Exporting Textures for Blender

[Shu]

Hello there!

Recently I bought 3D-Coat so I am quite new to this program.

There is already one question I would like to ask:

How do I export Textures from 3D-Coat properly so I can use them in Blender?

I have already found this video:

http://vimeo.com/10890641

But when I export the diffuse map, the specular map and the normal map by clicking Textures -> Export, they will either be empty (when exporting as .png) or completely black (when exporting as .tga).

Hopefully someone can help me here as I would really like to use both, Blender and 3D-Coat at the same time when working on something.

Oh, and one more thing which might be important: I also used Photoshop in order to paint on the object by clicking Edit -> Edit Projections in Ext. Editor.

[Daniel]

what about other file formats? maybe send the scene to workflow@3d-coat.com

[Carlosan]

Hi Shu

what happened when you use to export

File

Export Model

-----

you can use too

Blender applink

http://3d-coat.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=6706

[Shu]

Alright, first of all, thank you very much for trying to help me!

When I export the texture in different file formats, I get the following:

Files being completely black: texture.tif, texture.tga, texture.jpg, texture.exr, texture.bmp, texture.tiff

File being empty (no color at all, I guess because of the alpha-channel): texture.png

File I cannot open: texture.dds

When using Export -> File -> Export Model, the model will be exported as exportedmodel.Obj and exportedmodel.mtl. I can open exportedmodel.Obj in Blender but the model will be without any material. I don't really know about this file, but I guess exportedmodel.mtl is supposed to describe the material. It doesn't seem to be working properly.

I don't know if this helps solving the problem but the file contains following information (opened with TextEdit):

"newmtl VoxMtl

Ns 100.000

d 1.00000

illum 2

Kd 1.00000 1.00000 1.00000

Ka 0.00000 0.00000 0.00000

Ks 1.00000 1.00000 1.00000

Ke 0.00000e+0 0.00000e+0 0.00000e+0

newmtl VoxMtl

Ns 100.000

d 1.00000

illum 2

Kd 1.00000 1.00000 1.00000

Ka 0.00000 0.00000 0.00000

Ks 1.00000 1.00000 1.00000

Ke 0.00000e+0 0.00000e+0 0.00000e+0"

The Blender Applink only seems to work when you have your original object in Blender, exporting it to 3DCoat in order to change it so you can update it in Blender again. My original object is in 3DCoat, though. So I have no object to update from. When I use File -> Export to -> Blender in 3DCoat, 3DCoat will export object.obj and object.mtl without directly exporting it to Blender. When importing that object.obj to Blender, the mesh will be imported but there will be no texture just like when I use File -> Export Model.

Well, as I told you, I am somewhat of a beginner when it comes to digital sculpting so I don't really know about how to do things properly. Do I need to use the UV-section in 3DCoat first in order to be able to export the texture?
Before using 3DCoat, I used Sculptris frequently. Sculptris exports meshes and textures directly as object.obj and texture.png so I can import the object.obj in Blender and assign the texture.png. I am still using Sculptris for basic modelling so I can import a basic model to 3DCoat where I can elaborate its forms and paint on it nicely.

[Shu]

As I cannot edit the post before any more, one more thing:

At some point, 3DCoat seems to have exported more data. There were 3 files I did not notice:

object_superhero_3dcoat_001_color
object_superhero_3dcoat_001_nmap
object_superhero_3dcoat_001_specular
with "superhero_3dcoat_001.3b" being the 3DCoat file name of the file I used and all of them being completely black just like most of the other files I exported earlier.

[Carlosan]

hmmmm

sorry my question but

are you painting over a model with UVset ?

[Shu]

I don't know, what do you mean by "UVset"?

After finishing the model, I just clicked on "Paint" in the upper left corner (next to "Tweak") and painted on the model.

Then I tried to export the painting I've done.

[Carlosan]

you finished the sculpted model and switch to paint room, ok

First you need to bake the painted textures using Retopo room

hope this link help

http://3d-coat.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=14451

[Shu]

Thank you very much!

I will take a look at that and try to export textures then.

[Shu]

Well, I tried using AUTOPO with guidelines now, but I've got a problem there even before I can bake.

As you can see in the images I linked below, the symmetry plane goes off-center and one of the models will be off-center too. Some of the layers are assigned to one of the models, other layers are assigned to the other model. I don't really know what is going on here but the symmetry plane sometimes moves. When using AUTOPO, it seems to move for sure as I tried this several times with each time happening. I have set the Lock Symmetry Plane setting to on, though.

http://s7.directupload.net/images/130710/zsh9qs2v.jpg

http://s14.directupload.net/images/130710/nouoa4z7.jpg

http://s1.directupload.net/images/130710/y77aaxaf.jpg

http://s1.directupload.net/images/130710/xrjwhgyz.jpg

[Carlosan]

sorry i havent a Mac version to test it

please send email and -if possible- link to your project download at

support@3d-coat.com

[Daniel]

send 3b file here: workflow@3d-coat.com

[Shu]

Alright, I am receiving help now. I do not know what is going wrong here, yet. The mesh which appears after using AUTOPO even seems to be distorted.

I have tried different approaches, though. After failing with trying AUTOPO on another model (the resulting mesh was missing its fingers), I used a completely different way without Retopo.

First, I imported a mesh I started in Sculptris. Then I finalized its form in 3DCoat and exported the mesh as an .obj file. Afterwards, I used the "Paint directly over UV-ed model" option which is displayed when you start 3DCoat. Picking the mesh I exported before (.obj file) for that task will open the Paint mode for the mesh where I was able to paint on the mesh and create different layers for color, specularity and depth. Then I only had to export the whole data using File -> Export Model while being still in Paint mode.

This function will create an .obj file for the mesh, a .mtl file and 3 files for describing the material (one describing the color, one describing specularity and the third one describing the depth ("nmap" - normalmap, I guess)).

After this, I imported the material in Blender by doing the following:

(I am not quite sure if this is a 100% correct way on how to do it but the result seems to look like I chose the right settings)

1.: Using Blender Cycles render engine

2.: Creating a material for the mesh

3.: In node editor, the material is made by two shaders combined with "Add shader"

those shaders are "Diffuse shader" and "Glossy shader" being connected like that:

Texture coordinate (UV) -> Image texture (color-map*) -> Diffuse BSDF -> Add shader
Texture coordinate (UV) -> Image texture (specular-map*) -> Glossy BSDF -> Add shader

-> both linked with Add shader to Material Output

For this model, I did not use any depth in the Paint mode. But after testing it just out of curiosity, the following setup works fine:

Texture coordinate (UV) -> Image texture (color-map*) -> Diffuse BSDF -> Add shader
Texture coordinate (UV) -> Image texture (specular-map*) -> Glossy BSDF -> Add shader

-> both linked with Add shader to Material Output

Image texture (nmap*) -> to the Normal input of both, Diffuse BSDF and Glossy BSDF

*Those have been exported earlier being in the same folder as the .obj and .mtl files after exporting the model.

[Shu]

The whole problem is solved now. If someone has the same problem at some point, the following steps solved my problem:

"Autopo works only with global symmetry, so you need to make your object to be symmetrical in global space. So

1) Go to ortho mode (cube icon on top right)

2) [camera]->front, zoom in, show axis

3) Go to transform tool in voxel room, move object to be completely symmetrical - symmetry plane should be exactly along y-axis

4) VoxTree->RMB->To Global space (possibly you may skip this step)

5) Do autopo, but you need to clear strokes and do from scratch" (by Andrew Shpagin)

After step 4, I had to center the symmetry plane again. Then step 5 worked nicely.