Texture Presentation

[Diego]

yeah, that looks pretty damn good! i dont see why change to match the t2 one..

[Renzatic]

I've started making a normalmap for BT's brick wall texture in Max, looks like all the practice is finally starting to pay off....slowly...

 

 

Corth is helping me finish it up, so BT should have his wall completely normalmapped shortly.

[Corth]

Yeah, Ren looked like he needed a bit of help :lol:

 

Here's what the normal map will be derived from:

[BlackThief]

hey that looks fine - I'm really looking forward to that normalmap

[Renzatic]

Man, that's awesome. How were you able to do it?

[Corth]

ok, so I completely bunked up. I converted the mesh to obj and sent it to Renz, then I deleted everything from my HD. Big mistake

 

now I gotta do it again. Renz, it's mostly a bunch of manipulation of the phototexture, and knowing how your app handles displacement maps.

 

Anyway, here's what I've come up with so far:

 

[Corth]

here is the normal map and specularity map on one polygon:

 

[Renzatic]

 

It be be-you-ti-ful. I've gotta tone down the spec map a bit, but the normal is dead on excellent stuff.

[Renzatic]

I decided that BT's wall would be a good chance to test out glossmaps, which you can find here.

 

The lighting is exactly the same in all 3 shots, as is the specular (which is brighter than it should be for the test), this is what I've come up with.

 

High glossiness

 

The surface almost appears to be made of plastic, the sheen is way too high for a brick wall.

 

Medium-low glossiness

 

Getting better, still a little too shiny

 

low glossiness

 

The lighting appears almost chalky on the surface, good for a wet wall or sewer.

 

If any of you claim to not notice any difference, save all 3 and check them out in full screen in irfanview. It's fairly damn dramatic.

[BlackThief]

wow that's a awesome normalmap

 

I think glosslow looks quite realistic, but glossmed isn't bad either.

 

 

BTW I noticed that you can see a thin black line on that shot. not sure if it's caused by the specular or by the normal map - but I guess it wouldn't be a great thing to fix that.

Edited March 5, 2005 by BlackThief

[oDDity]

A brick wall doesn't need even need a spec map, just a black one will do. Dry stone and brick are too rough and porus to have much specularity. Try it with a black spewc map and no glossmap, that will look fine and be zero effort.

[Corth]

If the brick is wet, or in a damp place, it will need a specularity map

 

That black line was (I think) because of the normal map, I've fixed it up, you can dl it here. If the black line is still there it'll most likely be from the texture.

[Renzatic]

A brick wall doesn't need even need a spec map, just a black one will do. Dry stone and brick are too rough and porus to have much specularity. Try it with a black spewc map and no glossmap, that will look fine and be zero effort.

Almost everything has a tiny bit of specularity to it, save for certain surfaces like dry wood or sponge.

 

Rock walls would have some shinyness along the surface. Places where the rocks are a bit smoother and a slight bit more reflective would give off a subtle sheen in certain lighting conditions.

[oDDity]

Depends entirely on what kind of stone it it. Chalky stone has no spec, whereas flint stone (meet the flint stone) has got spec. Almost all kinds of brick are clay based and have virtually no spec.

Don't get caught up in 'ooh, doom has spec maps, cool - lets put one on everything'

[Renzatic]

Don't worry about me going overboard with the specs, cept for the gallery wall texture I've kept em under control.

 

As for the bricks, they won't have much specularity at all unless they're cut directly from stone and aren't baked at all...but you also have to take enviromental touches into account when you're making em. Like if it's exposed to the elements it'll probably have alot of random crap growing on it, which will make it look nice and shiny.

 

So for an interior wall you'll wanna go with a low spec, if you go for one at all. For something underground, or a neglected outside wall, you'll want a mid spec with a mid-low gloss applied to it.

[oDDity]

No brick is cut directly from stone. The definiton of a brick is a clay based cake that's been baked in the sun or an oven.

No brick has specularity, except temporarily while wet, and weathering doesn't not change that.

Specularity doesn't actually exist in the real world, it's a CG term. It's a way of faking reflectivity, and reflectivity is actualy want you see in real world surfaces.

[Springheel]

I've been quietly working on a few mansion textures. Here's the first one that seems complete, an ornate wood panel:

 

 

The wooden frame could use a better normalmap if anyone's up for it. I'm going to leave it to Corth or Ren to tidy those up.

[BlackThief]

WOW that's awesome! great work spring

[New Horizon]

That's awesome Spring. Great job.

[sparhawk]

That looks absolutely good!

[Renzatic]

Damn awesome, Spring..I like it.

 

You could do a heightmap and convert it to a normal fairly easily with that texture, just do a simple version in black and white with a gradiant along the edges. If you do it right it'll turn out really well when ran through the NV plugin.

[Macsen]

Top class Spring.

[Springheel]

You could do a heightmap and convert it to a normal fairly easily with that texture, just do a simple version in black and white with a gradiant along the edges.

 

What do you mean by a gradiant?

[Springheel]

Here's another mansion door:

 

[New Horizon]

Nice work Spring! That's the style we're looking for.