Apache Chassis texturing problem

# 1 11-04-2005 , 08:06 PM

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Need some advice Kari; When I originally textured my model, it took me well over a week to do as it was my first experience with texturing, and although the first 3 tutes are understandable, it didn't prepare me for a complex item like the chassis. I managed to stumble through and was quite impressed with the end result of the entire Apache. However, the bump mapping was quite a reality shock, but the tutorial was excellent in explaining the principle. Unfortunaltely I had messed with the UVs too much on the chassis for my bump lines to stay straight, and I quickly decided to move on and finish the project which you know I now have. Anyway, I went back to it this weekend and laid out my UVs differently and with an idea how they should look at the end. It took my an eternity to do this one object, not helped by the fact that I think it got too heavy for that DannyGnan tool, as it crashed my machine repeatedly when I pressed the map faces button <I think the solution to this is to map them every so often and not wait till the end for one big mapping process, and I'd love to know if that is right Kari?>. In the end I managed to do it by Automatic mapping and a coulple of hours of sewing believe or not, and my UVs were as good as I could get them... but here's where my problems started. The small wing you show how to map takes up nearly all of a 512 canvas and bump mapping this was a breeze, but always in the back of my mind I have been sruggling with the concept of "resolution" in 3D software, as I am more a specialist with 2D imagery. So, when I bumped mapped the chassis using a 1 pixel line, it looked way too fat on the chassis as 1px a far higher percent with this image on a 512 texture, than the little wing was. Not only that, but you could see terrible stepping on angled lines. I quickly understood the resolution problem but was not sure as to what to do about it in the right way. I tried with a 1024 texture and things improved but not enough, then I did it with a 2048 texture and it looks great but unfortuanately other problems started to appear. The first problem is that, I now can notice a difference in indent width between it and the wing, and although it is not much and I'm not bothered about it, it did set my mind working on how to overcome this in the future, and a bigger probelm is that selecting any object and shift selecting my camo shader, in order to convert it to a file texture, won't work at a 2048 setting? it will at 1024 so is that the limit I wonder?
In conclusion I suppose I have a few questions which are:
1. Are there limitations with the DannyGnan script?
2. Can I have different size textures on the same model? i.e 512 on everything but 2048 on the the chassis?
3. If I use larger textures, what effect, if any, will that have when rendering the final animation? (as in the render time length)
4. Lastly, can you advise on that "convert to file texture" problem I mentioned above?

Sorry to everyone that this reads like the bible, but I wanted it to help anyone who takes this model on, whom might have as little experience at texturing that I had.

Thanks in advance

Smokey

There are 11 types of people in the world, those you understand binary, those who don't and those who have a life (my own variation)

Last edited by smokeyb; 11-04-2005 at 08:10 PM.

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# 2 12-04-2005 , 06:43 AM

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1. Not that I know of. How much RAM do you have? You might be running out of memory...

2. Yes you can have different sized maps. To have your bump lines appear same width and depth you have to do some experimenting.

3. Larger textures do have an effect in the render time. They take longer to load and they take more RAM.

4. You should be able to do this. It will take longer to convert to 2k maps though. Again this sounds like you're running out of mem.

Doing UVs properly on a complex object will take a lot of time. Unfortunately that's just how it is. And if you just bodge them quickly it will show in the end.

My chassis textures are 2k maps. Here's what my UVs look like (scaled down to 512x512):

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Kari
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Do a lot, Fail a lot and Learn a lot!

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# 3 12-04-2005 , 02:34 PM

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Ah... I never thought of RAM as it has never been an issue with my other software, but we are talking 3D software here aren't we. I have 3 machines: one is a 2.6Ghz Intel pentium with 1Gb or RAM, Another is a 3Ghz Intel pentium with 1Gb of RAM, and the last is a Centrino system, running a 1.7Ghz Pentium M (has to be to have a Centrino badge I know) also with 1Gb of RAM. All my systems memory consists of 2x 512Mb boards, and 1Gb singles cost a flipping fortune at present, so I'll have to live with what I have for now and devise work-arounds.
Thanks for the advice, and I can see from your UVs that the main part of your chassis is a lot larger than mine which would help with finer detail with a bump map, and I may do it one more time before I settle for the UVs for good.
Thanks again
Smokey

There are 11 types of people in the world, those you understand binary, those who don't and those who have a life (my own variation)

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# 4 12-04-2005 , 02:42 PM

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looking closer at your UVs, I can't see the interior to the Chassis? Did you not map them or did you make the interior a seperate object, or am I missing something?
Thanks

There are 11 types of people in the world, those you understand binary, those who don't and those who have a life (my own variation)

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# 5 12-04-2005 , 04:29 PM

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I have 1 meg of ram and have no problems with the Danny script.
I have also used it with a machine that only has 512 meg ram...
I think its something else.

Try re-downloading and installing it again...
What verson of Maya are you running the script with ?

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# 6 12-04-2005 , 06:11 PM

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uberstonks: I take it you mean 1 Gig of RAM but it wasn't the script didn't work, it was it wouldn't work when I had mapped the entire chassis without periodically pressing the map faces button. Unlike Kari's clean latout above, I has numerous little inside bits and the entire interior mapped before I pressed map faces, and the result was it just froze on me. It didn't have any problems with any other component but the were a lot less complex and a good deal smaller. It actually froze when I first mapped the chassis about a month ago and I ended up mapping a section at a time, which worked fine. I think that Kari is right about it being memory, as this model is very heavy and does challenge my machines occasionally. But thankyou for the input which I will never refuse.
Smokey

There are 11 types of people in the world, those you understand binary, those who don't and those who have a life (my own variation)

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# 7 12-04-2005 , 10:52 PM

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Originally posted by smokeyb
uberstonks: I take it you mean 1 Gig of RAM

Originally Posted by

Hehehehh Yup I sure do.. silly me

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# 8 13-04-2005 , 07:22 AM

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Originally posted by smokeyb
looking closer at your UVs, I can't see the interior to the Chassis? Did you not map them or did you make the interior a seperate object, or am I missing something?
Thanks

Originally Posted by

The interior is there. The four bigger shells at the corners of the snapshot...