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Heath_3d

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Everything posted by Heath_3d

  1. Hi! I'd like to share an artwork I've been working on. Texturing was completely done in 3d Coat. Other aspects used Blender. I hope you enjoy. If you'd like to see clay renders and animation, check out my ArtStation page at the link below: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/w86lvw

    © Heath Freeland 2018

  2. Hi Andrew, I'd like to request to have a "color by depth contribution" option added to the "pressure dependant by" rollout or to the color options. This would be really useful when "additive painting" is turned off in the depth options. As an extension to this, a blend mode of "color by depth contribution" would be a useful addition as well. I feel this would really benefit a lot of people using 3d-coat for texture painting. Thanks, -Heath
  3. Hi Andrew, I've just had a look at the colored spec blend mode and find it mostly great. One problem though is that when using cube mapping(the environment shade option in the view menu) the reflections get tinted a completely different color to what is expected. Metal effects such as gold,brass and copper are especially reliant on colored spec and cube mapping used in conjunction with each other. Otherwise, I actually really like the way the blend mode system works, as it makes it very easy to check subtleties by switching back and forth between colored spec and standard blend modes.
  4. This would be fantastic, a major issue a lot of game artists have with 3d-coat is it's lack of colour spec maps support.
  5. I suggested this a while ago but maybe it flew under the radar(or maybe there's a good reason why it hasn't been implemented ) But the voxel shader library is the only library that seems to not have the drop down "options menu" in the top right corner. Materials, masks, brushes, strips models and splines all have this handy feature but shaders don't. I'd really like to be able to organise my custom shaders into folders like Woods, Stones, Dirts etc. rather than have 150 shaders that i have to scroll all the way through to find the one I'm looking for. Thanks, -Heath
  6. Hi Herve_bis, So the problem here is that you're wanting something not possible in your described workflow. With current VD tech, you simply can't take two arbitrary meshes and turn one into another. As mentioned by Ghib, VD does most definitely require a subdivision workflow(such as mudbox or Zbrush). This is because VDM do not bake from a delta like a normal displacement map, but use the displacement tesselation at render time to determine the final location of the subdivided polygon. It does it this way because when you subdivide a mesh for sculpting, the Uv's are subdivided as well. So the new position of the sculpted polygon can be represented as an RGB value showing it's offset to it's original position. To have a VDM work the way you'd like, would require a lot more calculation with a lot more room for various errors. The Bake would have to take into account edge connectivity, somehow determine what parts of the source and target mesh were "meant" to be representing the same part of the object(so you'd be talking about some sort of difference threshold just for an initial pass) and then you'd have to have something in place for when crazy artists want to put a hole in the sculpt when there are none on the low poly model(one of 3dcoats main benefits is the ability to put holes when and where you'd like). If it's the sculpting tools in 3ds you prefer and that's why you're not using Mudbox, a method that might work is to subdivide your low poly mesh in the topo room over your sculpt(with snapping)a bunch of times(until you get the detail you want), export the new hires retop as an obj. Import the original model as a base layer in Mudbox, subdivide up to the same level you were in in 3dcoat and import the highpoly retop obj as a new layer.... a hassle but it might work. Hope this clarifies a few things for you. Oh, I think the VDM in 3dc is just for when working on microvertex painting. Good luck!
  7. Wow! Thanks for the reply! I just saw the new videos on Rauls blog(farsthary.wordpress.com/) The progress looks amazing and should really resolve some of 3dcoats current limitations as an end to end solution. Thanks again Raul and thanks Psmith for passing this on.
  8. Hi Farsthary, It's really exciting to see you working on these features for 3dcoat. I have a few questions regarding your work. Are these features slated for 3d Coat V4 or are they intended as part of a point update to V3? What sort of mesh res will we be looking at with these features? Will this toolset allow for micro details and sharpness on par with Zbrush? Is the surface sculpting going to be a lot like sculptris, and would it be worth while familiarising ourselves with that tool in order to hit the ground running when these features are implemented in 3d Coat? To clarify the eventual goal: We'll have the ability to work with high frequency details on a voxel object by switching it to surface mode. We will then be able to return to voxel mode and these high frequency details will remain intact over our low frequency voxel model(similar in a way to a texture on a low poly object). Is this right? Thanks for taking the time to read this, I look forward to your reply. -Heath
  9. Well, I'll be a monkeys uncle. I did a couple more tests and it appears that max/LW export works fine..... Sort of. On most of the work we've done there are many materials on individual objects. In this case I noticed all but one material use normal maps with the color orientations as I described above. The one that doesn't, uses the max standard by the looks of things. I'd say that at some point someones decided to bring blender normals into line with Max and Lightwave but there's some legacy issues/bugs. This would explain why some people have been having problems while others haven't. As a disclaimer, I only tested this on blender 2.49 and 2.54 so am not sure as to the consistency of the issue. Also, I tried splitting an object up so that it's individual faces were different UV shells, but didn't notice any problems occurring with more than 15 UV shells. BTW our workflow here has people working on different object parts and then joining them together in blender. Hope this helps in some way with dev. cheers
  10. @michalis Sorry to open your mouth michalis. In regards to doing tests, it goes without saying. My point is purely based on using these two apps together in a production environment. In regards to this blender bug you mentioned, could you point me to a thread, bug report or any other URL regarding it? It would be genuinely appreciated. In regards to the inverted channel "myth", here's a quote right out of the blender manual. Warranted it's talking about the normal maps generated by blender, but it stands to reason that blender would generate normal maps it could then use. "Blender's normal map baking tool is different from other applications, such as xNormal and Maya. Both of these are widely used in the games industry and are already production proven (meaning the way they bake their normal maps is more commonly used and can be regarded as a standard). To convert a Blender normal map to an xNormal, you need to invert the Red and Green channels." I'm not wanting to start an argument or anything, it's just that my experiences with blender normal maps matches what the manual tells me to expect. That said, I opened your file in blender 2.49b and it seemed to work off the bat, so kudos for finding a method that works for you.
  11. Hi guys, Just saw this thread and saw that people are having a few issues with blender normal maps(inverted relief or visible seams). I haven't tried the applink yet but have extensive experience with using 3dcoat and blender in conjunction with each other. The point I want to make is on the how blender treats normal maps compared to Maya and Max/LW(3dcoats natively supported export options). If you're exporting max/LW style normal maps from 3d coat(changable from the preferences) you will need to invert the red channel of those images in photoshop. If exporting maya normal maps you will need to invert both the green and red channels. I'm not sure if this applink already does this and peoples issues are unrelated. I've been doing this manually for a wide range of models for a while, and acheived perfect results every time. Hope this helps with development.
  12. Hi, I think it would be great to have the ability to have retop groups be able to ignore/include the varios voxtree layers. At the moment one of the biggest issues I find with the voxel baking is that you get inadvertant baking of elements onto the wrong part of your retop mesh (eg. curtains being baked to the window as well as the curtain retop mesh). being able to exclude one voxel layer(eg the curtains) from a retop group(eg the window pane retop group) during the baking process would eliminate this problem.
  13. Just to clarify, I am getting a normal map on my new low poly object after baking, But it's being driven by my higher poly objects geometry rather than it's normal maps.
  14. Hi, I'm wanting to use the Retopology tools to make some lower LOD meshes from existing meshes I've created useing 3d Coat. I've textured the higher poly meshes and they have normal maps as well. I can load everything up in the paint room with no problems(including the normal maps) and make the new mesh and unwrap it in the retop room with no problems. When I "merge for per pixel painting with normal map" everything works well except the normals from my original objects normal maps get ignored! In short I can only get the color and specular information from my high poly object. Am I missing something? Any help appreciated, -Heath
  15. Wow, I'd say that's about 50% bugz, 50% genuine feature request. +1 on everything from me
  16. Well, the title says it all really, it'd be great to be able to load 3d objects as custom pens using a .3b file in the same way as .obj is used currently. The key benefit would be that of being able to have textured 3d objects as the basis for the pen color as well as depth. At the moment the "pen from 3d object" seems really good at first, but quickly feels very limited, not even having smooth shading on the selected model as an option. Thanks, Heath
  17. Ultimately I'd like to get a fully fledged terrain shader.I've been having a lot of fun using 3d coat for doing a mesa desert scene I'm working on and would like to do more, but take out a bit of the textureing work. The final custom settings I'd like are: Top col map Bottom col map side col map Top norm map Bottom norm map Side Norm map Slope (Top to Side Blend) Slider Bump Amount Slider Top Specular Amount Slider Side Specular Amount Slider Bottom Specular Amount Slider Cavity Col picker Cavity Col affects COL/SPEC check boxes Maybe this belongs in the features request thread, But as it's the ultimate goal of my current dilemma I thought I'd post it here. Any help appreciated, Heath
  18. Thanks Phil, That got that problem solved. I think the others might be tied into the "Method" section of the variables XML for the shader. When I don't alter the XML file at all, the shader bakes, but only respects the sides color and normal maps. For those in the know, here's the HLSL code with the changes (don't laugh ). // Vertex shader float4x4 g_WorldViewProjectionMatrix; float4x4 g_WorldMatrix; float3 g_ViewerPos; float4 Sphere; float OverallScale; float4x4 ShadowTM; struct VS_INPUT { float3 Pos : POSITION; float3 Normal : TEXCOORD0; }; struct VS_OUTPUT { float4 Pos : POSITION; float3 N : TEXCOORD1; float3 Ps : TEXCOORD3; #ifdef SHADOWS float3 SPos : TEXCOORD2; #endif }; VS_OUTPUT main(const VS_INPUT In) { VS_OUTPUT Out; float4 P = float4(In.Pos, 1.0); Out.Pos = mul(P, g_WorldViewProjectionMatrix); Out.N = In.Normal; Out.Ps = In.Pos*0.005/OverallScale; #ifdef SHADOWS Out.SPos = mul(P, ShadowTM); Out.SPos.xy += float2(1.0/4096.0f,1.0/4096.0); #endif return Out; } // Pixel shader struct VS_OUTPUT { float4 Pos : POSITION; float3 N : TEXCOORD1; float3 Ps : TEXCOORD3; #ifdef SHADOWS float3 SPos : TEXCOORD2; #endif }; sampler ShadowSampler; sampler CustomSampler1; sampler CustomSampler2; sampler CustomSampler3; // Change number one added a couple of custom samplers sampler CustomSampler4; sampler CustomSampler5; float4 Color; float4 CurrColor; float4 ColorMod; float4 SpecularColor; float3 LDir; float3 VDir; float LDiffuse; float LAmbient; float Opacity; float ShadowMin; float Bumpness; float Specularity; float SpecularPower; float4 main( const VS_OUTPUT v ) : COLOR { float mpl=1.0; float4 mxy=tex2D(CustomSampler1,v.Ps.xy); float4 myz=tex2D(CustomSampler1,v.Ps.yz); // Change number Two changed custom sampler for zx float4 mzx=tex2D(CustomSampler4,v.Ps.zx); float4 nxy=tex2D(CustomSampler2,v.Ps.xy); float4 nyz=tex2D(CustomSampler2,v.Ps.yz); // Finally changed custom sampler for zx float4 nzx=tex2D(CustomSampler5,v.Ps.zx); float wxy=v.N.z*v.N.z; float wyz=v.N.x*v.N.x; float wzx=v.N.y*v.N.y; float3 dN=float3(nxy.x-0.5,0.5-nxy.y,0.0)*wxy*Bumpness; dN+=float3(0.0,nyz.x-0.5,0.5-nyz.y)*wyz*Bumpness; dN+=float3(0.5-nzx.y,0.0,nzx.x-0.5)*wzx*Bumpness; wxy*=wxy; wyz*=wyz; wzx*=wzx; mxy=(mxy*wxy+myz*wyz+mzx*wzx)/(wxy+wyz+wzx); #ifdef SHADOWS float3 m=tex2D(ShadowSampler,v.SPos).xyz; float3 d=float3(1.0,1.0/255.0,1.0/255.0/255.0); mpl=clamp(2.0-(v.SPos.z-dot(m,d))*120,ShadowMin,1); #endif float L=length(v.N); float3 N=normalize(v.N-dN); float3 refl = VDir-2.0*N*dot(VDir,N); float S = dot(refl,LDir); float dd=clamp(L-1.0,0.0,1.0); S=clamp(S,0.0,1.0); #ifdef AOPASS float D = LAmbient-LDiffuse*dot(N,LDir)*mpl; #else float D = -LDiffuse*dot(N,LDir)*mpl; #endif float4 C=ColorMod*D*mxy*2+SpecularColor*pow(S,SpecularPower*mxy.w)*Specularity*mpl*mpl*mxy.w; float4 c1=tex2D(CustomSampler3,float2(dd,0)); C=lerp(C,c1,dd); C.w=Opacity; return C; }
  19. Hi Guys, I modified an existing shader to get this result, which is exactly what I'm after(essentially the tree shader with normal mapping for doing landscapes and the like). But a few things were amiss. First, I'm not getting any thumbnail showing up in the shader pallette. Second, when I try to bake out I'm just getting black on my color layer and my normal textures are being ignored. Third, My texture selection buttons don't work at all for the normal map. In short.... It's useless As I'm not a coder at all, I'm actually pretty surprised I got this far; but if anyone can see it in their heart to make their own modified shader to do this, or point me in the right direction I'd be really grateful. Here hoping, Heath
  20. The best approach I've found for doing displacement maps for preexisting models is as follows: The Texture bake tool has the option to import an external mesh as a target model, but it doesn't appear to work properly. Large displacements result in "black holes" in the displacement map regardless of scan depth(bug?). However, you can import your external mesh into the retop room, don't snap the mesh to the voxel sculpt, and export for pixel painting to the texture paint room. This will bake a normal map to the model which you can save for long distance shots, but now when you use the texture bake tool with the option to use the current low poly mesh, you should get a good displacement map. A couple of things to keep in mind are that the scan depth is in pen units so have a glance at the radius of your pen to gauge how far you need to scan. Also make sure you choose the option to maintain vertex positions while smoothing, as that is how the model will look in your external package. If this doesn't work, be sure to check that the problem is on the 3d coat side of things, as different renderers have different zero levels and a host of options for optimizing displacement rendering. Hope this helps, -Heath
  21. Hi Cakeller, Thanks for the reply, I'm using DirectX vesrion. I like the sounds of your ideas, but I like the idea of one master shader as opposed to varios prototypes. It's the same idea as Mental Rays Mia_Material where you can get all the effects you want by toggles in the one shader. I definitely think there should be a way to view only the shaders applied to objects in the scene/current voxel layer as well. regards, Heath
  22. Hi Andrew and Crew, I'd like to request that the same options available for the Material library be made for the Voxel Shader Library. These are in the pop out menu available from the material library that allow you to make folders for groups of materials and change the icon display size. I've started using the complex shader to publish my own variants and it's starting to get crowded very quickly in my Voxel Shader library. Also, It'd be great if the complex shader had the option to put different maps on each side of the cube map, like how the tree shader uses a different map for the top and bottom to the sides. Regards, -Heath
  23. I used that same technique for all the hair and feather follicles on this guy.
  24. Hi Cinnamon, A couple of points that might help you out. First up, the strength of voxel sculpting is to let you be free of certain restrictions of surface sculpting. So if those restrictions aren't a hindrence, use a surface sculpting program. One thing to keep in mind is that you can hide off parts of your object to increase performance(I have to do this in zbrush as well when it comes to detailing). Finally, keep in mind 3d Coats original function: detailing models in the paint mode. The software has great tools for adding really fine detail in texture, these details generally won't need the functionality of voxel sculpting.BTW, don't be too surprised if you get a bit blasted for leaving a negative review of the software on it's own site, however, it's good too know what new users first impressions are of 3dCoat. -Heath
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