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XNormal Viewer. User made Maps are affecting the mesh
February 25, 2011 - 7:33am
- 1497 reads
Hey all.
I've been designing a TommyGun Concept gun. I've been doing it in parts like the barrel the front grip back grip, scope etc. Baking off normals and AO in XNormal and everything was great, nice clean maps etc. (Great Programme btw.. really really great! ) :) I was going to explode it for speed but wanted to iron out my workflow before doing that.
I've now merged all these separate files together in Photoshop and joined the mesh in 3Dsmax ..exported and opened it up in XNormal Viewer and this is what i have got. it looks like the texture is effecting the mesh some how.. (Small and Big picture) In the large I added a map generated by XNormal only (The scope) and so the scope is the only thing to have come out correct.. i do this with any seperate map generated my XNormal and it works fine ) But i need to have the whole of the meshes Normals on 1 map. I do this in Photoshop and I nothing comes out properly in XNormal viewer (Small Pic)..what am i doing wrong ?
Can you post your normal map please?
Yup will do in the next 30mins in my other comp.. ill attach it as a jpg because it over 16mg as a bitmap at the minute (i first thought this was the problem.. i.e the size of the file but xNormal produces the same size maps and it works fine ?
okay now we enter the realm of weird (For me anyway 
)...I just attached the jpeg to the model and viewed it in XNormal viewer and it works. although the quality of the Normal map isn't great with a jpeg.it looks washed out..? See Picture
Also please find attached the Normal Map (Jpeg) why is it giving me weird results from Tga,Bitmap generated by PS
1. It could be a problem with mipmapping in your GPU. Update the GPU drivers or change xNormal to OpenGL/DX10. Also sure you aren't using texture compression.
2. Notice xNormal does not support MultiSubObj materials ( it needs 1 mesh = 1 texture ), so you must be very cautious mixing the maps.
3. As a machine gun it's not skinned/morphed you could try to use an object space normal map instead.
Thanks for your quick reply .. it all points to my end and as you said the way my GPU is reading the tex maps.
MipMapping make senses as the model has increased in size (Both Volume and poly count) and the way it looks okay in small parts if you zoom right in. I must of been on the threshold when viewing the individual parts and they looked fine
your input has been great. at least it has eliminated me being the problem which it usually is the quicker i get a new GPU the better !
A question... are you using the 3.17.4 or the 3.17.3? I touched a bit the code to generate mipmaps in the 3.17.4 so perhaps it's a bug. Can you try with the 3.17.3, pls?
Hey ,
Its happens with both 3.17.3 and 3.17.4. ( I updated to V.3.17.4. when i came across the problem last night and it was still causing problems)
Btw, you can try with the Raytracing software driver. I use the CPU and it does not perform mipmapping... just to test.
Hey jogshy,
Sorry the delay between posts i'm working on anther comp with no internet.
Where is the option to change the driver?
Where is the option to change the driver?
Plug-in manager ( left bottom plug icon ) -> Default graphics driver -> Realtime ray tracing CPU
( and remember to change it back to DX9/DX10/OGL because the RT CPU is very very slow ).
Got it. I forgot all about the plug-ins
Yes that works ..changing to Realtime ray tracing CPU brings up the 1st attached Image.. the alisaing is a bit off but no more clipping artifacts.
My GPU is not the best and Im pointing the finger at that.(Even more now)
I've attached a dxdiag of my comp if it helps.(2nd Image) Its not the best Normal map also as there are artifacts etc due to my cages but didnt want to move on or up until I got this sorted to eliminate possibilities
But I have to say thanks a million for all your help.
The fact that I cant view it via XNormal viewer isn't a problem as I have a basic Graphics card .. Im in the process of learning at the minute with regards to Normal maps etc.
If you need anymore info I'll be back at my comp Monday ..I have to say also that XNormal has become a solid kit in my work flow. well done and thank you
Have you tried with the xN's DX10 or OGL graphics driver? As you use W7, it's possible that the manufacturer is not updating the old DX9 GPU drivers but centering in DX10/11 instead.
Take a look also to the NVIDIA/ATI control center options. There should be a thing called mipmap quality there. Maybe you can fix it setting it to the maximum quality.
Thanks man I'll look into all those suggestions, and will post you a final image when I get there
1st class 
P.s if i move close to the mesh the black artifacts move and then disappear and it looks okay for the part im zoomed into kind of
I've made maps in Photoshop loads of times from maps generated by XNormal and never had this problem although this is the first time i have attached a mesh together after baking individual parts ..they all are laid out on Ch.1 in UV space..with no over-lapping.. .its sending me mental because its such a random problem that i dont know whats happening