Baking Normals
marth_e
Posts: 182
in The Commons
I was wondering which software do you recommend for baking normals. Which one would you say gives you the best results.
I have tried baking in Zbrush using the multimap exporter plugin but I think a lot of the detail from the HD mesh is lost no matter what I do. I have also tried using Xnormal and I think it keeps a little more detail but, as fas as I understand, it doesn't support UDIMs.
Any ideas or recommendations?
Thanks,
Martha
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Comments
Even if it doesn't support UDIMs, as long as it does support different maps for different surface groups you should still be able to use it for a UDIM mesh (or you can collapse the UVs to the unit tile if exporting an OBJ from Daz Studio).
Substance Painter is my favorite for normals :)
Chevybabe25, would you say that baking your normal maps with Substance Painter you can keep most of the details of the HD mesh?
Thanks,
Yes. It is beautiful for normal mapping and its super easy.
I use Zbrush, Mudbox and Substance. Mudbox does a lovely job too but its not as straight forward as Substance Painter.
Thanks a lot for the tips, Chevybabe25. :)
You are very welcome. If you choose to go the route to use substance, drop me a direct message here or in the daz3d slackers discord and ill give ya some easy directions :)
Why not post those instructions here so everyone can see them at anytime?
You know, you might want to rephrase how you say that, as offering to help someone become a substance user just sounds a little wrong.
Ok then :)
Substance Painter - Make 3d Normals directions with a few visuals:
Save out two versions of your object. One that is a smoothed version of your unsculpted object Subd 1 or 2. Sometimes base resolution can give funky normals.
Save out your high resolution sculpt.
Open Substance Painter.
File: New
In the pop up box:
File: Select: Select your smoothed Unsculpted Object.
Leave all the other stuff the same. Click OK.
On the right side of the screen, there is a box "Texture Set Settings" it has a sliding bar along side it. Slide the bar in that box down to see the rest of the options. (See Attachment 1)
Scroll Down to "Bake Mesh Maps" Click on that (See Attachment 2)
In the popup box (See Attachment 3)
Change your"Output Size" to the size you want your maps. If you are working on G8, set it to 4096.
To the far right in that box, you will see a small file icon (circled in the visual) click on that.
Load in your high resolution sculpt.
If you are using this strictly from normals, there is no need to produce all the other maps listed to the left. You can uncheck any of the ones you dont need.
Click on "Bake Selected textures" and watch Substance do its thing.
To export the baked maps:
File: Export Textures
At the popup box:
Output Directory: Make sure you either make note of where Substance is saving your file or change it to your own directory
Have fun :)
XD I wish I paid much more attention in English class. Writing is definitely not my strong suit.
It's too bad that SP can't extract a normal from a loaded texture map. I like SP but that's a limitation that keeps me from fully using it. I don't really sculpt but instead use merchant resources and most do not come with normal maps so I have to use freebie ones to extract and create normal map information.
that stated, Marth E you can use this
http://cpetry.github.io/NormalMap-Online/
I like the results allot and you can have some control using the sliders. You will have to play around with 3D Preview options. I usually switch from Cube to Plane, esp if I want to zoom in, which you can do with your mouses middle scroll button. I usually reset the strength to 1 from the default 2.5 as at that higher setting I get allot of artifacts in my renders, so keep it simple and set to 1. for better results unless you like a really strong Normal map. There are options (tabs) for Displacement, AO and Specular and from either the Displacement or the Specular you can play with the sliders to get really nice Bump maps created. At the bottom there are options to export just the tab your in or all the maps.
Chevybabe25 thank you so much for the info. It has been so very helpful. Really, really appreciate it!!!! :)
Wow, RamWolff. Going to try it too. Didn't know there were online options. Looks very interesting. I'm gonna try it. Thanks a lot!!!
You very welcome!
Also - a Substance Painter trick I use all the time. You can load an existing greyscale bump map into the height channel of a fill layer (turn off all other channels) and you can export is as a normal using Normal+Height+Mesh In the Converted maps options in the export templates.
There's always Blender...
A one minute explanation of How To and a great visual example of what Baking Normals actually means/looks like, in case one wasn't familiar with the term and got hungry thinking Baked Normals were a new foodie dessert trend.
Mmmmm... hot Baked Normals... (Homer Simpson drooling sounds)
And for anyone just interested in making Normal Maps for image based textures there are these two free alternatives...
Materialize: http://boundingboxsoftware.com/materialize/index.php
Awesome Bump: https://github.com/kmkolasinski/AwesomeBump
And if you have Filter Forge...
Bump to Normal Map: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/8297.html
RealNormalMapper: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/8462.html
RealNormalMapper_ABMod: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/8536.html
Normal Map Channels are Offset Maps: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/1477.html
You need Filter Forge to use the Filter Forge filters, of course and the above are more useful for converting bump maps, adjusting normal maps or just tinkering with existing normal maps, but I've found most of those useful to have.