Normal map and polypainted map not lining up in external program

[system]

Hey all

I have a small problem I cannot seem to resolve. I have sculpted and polypainted a part of my model. I then export the normal/displacement maps as well as a diffuse map from the polypaint to use in an external program, softimage in this case. Upon rendering in softimage I noticed that the diffuse map and the displacement/normal maps do not line up exactly. Upon noticing the variation; I opened the maps in photoshop where the misalignment was also apparent.

The misalingment is not everywhere and if it werent for particular details, in this case lighter toned stitches on darker leather, it would go largely unnoticed. The problem seems to occur where there was more editing/detail in the model.

I have tried numerous settings on output to no avail. The displacement and normal maps align perfectly as, I assume, they are generated in the same fashion. Yet the color map, from polypainting, is generated in a differently as, I once again assume, there is no low res to high res computations.

I do not have any problems in the uvs and have tried different setups from manually laying out the uvs to auv, guv tiles. The same problem persists.

If anyone has a solution to this minor issue I would be greatly appreciative.

Thankyou

[goast666]

it’s actually a problem with the difference in the raycasting that happens in the normal map generation and the smoothing of the UV’s during the subD process.

The only working fix that I have found is to bake your normals and diffuse map in another application at the same time using the same proxy mesh.

I use xNormal for this. I generate my diffuse, normals, displacement, and AO all within xNormal and the problems with textures not lining up never happens in there as it does in Zbrush.

As a side note, ultimapper in XSI can also do all of this.

I hope this helps.

[system]

Thankyou very much for the tips. Other than knowing where ultimapper is in softimage I have never used it. I will look into both options and see which works best for me.

again, thankyou
Ben

[system]

I have been playing around with xnormal for a bit and have had some trouble producing a quality map. I have tried numerous distance settings from using the built in tool to give distance to guessing and everything in between. Below are some images of part of my map. The model is of leather straps.

Uvs laid out in another program. I do think their could be an issue with the uvs being to tight in areas but I have changed it and tested to no avail. I also tried guv tiles with no luck, as far as I could tell. []

Attachments

[goast666]

I’d need to see your ztool and the lowpoly in order to trouble shoot.

[system]

Images or actual files?

I have been working on it further today and here is what I have found out. Initially I had some floating geometry which was causing some errors, not an issue in zbrush but it seems to be in xnormal. I solved the blurring but i am not exactly sure how. I have not seen it since then.
[]

Still a few errors but I cannot seem to fix them. I am at a point where I am about to call it on this character. He has about 25 leather straps among a lot of other details and if I had to break them all down to get maps I just cannot fathom. I actually thought that rendering the normal maps would be the easy part but in retrospect I should have just painted some bump maps and called it a day. I would say less than 10% of my time has been in the modelling/texturing vs fighting the technology.

Attachments

[goast666]

I needed the actual ztool to trouble shoot more in depth. But you seem to be doing fine. You need to set up blockers on the inside hole (where you’re getting the errors). Your raycasting distance is getting confused by the sharp curve you have on that hole verses the hard angle that is on the lowpoly version.

And yes, the first couple of times you’re creating normal maps you’ll have to fight with it, but after you get your flow down and have a better understanding of how the normal map is generated it will all just flow together.

[system]

I think I skipped the chapter on blockers. I will go back and read up on it. Thankyou so much for your help in this. I think I have most of it squared away.