shiney seams.. UDK

cdavidson

hey guys am new to all this so this may be a simple problem.

whats causing the shiney seams in this floor panel? the texture tiles fine in max etc but when added to udk its coming out like below. help would be great

almighty_gir

try multiplying the normalmap with a custom3vector, which has values of (1,-1,1) and see if that helps (essentially flipping the green channel within udk).

cdavidson

almighty_gir wrote: »

try multiplying the normalmap with a custom3vector, which has values of (1,-1,1) and see if that helps (essentially flipping the green channel within udk).

quick rundown on how todo that mate?

cdavidson

ok flipping the green channel didnt do anything...

any other reason these seams would be like this?

Thor Sowards

Looks like a lightmap problem, did you give it a second uv channel for the lightmap?

cdavidson

that will be it then.. lol as didnt know about that guess ill look into how to sort that. cheers chap.

cdavidson

this light map malarky is driving me nuts! lol cant seem to get it looking how it should

Sean VanGorder

I don't think that's a light map problem. Looks more like a smoothing issue. Have you baked the lighting yet?

Can you post a shot of it in Max, one with a blank material and one with the normal map applied?

cdavidson

with just mat
http://sandvoid.com/artdump/nrtest.jpg

with normal and mat
http://sandvoid.com/artdump/nrtest2.jpg

in udk
http://sandvoid.com/artdump/nrtest3.jpg

Sean VanGorder

Could you post your normal map as well? (Sorry, should have mentioned that earlier)

And is this before or after you baked your lighting?

cdavidson

its there before baking lights and even worse after baking them.

normal map.
http://sandvoid.com/artdump/nromalmp.jpg

does the whole model need to be in 1 smoothing group or no smoothing group atall?

Sean VanGorder

Alright, the fact that it's there before baking your lights rules out the light map issue for sure, even though you'll still need to do that to get correct lighting on it, but that's another issue.

As for the smoothing groups, its dependent on how you go about generating your normal maps and what results you're trying to get. Rather than me trying to explain this haphazardly, try reading through this.I would probably break this up into different smoothing groups because of the hard egdes. I would also probably not even model in the indentations you currently have on the low poly.

cdavidson

ok bud ill give that a read ta for the help.

rebb

What do the vertex-normals of that mesh look like ? are they all pointing at the same direction at the seams ?

Edit: nm, already implied in the smoothing group suggestion

cdavidson

yeah i added some smoothing groups etc. it sorted bits of it.. not looking so bad. but its still got a light seams.. and am sure my lightmap is fine...

heres some images of it now..

before light build
http://sandvoid.com/artdump/norm1.jpg

after light build
http://sandvoid.com/artdump/norm2.jpg

the lightmap uv set
http://sandvoid.com/artdump/norm3.jpg

driving me crazy this lol

cdavidson

any ideas guys? spent all night trying to sort this but no avail.. it seems to be a lightmap issue but no matter what its not getting sorted!

Parkar

Based on your last pictures it seems it looks ok before building the light. It will be more or less impossible to get rid of the seems between meshes completly so might not be possible to get the look before bulding to look any better.

Have you tried just as a test to let unrealed generate the lightmap uvs and see what happens?

cdavidson

yeah same problem.. it seems its messing up where the uv joins are on the first uv channel.. but i have it set to use the lightmap uv channel so why is it taken the texture uv channel into account aswell?

arghhh!

Ott

Are your UVs in channel 1 overlapped? The UDN actually recommends splitting your second UV at the same spot where the 1st UVs are overlapped.

ariofighter

I had a similar issue with modular wall segments in something I am working on. I think the problem for me was that my smoothing groups forced the shading to repeat again over each wall tile. This didn't shade it like a solid wall chunk like I had wanted.

My fix was not optimal but it worked out for me. I snaped the modular sections and welded them together in Max and then exported the larger segments. With the smoothing issues taken care of in max they baked cleanly in UDK.

Like I said, not the best way to work, but it solved my problem.

I hope it helps.

cdavidson

yeah the uvs in channel 1 are over lapped as its 1 side unwraped layed over the other side.

i tryed to split the 2nd set at same point as the first but that didnt help it.. the first uv set is defo effecting the 2nd set.. just dont know how or why...

ill post my uvs later on when i get time to at the comp.

cdavidson

heres the 2 uv sets...


http://sandvoid.com/artdump/lightmapset.jpg

and

http://sandvoid.com/artdump/texuvsett.jpg

bugo

edit: ugh, nvm, just saw the other post, and you figured it out already.

Ott

What other post?

The only other possibility that I can think of is that you are overlapping your first UVs "Up and down" which is a no-no, and instead should only mirror "Left-to-Right".

You will have to rebake your normals and all that as well, but the UVs MUST be horizontal when overlapping UVs in UDK.

http://udn.epicgames.com/Three/LightMapUnwrapping.html

Scroll down to "Mirroring UVs"

Ott

And by "Must be horizontal" that specifically applies to UVs that are mirrored down a seam.

Sean VanGorder

Did you rebake your normal map after you changed up the smoothing groups? If not, you should.

I would actually do a rebake anyway. Try tiling the high poly and welding them together before baking. That will make sure the normals on the edge of your model are pointing in the correct direction.

cdavidson

ok thanks guys.

ill have a bash again at this tonight from the start taken the stuff into account and see how it goes will post once ive tryed it all.

cdavidson

still no joy with this after rebakes and redoing 2nd uv set.

Sean VanGorder

Out of curiosity, do you get the same seams in UDK when you don't have the normal map applied?

cdavidson

yeah with and without it

Sean VanGorder

So cdavidson sent me the obj for the floor and I managed to find what was causing the shading problems.

I'm not sure what caused it, but the smoothing in the mesh seemed to be all jacked up. Even with all the smoothing groups removed, the mesh remained smooth.



I fixed it by first resetting the Xform and the running the STL Check modifier on it. Then I redid the smoothing groups and exported it back to UDK.



This is before baking the lighting, so any artifacts you get after baking from this point on are most likely from the light maps. You'll have to rebake your normal maps after fixing the smoothing groups as well.

cdavidson

still no good mate lol. defo the lightmap then. but cant see why the lightmap should be messing it up as its following the rules.

Sean VanGorder

If you're getting issues before baking the light, it can't be the light maps. You'll always get some sort of seam after baking the light, you can just minimize it by upping the res of your light maps and using other meshes to hide it.

If you tried the fix I posted and removed all the smoothing groups, there shouldn't be any more of the errors you were experiencing earlier.

cdavidson

found the problem.. it was the geo?

i removed a line from the center of the panel and welded it into the side so its just 1 big bit.. and its away now

still faint seems where modules join but there not to bad

feanix

The UDK has a problem where you will ALWAYS get specular seams between meshes and UV seams, especially in lightmass. The best work around is to create some kind of intentional seam between models, like a slight bevel. It's pretty much impossible to have smooth lighting across multiple meshes that are flush against each other.