Maya Transfer Map, Normal Map Help

stringkeeper

Hi everyone!

I am trying to bake normal maps using the maya transfer maps tool, but the geometry of my low poly geometry seems to distort the resulting Map. Wierd right?
here are some Pictures of my problem:

Normal map
http://stringkeeper.deviantart.com/gallery/#/d33mt4h
UV's
http://stringkeeper.deviantart.com/art/Uv-s-187501690
Geometry
http://stringkeeper.deviantart.com/art/Geometry-187501783

I'm glad about any suggestions.
Thanks in advance for any help

EarthQuake

It looks like your uvs are simply distorted. How does the model look with the nm applied in "high quality" viewport mode?

Or with a checkerboard texture on it?

You see, the baker is going to account for any uv distortion, and distort the baked result accordingly, so it shows up straight on the mesh.

stringkeeper

Thank you so much, that was it. Although I remember applying a planar map from straight on, so that shouldn't have happened. Probably getting senile or something. Anyway, thanks!

stringkeeper

Hello again!

Got another problem already. The distortion caused by the uv's is now corrected, but I still can't figure out howto bake a nice normal map. I played around with the envelope, tweaked the lowpoly to be outside the highpoly, inside, in the middle and I'm running out of Ideas to try. Here are some Pictures:

Lowpoly + Normal map


Lowpoly geometry


projection envelope


Highpoly


what do I need to do to bake a nice normal map? Does the Lowpoly need to be adjusted? Do I need to tweak the cage? Do I have to say the magic words and clap my heels together three times?
Thanks for any suggestions!

stringkeeper

I think the pictures didn't get posted. So here are the links again:

Lowpoly + Normal map
Lowpoly geometry
projection envelope
Highpoly

Scruples

The combination of your distorted Cage and the difference between the surfaces of your high-poly low-poly is causing the problem.....but mainly the cage.

Is your lowpoly using all hard edges?, might be better if you dont use a cage and use the default ray distance method.

stringkeeper

Thanks for the reply!
I tried using no cage, all hard, all soft edges, a cage of 1%, a ridiculously huge cage (just because it seemed the only thing left to do), tried manually adjusting the cage for a tighter fit. All to no end.
In the picture I exaggerated the cage to show it's distortion. Because I don't know if this is normal behaviour for a cage, or if it is part of the problem.
I since tried making the lowpoly tighter, which helped a little bit, but now my damn *** doesnt show me the applied normal map in the perspective window any more (even though I use high quality rendering) for some reason.
Additionally I heard a lot of people say it doesn't matter wether or not the high and lowpoly Intersect, but my normal maqs seem to get cut off on intersecting parts.
Okay, sorry for rambling.

Scruples

Try using automatic uv mapping so we can rule out the UV's.
If that doesn't work sharing your scene file will allow someone to point out the problem alot quicker.

stringkeeper

I used automatic mapping. I'm probably just really bad at doing this.
I know i don't make it easy to help me, but where should I put my scene so you can get it. Does polycount have webspace for that or should I use any filesharing service?

cw

this is handy
http://www.dropbox.com/

ivars

Try changing between "surface normals" and "geometry normals" in the advanced settings. One is using all "soft" edges for the search rays and one will use the lowpoly normals, I never remember which :P

stringkeeper

Wow! Using surface normals really made a difference. Thanks.
I have a completely different set of problems now