XSI Question

Question #1

When I model i have to go inside to
fix problem areas (quite a bit actually, lol)
How do I make the backfaces shade exactly
like the frontfaces?

Question #2

When Importing a model from outside
programs like Zbrush or Maya, the normals
are inverted (depending on what i was doing!).
This is because the copy was scaled negatively
in X and the normals also flip. I have tried simply
to just flip the normals aswell as some of the other
functions I can find. When I have flipped the
normals and then subdivide preview the normals seem to flip!
But here you can see in the last image that the normals are fine!
But they are still showing as though they are black?
What would be causing this? and whats the fix?

Thanks very much for you help.

OK FIXED IT UP, I HAVE EDIT PRIVILEGES NOW

just invert polygons [poly mesh-invert polygons] and you should be fine

when it comes to shading - well that's what I personally love about xsi - I see which faces are facing which way.... no idea why you'd want to have it display differently in the viewport?... it'll render properly.


[just btw it's not an xsi forum so I'd go to autodesk xsi one if I were you ;)]

I can't remember if just flipping normals works to fix this problem (as you say, I get it when importing an XSI model into ZB that has had parts of it duplicated and scaled -1). I do know I used to fix it by selecting all polygons and doing an extract polygons (under Create polymesh). Pretty much brute force but it seemed to fix all normal problems I had. (Do I remember wrong, or do versions of Softimage from 7.5 have tools to actually tweak the normals - I use 7.01.)

I'm not quite sure what your problem is with the shading, but you might like to try turning on the headlamp in visibility options.

Yeah I did post this question on the Autodesk website, no reply's and hardly
any views LOL! (nevermind). I felt that it would be alright in this area of
the forum, since its non Zbrush. But thank you both Magdalena and
bonecradle for answering.

I have the headlight enabled.

I have seen where people that want to have both sides lit, can use an
opengl shader, but they didn't elaborate... ...Also I'm gussing that just like
with most opengl or hlsl shaders, you would be missing out on all of the
other nessesary guides like edges for example.

Magdalena:
Since the post got screwed up you've missed what I meant a bit. Which is
understandable, I can't edit it. I do know how to invert normals. Its just
that once I have inverted them and use subdivide preview (- and +) they
act as though they have flipped. The images here are in order if you save
them to the desktop and open them up, it should make sense.

Also I'd like to say that I love your work.


For some reason a duplicate half of the model, created from an outside
program (sometimes within Softimage), can have the normals fixed in
softimage but when in subdivide preview the object apears black (above the 1st level).

In maya I would just select both sides and go to normals->set to face
and that fixes any normal problems or normals->reverse

in softimage i have to delete one half and symettrise. sweet as.

but thats ok, its not like its holding me up. But I just want to know, so
that I can be grand master champion knowledge leader black belt triple star. LOL

I just jumped onto using Softimage after seeing the tools and compared the
workflow to Maya. So far I really like it, It has given me a tonne of speed
to modeling. Which is strange since I'm supposed to be a biased maya user
:lol:.

In many cases mirroring is a simple duplicate and negative scale on X axe. In that case, the polygon is inverted, that's why it looks flipped. You should re-invert it as Magdalena said. XSI takes care of it auto-magically

The back side will be never shaded as the front side, since it's back side :) you have to give thickness to the mesh, or close to get proper shading. Actually that's why it is called surface modelling :)

Thanks again Jester.

I'm just a Maya user to XSI that wants the comforts of Maya lol. But if it
works for you guys having black backfaces in the viewport, I guess I'll just
have to go with it. The main reason I like to have both sides shaded is when
I make indented stuff. I can go around the back of the object and fix it.
Perhaps fixing up the eye sockets of a head for example. I guess my work
around would be just to simply invert the normals temporarily and do that
instead. Then when its done invert them back again. Would be nice to have
a double sided feature in XSI. But it would be even better if the modeling
tools in Maya were like XSI :lol:.