Ok, how do you adjust the ray depth? I’ve gone through, and can’t find anything on it. Also, why do you suggest using Tangent normals? Any specific reason?
voila encor une autre creation enfin c tupac beta 2.0 ba fini encore
Hmm. I was thinking for some reason that you where generating the normal map in Max rather than in Zbrush. Forget what I said about ray-depth.
Tangent space normal maps are what most objects use. You would probably only use world or local space if you are making an object that won’t deform, and will remain in the same orientation as it was created in. So…virtually all objects use tangent space normal maps. I wouldn’t worry about what doom3 used too much unless you are making something specifically for a doom3 mod…that game used early normal map technology. I work on games and I’ve never seen any normal maps used in games that don’t use tangent space.
Keep up the good work!
I am generating the normal map in max. If I was doing it in ZB, it’d be a snap, but this projection modifier, cage, ray depth, stuff is confusing as hell. I still haven’t been able to find anything on the ray depth stuff. I don’t see it in the RTT dialogue, the Projection modifier, I couldn’t even find anything in the help file that comes with Max. The fleshy bits just need a little more work, and they should be ok, it’s the mech parts that are killing me. But I did have this same problem with another alien I worked on for a while. Everything looked fine, except for certain parts that would always render black no matter what I did.
None the tut’s I’ve read talk about this kinda stuff, they just do their thing, and it goes off without a hitch. I’m getting a little aggrivated here…
Unfortunately the Max docs for projection rendering to texture suck.
I’m not at work right now, but as I recall, to adjust ray-depth you 1) select your lo-res object 2) go to render-to-texture 3) in the projection area, click on “options” 4) adjust ray depth in options, and turn off the cage in options.
The ray depth should be a little bit more than the furthest distance between your lo-res and high-res models. So, if your model is 8 feet tall, the gaps between the 2 versions are probably a few inches or less. If your model is 1000 units tall, the gaps might be around 20 units. Assuming you have ray check on (under ‘options’ in render to texture projection area), areas that are too far out will render as bright red. Simply increase the ray depth until you don’t get red areas.
The seams you are getting may be from smoothing group errors. Often you want most contiguous areas to be the same smoothing group on the lo-res model.
Don’t get too discouraged. Your learning tons of really usefull stuff from this model, and it may turn out totally badass. Your working method of detailing out one limb at a time, then baking it down in Max, is a killer workflow. Try baking out global illumination/ambient occlusion while rendering to texture…it will give a nice start to your diffuse texture map. To bake ambient occlusion just make a pure white skylight, turn lightracing on (rendering->advanced lighting->light tracer), and assign a white material to your high-res model.
Thanks for all the help, kalbers. I know I’ll get it, I just need to keep working at it. And since I really like this model, I WILL get it done right. 
I tried adjusting the ray depth, and I got it to where there were no red spots, but, the vast majority of it is still not rendering right. It shows up as solid colors. And on top of that, I still can’t get the wireframe out of the normal map on the fleshy parts…
I think I’m done for at least a couple of hours. I’ve got so much going on that I can’t think straight, so I keep going round in circles trying to fix the same problems with the same tools that weren’t working to begin with. I don’t like this idea, cause there’s a LOT of pieces to this thing, but I guess just tearing it apart, and doing it piece by mechanical piece is what I’m gonna have to do. I’ll post those results if they turn out ok.
[EDIT] Oh, and thanks for the tips on the ambient occlusion stuff. I do wanna texture this guy too, so that’ll be a great help. One question on that subject though, do you only use the ambient occlusion maps in PS, or is there a way to apply them in Max?
great stuff:D
You can use the ambient occlusion map you bake out as one layer in a multi-layered PSD file, then assign the PSD to the diffuse map slot in Max (like any standard game texture map). Usually I set the blending mode of the ambient occlusion layer in photoshop to “multiply”. Often I bake out a diffuse map while rendering to texture, with some sort of procedural material assigned to my hi-res models (like a flesh material using a Darktree Symbiont shader). That diffuse map gives me my bottom layer in the layered PSD, with the ambient occlusion layer multiplied on top of the diffuse layer. That way I have a nice start of a texture before I even start painting anything in photoshop.
Thanks again, kalbers. I’ll give that a shot after the normal maps done.
akze, MAKAVELI THE DON, sorry I somehow missed your posts. Thanks for the comments, even though I have no idea what MAKAVELI THE DON said… (I tried babelfish, but that translator sucks.)
Ok, I broke down the mech bits into pieces, and I still get that crazy looking normal map. I’ve tried using the cage, I’ve tried it using ray depth, I’ve tried automatic uvunwrap, to see if my uv’s were bad. I’ve officially tried everything I know to do, and some stuff I didn’t know till someone else spoke up, and I’m still getting terrible normal maps.
This thing has got me stumped. I can’t think of a single reason why it won’t work. I even brought it into ZB, and used GUVTiles for the uv’s, and I’m still getting bad results. I’m starting to think this is a Max problem.
Does anyone know of any other decent free normal mapping software? I just don’t know what else to do.
If you’re confortable with the idea, I’d be willing to look at the model and trouble shoot it a bit. Perhaps you could send me just one part of the model for me to look at. I’d need the hi res and low res versions of the part in max format.
My email is [email protected] if you’re interested.
Sure, I could do that. Just to make it easier, I’ll send the whole thing in a rar file if it’s small enough to send. Will the .max file be ok? Or would you rather have obj’s?
I’m trying Nvidias Melody right now, but that thing takes forever. It’s already been running for over an hour, and it’s not even half done.
Ok, I got your file. I just worked on the one organic arm. Here’s what I did:
–Reset the cage, then pushed it out to encompass the hires mesh.
–In RTT Options, I set the Normal Map Space to Tangent. (Though I haven’t worked with the Doom3 engine I’m 99.9% you want tangent space. Not local)
–In RTT I enabled “Render to Files Only” (Why 3ds max doesn’t default to this, I don’t know. TONS of people get caught up on that stupid OutputInto Source/Create Shell crap.)
–OK, this was the real source of your problem: You had a material applied to your hi res object that had a bump map in it. While it can be handy to generate normals with a bump map on your hi res object, (for wrinkles, warts and micro detail you’d rather paint as a bump instead of modelling in,) in your case it was detrimental because the map you had applied was bad.
So really your problem was that you generated a junk normal map by using local space, then mapped that back onto your hi res object, which in turn was used in each successive attempt to generate normal maps again. A vicious circle!
Here’s what it should look like:
http://users.rcn.com/anoon/Strogg_fixed.jpg
Thanks for the help. I’ll give render to files thing a shot and see what happens. I sent you another email about the problem. If you can figure out that part, it would be great. Thanks again.
YES, YES, Y.E.S! I finally got what you were saying, alannoon. I didn’t have a bump map in there, but another normal map, and since max will render whatever’s in the bump slot WITH the normal map, it kept rendering the bad normal map.
I tossed the bad normal map, rendered again, and it looked pretty awful, but better than before. Then it hit me that with all the contours of mech stuff, the cage is overlapping all over the place, and can’t really get any good information to the normal map. I broke it apart, and rendered out just the gun, and it looks pretty spiffy. There’s still some clean up to do, but that just takes time.
this also solves my problem with my other model’s normal maps.
Thank you guys SOooo much for helping me out, especially you, alannoon. I’m now off to do this thing RIGHT! 
Love the progress you’re making. Good lookng stuff there. I’m treading a similar path as yourself currently. High res mechanical modeling is my current shortcoming though. I have an obsession with clean meshes, and adding tons of mechanical detail to a model is not computing with my need for clean geometry. I’d love to take a look at a wireframe of some of you high res mechanical work myself if you’ve got the time.
Replica: No problem, dude. Glad I could be of assistance.
Over the last year I have been bringing our staff up to speed on normal mapping, so I’ve probably encountered just about every 3dsmax related issue associated with it and Render To Texture. The members of this board have been extremely generous with their knowledge in respect to some of the issues I’ve encountered with ZB, so I’m happy to share my knowledge, be it ZB, 3dsmax, or otherwise. 
Thanks, lt_ethe, I feel the same way about mechanical modeling. I like having nice clean meshes for that stuff, but sometimes it just doesn’t work out that way. It kills me when I see great mechanical models with perfectly clean meshes, like the stuff Seneca Menard (from id) does, cause I have no idea how they do it.
Here’s the wire of this guys mech stuff.
I just saw your reply there, alannoon. I’ll tell ya, I’m glad you were here to save my sanity. I won’t say I was about to give up, but I was completely out of ideas, and unable to move forward. Now all it’s gonna take is some work, and I have no problem with that.