3DS Max Quick Normal Map Tutorial

    just had my try at this tutorial yesterday and today again and i must say its reallly good

    doesnt say things like "and the rest you should be able to find out" but explains it all from start to finish, which is something i really appreciate about tutorials

    my go looks like this (no real detail or anything and i doubt it can be used ingame for various reasons but still i went through the process of creating a normal map which was really interesting to see - so thanks a ton for that tutorial):

    [Blocked Image: http://www.acumen-design.de/model_pics/wip/thewall/normalmap_try_tut1.jpg]

    [Blocked Image: http://www.acumen-design.de/model_pics/wip/thewall/normalmap_try_tut2.jpg]

    Nice tutorial!

    But i have another question concerning the rendering:

    Is it possible to perfectly fit the render to the size of the plane you project on, so that without croping, scaling etc. in PS you can directly open the perfectly tileable normalmap without black borders (or whatever the color of your background may be)?

    Quote from KIIIA

    Nice tutorial!But i have another question concerning the rendering:

    Is it possible to perfectly fit the render to the size of the plane you project on, so that without croping, scaling etc. in PS you can directly open the perfectly tileable normalmap without black borders (or whatever the color of your background may be)?

    3DS does that automatically if I follow you correctly.

    Quote from Erratic

    3DS does that automatically if I follow you correctly.

    Hmm, didn`t explain it right i guess. What i asked was, if there is a button in Max that fits the renderview to the edges of a model that you get something like this:

    [Blocked Image: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v404/zona69/wall01c_mino_normal.jpg]

    instead of something with black borders like this:

    [Blocked Image: http://www.acumen-design.de/model_pics/wip/thewall/normalmap_try_tut2.jpg]

    That would be really handy cause it would save a lot of rescaling in PS.

    Well you can always snap the lowpoly vertexes or edges to the highpolys outer bounds.

    In the case of the second tex there where you have black boarders you would still get those in the corners tho even if the lowpoly is just on the edges of the highpoly of course since they are chamfered. You can then set the ray check color to the plain normal color (127, 127, 255). Just as I said in the tutorial

    ok i followed this tutorial step by step but it just doesnt render a normal map. it always renders a greyscale (or whatever color the material on my hipoly model has) "bumpmap" tho i have selected NormalsMap as Output element. What have i done wrong? I'm using 3smax 7.

    Quote from Steppenwolf

    ok i followed this tutorial step by step but it just doesnt render a normal map. it always renders a greyscale (or whatever color the material on my hipoly model has) "bumpmap" tho i have selected NormalsMap as Output element. What have i done wrong? I'm using 3smax 7.

    Did you actually open the outputted normal map that was rendered?

    [Blocked Image: http://philipk.net/mapcore/normalmap_tutorial/nm10.jpg]

    Don't forget what you see in the render preview window is NOT the normalmap that was rendered The normal map is saved where you set the file to be saved. Like in the picture. Hope you understand what I mean.

    In response to KIIIA's question about the black borders, I think the solution you are looking for is to change the 'padding' value to 0 under the 'objects to bake' rollout in the render to texture dialogue. That'll make the texture fit the outputted file neatly.

    Or else, checking the 'Nearest Power of 2' flag at the bottom of the render2tex dialogue seems to make the texture fill the entire render window, though then it must be resized if it is not on a 1:1 ratio.

    That's pretty cool (allthough there are some "unnormal" things in it) - you may consider to post this in the random texture thread instead of a half year old tut thread

    Hmm. Weird. Seems perhaps like you rendered it with a cage.

    Goto "options" in your render to texture window and uncheck use cage.

    Also try and move your lowpoly plane further back perhaps.

    It does look like some ray missing/fckup kinda.

    Also I'd recommend you to add some support edges close to the extrudes on those large plate areas if you don't want those too look all that roundish later.

    Hi, sorry to revive this old thread (although it is a very useful normal mapping tutorial so I shouldn't be sorry at all!), but I have something to add to it.

    This is an alternative method of rendering the normal, without using projection mapping but instead rendering from an orthographic camera, using a script called NormalTexMap.

    This script works for 3D Studio Max 5+ and allows you to apply a normal map material to an object, which when rendered will display the normal relative to the camera location.

    Here is the script:

    http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/normaltexmap

    Unzip this to your 3dmax/plugins directory

    First, apply and set up the new material type for your object (very simple):

    - Set up your object exactly as Phil describes, but do not create the projection plane as it is not needed.

    - In the object's material, apply 'NormalTexMap' to your Diffuse, tweak its settings if needed, and then set the objects Self-Illumination to 100 (very important!).

    If you were to render the object as it is now, the result would be a normalmap render derived from the camera's viewpoint (unless you changed a setting), so next you must set up a camera to neatly frame the texture.

    Set up your camera and renderer:

    - Change your output render size to the size of the output image you wish (eg, 256x512).

    - Create a target camera, pointing directly at your object. Move the camera to the dead-center of the object. The target position must make the camera angle perpendicular to the object, but its distance from the camera does not matter.

    - Change the camera type to Orthographic.

    - Change one of your viewports to your Camera view, and turn on 'show safeframe' so you can see what it will render.

    - Set the camera FOV to 90 (Do not use the corner-to-corner lens measurement type).

    - In the last section of the Parameters roll-out, change the Target Distance to 1/2 the height of your OBJECT, or else if that does not neatly fit the texture, change the value until it does (It should be 1/2 of either the width or height of the object).

    Once all that is done, then preferably lock your camera view, as if it is set up correctly you need never change it again!

    Use supersampling methods as you like through the normal render dialogue (F10), as Phil suggests.

    Now, whenever you need to get the normal map from the object, just render from that camera.

    This method does not really have any benefits that I can tell over the projection method, except that it involves a little less dialogue management, and gives you full control over the render output in terms of rotation/scale/etc. What the camera sees is what you get.

    This also allows you to easily render multiple objects so long as they all have the NormalToTex diffuse material. Just remember to keep Self-Illum at 100, or else the renderer will apply shading from the object

    Also, in case there is concern for whether the resulting normal map is different somehow, I have compared this method against the projection method, and both resulting normal maps are identical.

    That is all. Thanks again to PhilipK for a great tutorial!

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