16 réponses à ce sujet

[Ugly_Duck]

I tested a few textures I'm making, and all looks good so far, but they reflect light & look like shiney metal when I move the camera in the toolset!  How do I fix this?

The shiney-metal look is from the light reflecting off the texture surface.

[dunniteowl]

Sounds like your specular map is too flat. I'm probably saying that wrong. I just saw a convo about this in IRC two days ago and it has to do with the alpha channel for the specular map being completely "flat." Maybe Hellfire or ArtEChoke or some other modeler with mad skilz will come in and assist my floundering attempt here.

From what I got out of the conversation, the specular alpha map has to have a pattern that allows the texture to be more shiny where the highest points of the model being covered by the texture would be and the lower (relative to their position on the model again) or more hidden parts less shiny. I don't know what the color/variance scale is supposed to be like, but it has to do with that and how the texture is to be applied to the model.

You could check some texturing and 3D modeling sites and search for Specular Map, I bet and get some answers pretty quickly.

dno

[Ugly_Duck]

Do you know if that Photoshop Elements 9 bungle I'm getting allows you to edit specular alpha maps?

[dunniteowl]

No, sorry, I haven't used it enough for texturing at that level to have any idea. Get on IRC and grill Hellfire about it. He would definitely know.

dno

(Check the sticky topics in General Discussion for getting in on IRC for NWN2.)

[BigfootNZ]

Edit:- Actually disregard what I just posted.. I think I have a few things backward and ill have to test a few things to make sure what i said is right, the RogueDao link mentions a alpha channel in the base Diffuse map which I didnt realise existed (it could be the spec strength map for the non normal map terrain texture)... At least i know what ill be doing in NWN2 today

Do you have a normal map for the texture?... there are if i remember rightly 3 textures in total.

Diffuse used with normal map, diffuse used for when terrain normal maps are turned off and a normal map.

The shine your experiencing was something I took a while to understand myself, the spec strength map uses the alpha channel of the normal map (its not really a spec map since NWN2's spec map doesnt really work like true spec maps in other games from what i can see, in other engines the spec map is its own texture and it also controls the specs color not just brightness), where spec appears in NWN2 is controlled by the normal map, the strength of the highlight is controlled by the material settings the 3d model is using (I think all terrain mesh has a preset value for these, personally i find it a little to glossy), and the spec strength map in the normal maps alpha channel allows you to tweak the base spec results allowing them as is, or reducing them down to nothing.

So first ill ask what your normal map looks like or if you have a normal map (you should have one since otherwise i think the terrain texture fails to work)... if your normal map is a blank 128,128,255 purple then that might explain your issue, its more or less reading a normal map that is effectivly a flat sheet with no deffinition to catch spec, ie just like a large flat sheet of polished metal. If you have a proper normal map and its still doing this add an alpha channel to it and paste in a copy of diffuse into it and then adjust this alpha channels brightness and contrast down by about 50%, black means all spec highlight will be ignored, full white pixels will use the base meshs material settings at full value, in between greys adjust this. So fiddle with brightness, contrast or curves in this alpha channel untill you have it looking like you want in terms of the strength and location of highlights and it should be ok.

So to simplify what I mean... or attempt to...

Base Diffuse Map - basic texture used when normal mapping for terrain is turned off

Diffuse Map '_c' - texture used when normal mapping for terrain is on

Normal Map '_n' - Used to determine directional lighting/shadow and where spec highlights are placed (basically where ever light falls you have a spec highlight).

Terrain Mesh Material Settings - Used to set the base spec highlight brightness and width (cannot be customized for terrain as far as i am aware)

Normal Map Alpha channel - grey scale image used to tweak the spec highlights the normal map creates, by choosing to allow the full material setting values for highlights or less per the textures pixels.


I havent done much with terrain textures myself, but im going to fairly soon since ive been playing around with nDo recently, does a good job and its free compared to Crazybump... although i prefer Crazybumps realtime viewing.

Heres and old post about it at RogueDao, its not all correct from what I can see but its helpfull.

www.roguedao.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php

Modifié par BigfootNZ, 01 décembre 2010 - 10:02 .

[BigfootNZ]

Well i did some testing and heres what came of it... hope it helps (but given the OP posts date, something i didnt notice at first it might not matter )

-Toolset Icon
64x64 sized BMP representing yout texture that is placed in the Toolset folders terrain folder in the NWN2 main directory.

-Priamary Diffuse
This is the Diffuse used when the game engine has terrain normal mapping turned off (which i might add helps the games performance immensly.. ie up to 10 fps on my machine usually gained having it off)

-Primary Diffuses Alpha Channel
The alpha channel of the primary diffuse is used to control the specular highlights of the Primary Diffuse, normally the Normal map would do this, but when terrain normal mapping is off the primary Diffuses alpha channel is used instead. For most primary Diffuses the alpha channel should be black for best results, but sticking some grey on things such as rocks or noticeable highlight areas in the primary Diffuse can help make it pop.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

-Secondary Diffuse Prefixed with _C
This is the diffuse that is used in conjunction with the normal map, this diffuse should have its larger and even smaller shadows and highlights evened out or removed completely to allow the normal map to diffine that sort of detail and leave the secondary diffuse to only really define the color or detail not present in the normal map. Leave any natural specular highlights the texture might have, but tone them down somewhat since they will be added to by the normal maps specular highlights which could cause some textures highlights to go overly bright.

-Secondary Diffuse Prefixed with _C Alpha Channel
The alpha channel of the _c prefixed diffuse does absolutly nothing so it can be ignored completely.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

-Normal Map Prefixed with _N
Defines the shadows as well as the placement of specular highlights of the texture when normal mapped terrain is turned on.



-Normal Map Prefixed with _N Alpha Channel
The alpha channel of the normal map controls the specular strength of the highlights the normal map defines. Black pixels have no specular, white pixels have their specular set to terrain meshs default value. The terrain mesh has a specific highlight strength and width which cannot be changed. Grey values fit inbetween these two extremes. A completely black alpha channel for the normal map will look odd since only shadows the normal map defines will be present and it will have no specular highlights, which is one reason to leave at least some slight original specular highlights in your secondary diffuse map.

Hope that helps... I think ill make a blog for it also.

[Ugly_Duck]

I'm still interested in this, but my main issue at the moment is, "Will my software be able to edit/make all these different maps?". If not, what do I need to get (preferably free, or reasonably priced is also acceptable).



Current Software I've got:

- Microsoft Paint (windows 7 version)

- GIMP 2.6

- Adobe Photoshop Elements 9



One other thing:

If I can't edit alpha maps, could somebody make a basic one scaled to the correct image size, that stops the light reflection off the texter, and post that on the nwvault? Also, please provide me a link to that download - I would appreciate that very much. I'll be starting my texture pack just as soon as I get my new camera, and finish off my icon pack.



Thanks.

[BigfootNZ]

As long as your image editing software can do alpha channels (which most do ie if it can save out to .tga then it should have support for alpha channels on an image) you should be fine with the alphas, never used Gimp but im sure it can. You'll also want some form of DDS converter either a plugin or a standalone app to convert your finnished textures to DDS once their ready (you dont need to convert them but its better in the long run for everyone)

You might have some problem converting your diffuse into a normal map texture since i dont know if there are any normal map plugins for Gimp... i know Nvidia has a plugin for PS that does it (not that good), I personally use the nDo plugin for PS CS2 and higher now (sure its not as good as Crayziebump but its free at least )... although i think ill eventually get Crayziebump.

You could get others to convert your diffuses into a normal maps for you. In the mean time you could make a simple full colored texture filled completely with 128,128,256 (blue purple color) that is the color that registers completely flat for normals as a stand in.

Modifié par BigfootNZ, 14 décembre 2010 - 08:32 .

[JasonNH]

GIMP has a decent normalmap plugin, as well as a DDS plugin.

[Ugly_Duck]

How do I find these plug-ins?

[Ugly_Duck]

I found the download, but I cant get it to work. I installed it as instructed from the readme file. I also installed the 3 .dll files in the gtk 2.0 folder - said i was missing a file but it was installed. Then I tried to install the .dll files into the same directory as the .exe file, but it still didn't start & gave me an error message saying i was missing the .dll file.



Any ideas on how to run this plug-in?

[JasonNH]

I just followed the directions in the readme file like you described. Then I run GIMP, open the file for which I want to create the normal map, and select:



Filters->Map->Normalmap...



You don't run the executable by itself if that is what you were doing, it is a plugin run within GIMP. The DDS plugin simply shows up as one of the additional file types you can load or save within the program.

[Ugly_Duck]

BigfootNZ wrote...

Well i did some testing and heres what came of it... hope it helps (but given the OP posts date, something i didnt notice at first it might not matter )

-Toolset Icon
64x64 sized BMP representing yout texture that is placed in the Toolset folders terrain folder in the NWN2 main directory.

-Priamary Diffuse
This is the Diffuse used when the game engine has terrain normal mapping turned off (which i might add helps the games performance immensly.. ie up to 10 fps on my machine usually gained having it off)

-Primary Diffuses Alpha Channel
The alpha channel of the primary diffuse is used to control the specular highlights of the Primary Diffuse, normally the Normal map would do this, but when terrain normal mapping is off the primary Diffuses alpha channel is used instead. For most primary Diffuses the alpha channel should be black for best results, but sticking some grey on things such as rocks or noticeable highlight areas in the primary Diffuse can help make it pop.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

-Secondary Diffuse Prefixed with _C
This is the diffuse that is used in conjunction with the normal map, this diffuse should have its larger and even smaller shadows and highlights evened out or removed completely to allow the normal map to diffine that sort of detail and leave the secondary diffuse to only really define the color or detail not present in the normal map. Leave any natural specular highlights the texture might have, but tone them down somewhat since they will be added to by the normal maps specular highlights which could cause some textures highlights to go overly bright.

-Secondary Diffuse Prefixed with _C Alpha Channel
The alpha channel of the _c prefixed diffuse does absolutly nothing so it can be ignored completely.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

-Normal Map Prefixed with _N
Defines the shadows as well as the placement of specular highlights of the texture when normal mapped terrain is turned on.



-Normal Map Prefixed with _N Alpha Channel
The alpha channel of the normal map controls the specular strength of the highlights the normal map defines. Black pixels have no specular, white pixels have their specular set to terrain meshs default value. The terrain mesh has a specific highlight strength and width which cannot be changed. Grey values fit inbetween these two extremes. A completely black alpha channel for the normal map will look odd since only shadows the normal map defines will be present and it will have no specular highlights, which is one reason to leave at least some slight original specular highlights in your secondary diffuse map.

Hope that helps... I think ill make a blog for it also.

Sorry if I don't understand this completely.

How many map layers am I supposed to put over a terrain texture?  Could you simplify thiis a little more for me please - I have no (ZERO!) experiance with this kind of stuff.  If you could walk me through this a little more, I'd be greatful.

Thanks.

[Hellfire_RWS]

you will need to make the



Primary diffuse with alpha

Secondary Diffuse with _c suffix

and a Normal map

[Ugly_Duck]

I apologize for taking so much time in learning this, but I'm extremely greatfull for all of the help you guys have given me thus far.



But I need some more help:

Can someone write me a step-by-step instruction on how to do this using gimp please? From what Hellfire_RWS says, I need 3 maps (or layers?) and such. I don't know how to make the 3 and combine them.

[Ugly_Duck]

Progess update:



I've figured out how to make the 3 images for the texture, but I still can't get rid of the shine on the texture from light sources.



Also, when resizing the images, 480x480 pixils leaves a black box around the texture when painted down - 64x64 works fine for me, but its so small that you can't make out the texture's details.

[dunniteowl]

try something that's a multiple of 24. Something like 256x256 maybe? I thought ground textures were 256x256 or possibly 512x512. They are dimensionally square, though.

dno