there are so many ways you can screw up a normal map.
It's difficult for me to explain how it is aswell, altough this is a know'n problem at the modo forums, i still have not found the answers to it.
I will post some images in a few hours to might shed some light at the problems.
You need to change the "Smooth Normals" settings for both the low poly and high poly models in xNormal from "Use exported normals" to "Average normals".
Spliting the edges in on your model in Modo where you want hard edges is the right way to do it.
Another idea might be to use Chai's pipelineIO script for Modo.
But i might give it one more go
Let's hope Luxology sorts out the FBX vertex normal problem with the next service pack.
EDIT:
Looks like they're working on the issue.
Looking at the script right now, seams realy nice.
Hope luxology does make modo more game friendly