Problem with normal maps seams overlay
polycounter lvl 14
Hello , I have created a normal map for my furslips model and looks fine on all seams , in xnormal , but then I needed to add fur details , so I painted fur on the "furry meshes parts" in mudbox and then I used flaming pear plugin to expand the texture beyong the seams , I then took this partial fur texture into Crazybump and I used to create a normal map of the furs out of it , it looks all god except for the seams when I overlay the map over the other original base nrmal map , the seams look evident after this merging ... what can this be due to and how could I fix?
Replies
- are you viewing the result in xnormal or a different viewer?
- did you overlay "correctly", knocking out the blue channel at least?
- swizzles..?
- ...
As the Red arrow show , the left version is the normal map same as the right one but I have overlayed a fur normal map extracted via crazybump from a textured version in Mudbox , the texture itself is seamless in mudbox , so I wonder why it is not in normal maps?
as for the overlaying I just did "overlay and deleted the portions of the normal that overlapped the other normal maps parts of the map under...
Check your crazybumped normal map alone, to see how visible the seam is, if it's alot less visible, you should look into how you're overlaying your 2 normal maps, check the wiki for better methods :
http://wiki.polycount.com/NormalMap#Blending_Normal_Maps_Together
imo, most of the time those kind of details are sculpted in HD, and only a sort of high frequency detail map is added in 2d, so the seams are almost not noticeable.
I was thinking that maybe using a detail texture as bump on a low poly, and bake a detail normal from it could do the trick. Thoughts ?
Yeah we need a software a la crazybump which creates a map considering a mesh normals/uvs
in some engines you could apply the overlayed normal map in the shader, and use worldspace coordinates to project the detial normal on the model instead of relying on the UV's that have seams.
or may be I should transform the texture into a alpha texture map and apply it on the fur parts in zbrush then extrude or brush out but I don't think woudl come out that well ...may be I coul djust go and create some alpha brushes for zbrush and make the fur in the model directly but then I am not sure how to give the "realistic " random colors of a real fur then in the texture and achieve the same level of detail ...
Oh btw thew game engine it is destined for is the not so advanced skyrim engine so doesn't have all the nice blending functions of UDK or other material properties of Cryengine ....