Hey I got a really annoying problem here, look at the screenshot:
From the (3ds max front view) the models look fine with nice lightning effects etc., usually the left side of the model is also ok, but the back is always some kind of blue while the right side seems green.
When I rotate a model the shading and lightning effects should make the front sided parts of my buildings look like the right building's front, but it stays some kind of green, this really sucks and I have no idea how to fix it. Could have something to do with smoothing groups maybe?
I tested this also with a simple box but it gets the same error. Front and left side work well while right side and back are grenn/blue :(
Check your object's orientation in max. it should be x-0,y-0,z-0(or any). The thing here is your model is rotated probably facing down or up in max. Reorient back to x-0, y-0 in rotation, then going to the sub-object level fix the rotation there.
I do it via the element level after fixing the orientation at the object level.
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Whatever you do, wholeheartedly, moment by heartfelt moment, becomes a tool for the expression of your very soul.
Quick question - did you check if your m2 importer can import WoW models from Cataclysm yet? I haven't been able to check myself but I was trying to pull models out of a pre-cata patch mpq (namely the Netherdrake) and the importer refused to import them. I figured the format changed... but I'm not sure.
One has normal map, and other has normal and specular map.
All maps work fine, except when I add specular map I get those shading problems. I used PS and CrazyBump to create specular map. Tried different type. Anyone solved this problem ? Or its caused by lack of features that exporting tool is offering us ?
Specular kind of affixes its own "shine". The shinier the section, the more it "shines" when the light hits it. Just like the Arbiter model I've textured. So, say your areas there are not supposed to "shine" within a certain degree of light, what you want to do is reduce the white level in your specular map.
If I remember correctly, specular must also have the same settings in the channels in PS. (I'll have to double check this later.)
I hope this helps.
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Whatever you do, wholeheartedly, moment by heartfelt moment, becomes a tool for the expression of your very soul.
Ok. I will try few tests tonight if I will catch a time. If I will still get errors I will send you model and spec map ok ? Then you can make and example (partial texture) so I can see the difference...
Look at that 1st picture I attached. Zoom at model on the right. Notice shadow lines are like tearing apart. They are not smooth.
Aha! It looks like your texture has either: Those parts with high specular, or did not fit well into the uv.
Try to draw the specular past the UV lines. On the specular map, try removing specular on areas that will not likely get lights from the key light. I keep specular just on surfaces that will get lights from the key light.
I'm really busy though.
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Whatever you do, wholeheartedly, moment by heartfelt moment, becomes a tool for the expression of your very soul.
omg. tigeria! I was at the brink of madness until I discovered... "The specularity spinner"! It might be the cause! If the map has 0 specularity it will create such a problem. With specularity, everything will be fine.
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Whatever you do, wholeheartedly, moment by heartfelt moment, becomes a tool for the expression of your very soul.
I am potentially working on a .m3 Import plugin for Cinema 4D (it's fate is undecided at this point). I have found NiN's script(s) to be extremely helpful (big thanks NiN!) in figuring out what's currently known of the format, along with the available blender scripts and various websites where the structure is being documented.
So far, I have the mesh (and materials) loading fine and I also have the bones loaded and skinned, but here's the problem(s) I'm having...
I currently don't own SCII :). This means that the only .m3 files I have access to are generally the ones I can download from sites like this. It also means that I don't have any good 'reference' viewer.
I do not own Max. This means that I have no means of trying/running NiN's scripts and... again, no means of seeing the results, inside Max.
...so, here's where the above is an issue... Cinema 4D's native orientation / axis is different from Max - in particular 'Y' is 'Up" (like it should be :) ). I have plenty of code and experience in dealing with this, but I'm having trouble getting the Base/Bnid-Pose bone orientations to look anything like I think they 'should' look ie. I would 'expect' the bones to be 'oriented' along the length of the bone on one of the major x/y/z axis, but they are not. The problem is that some meshes that I've looked at (the IREF matrices) are _clearly_ not aligned to any bone-related axis - for example any/all of the ones that were converted from WoW all use essentially Identity Matrices as the IREF matrix. And all of the other non-WoW mehes that I've looked at so far seem to have wacky bone orientations.
I know that animations 'can' still work (particularly if they are mostly translation keys as opposed to rotation keys, or if the animator used IK for everything, they may not have cared about orienting the bones, etc.), but I'd like to _know_ that I have them oriented as intended before I move on to animations.
What would help me tremendously is seeing a screen-shot of say the downloable Kerrigan model imported into Max, with an arm-bone seleted, so that I can see what direction the bone axis is pointing. And/or is there any model (downloadable .m3 file) someone can point me to that they know the bones are aligned in a FK-type setup?
Any help would be appreciated - thanks.
[p.s. @NiN - I posted a bug over in the comments section of the latest script download page]
Here's a quick ss of the Kerrigan Ghost model by Underp4ntz from here... the second image shows the mesh turned off and the bones enabled, with the upper arm selected... as you can see, the (red/green/blue) axis indicator is not at all aligned along that bone (ie. towards the elbow).
Thanks for picking up on that bug in the script, I'll get it fixed for the next update. I'm glad more people are taking an interest in developing M3 tools for other programs than max.
On to your technical question, the bones gave me a great deal of problems when I first started trying to get the models into 3ds max. Infact, they're still not done entirely correct when I import them. The envelopes are incorrectly done, there should be bone geometry linking the bones too instead of using the 'show links' method I'm using on import. These things I don't know how to fix properly in max, most of the systems I tried failed and ended up causing the bones to be shown incorrectly.
The IREF chunk in the model, from what I understand, is the 'Initial Reference' inverse matrix for each bone object. That is, the matrices for each bone when the geometry (i.e. vertices of the mesh) is skinned onto them. I don't think they're meant to have a bone related axis at all. They're almost certainly processed before the bone chunk of the model, so things such as the bones parent aren't even considered at the point the IREF is processed. The IREF matrices put the bones in the correct position/orientation/scale for binding the vertices to them. I'm not sure if you can deduce a bone axis from them, I never had to deal with that problem.
I don't really think the bone systems in M3's or any of Blizzard's model formats are aligned along the bone, rather they are simply objects in 3D space that affect each other in a hierarchy, if that makes any sense. You'll notice in my script bone hierarchy is setup after the inverse matrices are applied to each bone and that all animations are done starting from the deepest bone in the hierarchy and then moving upward. If you figure out anything let me know.
ATTACHMENTS
ZealotBoneArm01.jpg
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I got problem with specular map and its shadow/light casting on the model that has specular map.
Anyone got fully working custom SC2 model ?
Check your object's orientation in max. it should be x-0,y-0,z-0(or any). The thing here is your model is rotated probably facing down or up in max. Reorient back to x-0, y-0 in rotation, then going to the sub-object level fix the rotation there.
I do it via the element level after fixing the orientation at the object level.
Whatever you do, wholeheartedly, moment by heartfelt moment, becomes a tool for the expression of your very soul.
Quick question - did you check if your m2 importer can import WoW models from Cataclysm yet? I haven't been able to check myself but I was trying to pull models out of a pre-cata patch mpq (namely the Netherdrake) and the importer refused to import them. I figured the format changed... but I'm not sure.
Best regards.
Bump
Can you clarify your problem, tigerija?
Whatever you do, wholeheartedly, moment by heartfelt moment, becomes a tool for the expression of your very soul.
Is there a way to export a model to M3 without 3ds max like another program? What happened to Blender plugin...
Attached pictures.
One has normal map, and other has normal and specular map.
All maps work fine, except when I add specular map I get those shading problems. I used PS and CrazyBump to create specular map. Tried different type. Anyone solved this problem ? Or its caused by lack of features that exporting tool is offering us ?
Tnx,
Specular kind of affixes its own "shine". The shinier the section, the more it "shines" when the light hits it. Just like the Arbiter model I've textured. So, say your areas there are not supposed to "shine" within a certain degree of light, what you want to do is reduce the white level in your specular map.
If I remember correctly, specular must also have the same settings in the channels in PS. (I'll have to double check this later.)
I hope this helps.
Whatever you do, wholeheartedly, moment by heartfelt moment, becomes a tool for the expression of your very soul.
Ok. I will try few tests tonight if I will catch a time. If I will still get errors I will send you model and spec map ok ? Then you can make and example (partial texture) so I can see the difference...
Look at that 1st picture I attached. Zoom at model on the right. Notice shadow lines are like tearing apart. They are not smooth.
Aha! It looks like your texture has either: Those parts with high specular, or did not fit well into the uv.
Try to draw the specular past the UV lines. On the specular map, try removing specular on areas that will not likely get lights from the key light. I keep specular just on surfaces that will get lights from the key light.
I'm really busy though.
Whatever you do, wholeheartedly, moment by heartfelt moment, becomes a tool for the expression of your very soul.
omg. tigeria! I was at the brink of madness until I discovered... "The specularity spinner"! It might be the cause! If the map has 0 specularity it will create such a problem. With specularity, everything will be fine.
Whatever you do, wholeheartedly, moment by heartfelt moment, becomes a tool for the expression of your very soul.
You mean this ?
http://img151.imageshack.us/img151/9046/speco.jpg
I tried setting it to 35 also.
I think I gonna just make new model. Some kind of ball and test with that. When I get time. Havent done anything since then.
I'we only seen Triceron made it. But he is not responding...
specularity of about 80-100 is typical for models i've worked on the higher the number the less visibile it is apparently. in my experience.
Do you have some kind of example ? Custom Sc2 model.
Yeah that's it tigerija.
Higher specularity means the white is smaller. The specularity is focused on a small area. Lower makes it spread out more. Put it on 30 and test.
Whatever you do, wholeheartedly, moment by heartfelt moment, becomes a tool for the expression of your very soul.
Oh, ok tnx. I tough that 1 is 100% xD.
I will test it tomorrow with new model and then I'll give post results.
Hi gang,
I am potentially working on a .m3 Import plugin for Cinema 4D (it's fate is undecided at this point). I have found NiN's script(s) to be extremely helpful (big thanks NiN!) in figuring out what's currently known of the format, along with the available blender scripts and various websites where the structure is being documented.
So far, I have the mesh (and materials) loading fine and I also have the bones loaded and skinned, but here's the problem(s) I'm having...
...so, here's where the above is an issue... Cinema 4D's native orientation / axis is different from Max - in particular 'Y' is 'Up" (like it should be :) ). I have plenty of code and experience in dealing with this, but I'm having trouble getting the Base/Bnid-Pose bone orientations to look anything like I think they 'should' look ie. I would 'expect' the bones to be 'oriented' along the length of the bone on one of the major x/y/z axis, but they are not. The problem is that some meshes that I've looked at (the IREF matrices) are _clearly_ not aligned to any bone-related axis - for example any/all of the ones that were converted from WoW all use essentially Identity Matrices as the IREF matrix. And all of the other non-WoW mehes that I've looked at so far seem to have wacky bone orientations.
I know that animations 'can' still work (particularly if they are mostly translation keys as opposed to rotation keys, or if the animator used IK for everything, they may not have cared about orienting the bones, etc.), but I'd like to _know_ that I have them oriented as intended before I move on to animations.
What would help me tremendously is seeing a screen-shot of say the downloable Kerrigan model imported into Max, with an arm-bone seleted, so that I can see what direction the bone axis is pointing. And/or is there any model (downloadable .m3 file) someone can point me to that they know the bones are aligned in a FK-type setup?
Any help would be appreciated - thanks.
[p.s. @NiN - I posted a bug over in the comments section of the latest script download page]
Here's a quick ss of the Kerrigan Ghost model by Underp4ntz from here... the second image shows the mesh turned off and the bones enabled, with the upper arm selected... as you can see, the (red/green/blue) axis indicator is not at all aligned along that bone (ie. towards the elbow).
@Phygit: Go
Hey Phygit,
Thanks for picking up on that bug in the script, I'll get it fixed for the next update. I'm glad more people are taking an interest in developing M3 tools for other programs than max.
On to your technical question, the bones gave me a great deal of problems when I first started trying to get the models into 3ds max. Infact, they're still not done entirely correct when I import them. The envelopes are incorrectly done, there should be bone geometry linking the bones too instead of using the 'show links' method I'm using on import. These things I don't know how to fix properly in max, most of the systems I tried failed and ended up causing the bones to be shown incorrectly.
The IREF chunk in the model, from what I understand, is the 'Initial Reference' inverse matrix for each bone object. That is, the matrices for each bone when the geometry (i.e. vertices of the mesh) is skinned onto them. I don't think they're meant to have a bone related axis at all. They're almost certainly processed before the bone chunk of the model, so things such as the bones parent aren't even considered at the point the IREF is processed. The IREF matrices put the bones in the correct position/orientation/scale for binding the vertices to them. I'm not sure if you can deduce a bone axis from them, I never had to deal with that problem.
I don't really think the bone systems in M3's or any of Blizzard's model formats are aligned along the bone, rather they are simply objects in 3D space that affect each other in a hierarchy, if that makes any sense. You'll notice in my script bone hierarchy is setup after the inverse matrices are applied to each bone and that all animations are done starting from the deepest bone in the hierarchy and then moving upward. If you figure out anything let me know.