4 - Competent Aligning textures in 3DSmax with Gizmo

[Mauler]

This tutorial will cover how to align materials in max to have proper alignment for alpha blends, etc. Pretty much fixes issues with seams on objects in scene.

 

This is a section of my test map that I am having issues on seams. The alpha blended section materials do not align properly and cause it to look unsatisfactory.

 

This gif basically shows how to align all materials in the scene to x,y,z coordinates to 0,0,0. Basically all we do at this point is right click each object that has a material and select 'Gizmo' from the roll out, once selected the small yellow material box will show up.. at that point we will click on the x,y,z boxes on the bottom of the application and it will automatically set it to 0. Do this for every other box. Repeat for all objects that are textured (you will need to apply the gizmo to all UV modifiers to work properly and make sure that all materials have the same UV scales, e.g cliff has a scale of 15x15 planar, all other objects that share that texture must match.)

 

After the gizmo adjusting this is the final product! Very nice!

[moonsense715]

Note: if the uvw scales are different, the seams will still persist, so make sure they have the same scale too, aside from all starting at 0,0,0.

[ChopBam]

I've experienced problems in the past with centering all the gizmos to fix seams. What ultimately solves my non-3d seam problems is collapsing the modifiers and reapplying the UVW maps to the group of meshes as a whole. It's actually a lot faster than centering the gizmos, too, especially with keyboard shortcuts.

[Mauler]

I've experienced problems in the past with centering all the gizmos to gix seams. What ultimately solves my non-3d seam problems is collapsing the modifiers and reapplying the UVW maps to the group of meshes as a whole. It's actually a lot faster than centering the gizmos, too, especially with keyboard shortcuts.

 

Great, more info! Now others can learn more from these comments.

[moonsense715]

But if you collapse modifiers then open the map months later, you will not know the original scale, meaning you have to reapply a lot (if not all) again if you wish to change one. UV channels can and will differ on the materials too, which causes issues if you apply UVWs on a group.

[ChopBam]

But if you collapse modifiers then open the map months later, you will not know the original scale, meaning you have to reapply a lot (if not all) again if you wish to change one. UV channels can and will differ on the materials too, which causes issues if you apply UVWs on a group.

None of this is a problem for me.

 

We use standard 1k textures for our terrain in APB, so I have a standard scaling method that I use for ground and cliff, easy to remember because it's typically universal across three UVW channels. I don't typically collapse my UVWs just before closing, because I collapse with the intention of reapplying after I'm done doing whatever edits I need.

 

Another reason to collapse and reapply is because stacked modifiers can become corrupted and crash the program or even cause file problems.

 

I keep UVW channels the same across all terrain objects. If there's a custom unwrap, it doesn't need to be on my standard channels 1-3.

 

It's very fast once the habit is formed and I can reapply my three UVWs and one smoothing modifier with all their params in under a minute. It is quick, easy, and solves a host of other problems before they even form.

[Raap]

I've experienced problems in the past with centering all the gizmos to fix seams. What ultimately solves my non-3d seam problems is collapsing the modifiers and reapplying the UVW maps to the group of meshes as a whole. It's actually a lot faster than centering the gizmos, too, especially with keyboard shortcuts.

 

That's pretty much how I solve it in most cases, group applied modifiers or copy pasted from the same source.

 

As Chop says the channels are a non-issue. I personally have a standard;

 

1- 1024x1024 resolution UVW scale, typically 5x5

2- noise filter - interior/buildings (shrink wrap)

3- noise filter - exterior (plane UVW)

4- Larger tiled texture, for example on cliffs.

 

I often remove channel 1 UVW modifiers to preserve UVW coordinates for man-made type objects.

 

The only time I've used more channels was for special 3+ pass material effects, but those modifiers are kept separate.

Edited July 31, 2016 by Raap

[ChopBam]

Yes. At the very least they should be instanced.

[Raap]

Yes. At the very least they should be instanced.

 

I personally avoid instancing since I find it awkward to work with.

 

Also note that I largely merge objects that share the same material unless they are far apart (100+ meters), which cuts down on the overal UVW modifier overview.

[moonsense715]

It is easy if you never abandon a map, but if someone else takes it (for instance I took a Reborn map, creator long gone) and - surprise - I didn't automatically know what scaling they had on it so I had to break a lot of perfect alignment and break the scales (map is C&C Under)

[ChopBam]

It is easy if you never abandon a map, but if someone else takes it (for instance I took a Reborn map, creator long gone) and - surprise - I didn't automatically know what scaling they had on it so I had to break a lot of perfect alignment and break the scales (map is C&C Under)

It's easy enough to make your own UVWs if somebody dumped something on you. But what do you mean by "perfect alignment"? Did the cracks in the rock/cliff texture line up with cracks in the terrain model, and you didn't want to mess that up, or...?

[Raap]

90% of my work on APB in BHP was on assets created by other people. Perhaps surprisingly, of all the issues that came with it, material management was not one of them. I don't really know why, but APB assets always were relatively consistent with things like this.

 

I could open up a 2008 asset right now and not have much difficulty seeing where things go. The only problem is the texture file paths.

Edited August 1, 2016 by Raap