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Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#1 Old 3rd May 2012 at 9:53 PM
Default Alternative ways of making good Multipliers ?
Any other ways besides blender?I can never get my multiplier to look good using blender.I use paint.net and use a blur effect.But it never looks right.
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Alchemist
#2 Old 3rd May 2012 at 10:18 PM
Quote: Originally posted by MarcusSims91
Any other ways besides blender?I can never get my multiplier to look good using blender.I use paint.net and use a blur effect.But it never looks right.
What is the problem with the Multipliers Blender is making and how are you going about making them?
Née whiterider
retired moderator
#3 Old 3rd May 2012 at 11:43 PM
If you struggle with Blender's multis, you can always hand draw them - tools like bevel/emboss, drop shadow and so on can be used to great effect to make nice, professional-looking hand drawn multis without actually, y'know, drawing everything by hand.

What I lack in decorum, I make up for with an absence of tact.
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#4 Old 7th May 2012 at 9:36 PM
Thanks, are those tools in Paint.net ?
Quote: Originally posted by orangemittens
What is the problem with the Multipliers Blender is making and how are you going about making them?


I go off of the tutorial posted here.How ever Im not sure if its because I dont UV map right or what but it never turns out right.
Im going to make an example on a couch Ive made and post screens.
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#5 Old 7th May 2012 at 10:02 PM
Morphead tutorial.





Its actually came out better than before. I usually leave output as bmp but this time I changed it to DDS. However it still looks weird.
Screenshots
Alchemist
#6 Old 7th May 2012 at 10:57 PM
Quote: Originally posted by MarcusSims91
Morphead tutorial.





Its actually came out better than before. I usually leave output as bmp but this time I changed it to DDS. However it still looks weird.
Do you have all the faces that require different depth of shadow mapped to different places on your map?
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#7 Old 8th May 2012 at 12:30 AM
I think so.If im understanding correctly.So in order for this to work, the faces in my map has to be in the proper place?
Like for example the bottom of the sofa is at the top but it should be at the bottom on the map ?

btw love ur site
Sockpuppet
#8 Old 8th May 2012 at 12:38 AM
no, she means that faces not overlap on the uvmap
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#9 Old 8th May 2012 at 12:52 AM
Ohh okay well yea I dont think so.I made this sofa like 2 months ago.I just box mapped it and tiled and rescaled I think.
can I post the obj and someone show me step by step how you would map it and bake it ?
Alchemist
#10 Old 8th May 2012 at 1:39 AM
Quote: Originally posted by MarcusSims91
Ohh okay well yea I dont think so.I made this sofa like 2 months ago.I just box mapped it and tiled and rescaled I think.
can I post the obj and someone show me step by step how you would map it and bake it ?
Sure. Everything at my site is baked in Blender...I think if you can get it working you'll be very happy with the results
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#11 Old 8th May 2012 at 1:55 AM
Yea I really want to know how to do it with blender but I could never get it right.And with the set im working on now I will need to learn how to use it eventually.
heres the obj. http://www.mediafire.com/?fb7ihzo6c7j13fz
Alchemist
#12 Old 8th May 2012 at 3:02 AM
Quote: Originally posted by MarcusSims91
Yea I really want to know how to do it with blender but I could never get it right.And with the set im working on now I will need to learn how to use it eventually.
heres the obj. http://www.mediafire.com/?fb7ihzo6c7j13fz
Blender baking works by having the tool look at your object and apply appropriate shadowing to the surfaces that it sees. This means that all the surfaces, aka faces, of the object that need a different level of shadowing need to be mapped onto a separate place on the map so that Blender can give them all different shading.

For example, the underside of a sofa cushion is going to have a very dark shadow because it isn't exposed to light at all. The top is going to have some shading where it hits the back of the sofa but, on the whole, is not gonna have much shadow at all.

If you place those two surfaces in the same place on your map Blender is going to become confused because you're giving it conflicting information. On the one hand you're telling it make this part of the map dark and on the other you're telling it make this part of the map light. Blender will then try to compromise to meet both directives...it will make part of the area light and part dark. The result is a splotchy multiplier.

I've looked at your object and you do not have the faces of this object separated out onto separate parts of the map. Also there is a normals issue going on which could affect Blender's ability to bake the object since those determine how light hits the object.

To begin fixing for the bake you need to first pull the object apart into separate faces and place them onto different areas of the map.
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#13 Old 8th May 2012 at 4:23 AM Last edited by MarcusSims91 : 8th May 2012 at 4:56 AM.
Yea the normals issues on the back and on the further right side of the sofa happened when I applied direct-x in milkshape3d.I figured with this object that would cause issues.So basically I need to split the front and the back?or in this case top and bottom haha.I will try it out now

edit this is what I got



Looks better,I can edit the rest but I believe i can better results right?
Screenshots
Alchemist
#14 Old 8th May 2012 at 6:01 AM
Quote: Originally posted by MarcusSims91
Yea the normals issues on the back and on the further right side of the sofa happened when I applied direct-x in milkshape3d.I figured with this object that would cause issues.So basically I need to split the front and the back?or in this case top and bottom haha.I will try it out now

edit this is what I got



Looks better,I can edit the rest but I believe i can better results right?
You can get perfect results You just have to split all the faces onto separate parts of the map. Why are you running the object through MS if you use Blender to mesh with?
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#15 Old 8th May 2012 at 6:42 AM
Can you show me an example of putting the faces onto separate parts of the map ?Because im missing something lol.I use MS3d and 3ds max to mesh.I just have blender to bake.I dont know how to use blender.
Actually the sofa was just an example it looks pretty good with out baked shadows in game.
Alchemist
#16 Old 8th May 2012 at 12:48 PM
Quote: Originally posted by MarcusSims91
Can you show me an example of putting the faces onto separate parts of the map ?Because im missing something lol.I use MS3d and 3ds max to mesh.I just have blender to bake.I dont know how to use blender.
Actually the sofa was just an example it looks pretty good with out baked shadows in game.
This seating set that I made has all the faces pulled apart for the bake:

http://jaue.com/Indigo/?p=725

If you're unfamiliar with Blender prolly the easiest thing for you to do is get Cmo's Blender tools and use the EZ Bake. The tutorial I wrote on baking multipliers uses this method and it's very easy. Once the tools are installed making your multiplier is pretty much a matter of importing your mapped .obj, telling Blender what size your map is, and pressing the go button. That tutorial is in the tutorials section of this site.
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#17 Old 8th May 2012 at 10:11 PM
I get an error when I use EZ bake.I have 1.63 version of blender.
Screenshots
Alchemist
#18 Old 9th May 2012 at 1:04 AM
Quote: Originally posted by MarcusSims91
I get an error when I use EZ bake.I have 1.63 version of blender.
that is a very outdated version of Blender. You'll need to update to a more recent version to use the tools. The link is in the download thread. The newer version of Blender is amazing...well worth updating even if you don't use it for S3.

If what you meant is that you're using 2.63 the tools are not yet updated for that. Try using 2.62.
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#19 Old 9th May 2012 at 9:50 PM
Oh lol yea I meant 2.63 and I tried downloading 2.62 but it just goes to 2.63 http://www.blender.org/development/...gs/blender-262/.

edit: Nevermind I found a link.
Lab Assistant
#20 Old 10th May 2012 at 7:52 AM
This might be a dumb question at this point, but have you checked your face/vertex normals? If you have not mapped the parts on top of each other then something else must be shading the surfaces so that light cannot reach them - and that might be the surface itself. I was just thinking that maybe some surfaces or vertices/edges are turned inside the couch and not outside. You probably have those ok as you are able to get things in game properly, but those results just look like they could be caused by flipped normals.
Alchemist
#21 Old 10th May 2012 at 11:42 PM
Quote: Originally posted by misukisu
This might be a dumb question at this point, but have you checked your face/vertex normals? If you have not mapped the parts on top of each other then something else must be shading the surfaces so that light cannot reach them - and that might be the surface itself. I was just thinking that maybe some surfaces or vertices/edges are turned inside the couch and not outside. You probably have those ok as you are able to get things in game properly, but those results just look like they could be caused by flipped normals.
M we already went over that. The normals issue the object has was caused by the fact that direct-x was used on the object in Milkshape prior to the bake step. Once the object is mapped correctly it should be regrouped into a single group and then baked. Essentially you just make a version of the object specifically for baking.
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#22 Old 20th Jun 2012 at 1:04 AM Last edited by MarcusSims91 : 20th Jun 2012 at 1:50 AM.
Okay I took a break from this because I was busy.
Now I downloaded CMO tools for blender 2.6+ but only the Import and export options are showing I dont see EZ bake or the other options in the Sims 3 tool bar.After time to think I think I finally figured out what you mean by putting the faces into different part of the map
Do I have to regroup the faces that need different depth of shadow in Milkshape ?Because it would seem hard or almost impossible to separate those faces in UV mapper.
Il take another jab at it with a newer simpler sofa I just made.And post screens

Full sofa


Separating and regrouping the faces.Thats not all the faces but the main parts

Also if this is the right way do I have to do this for ever cushion and both arm parts ?I see some Sims3 sofas only do this to one and I guess duplicate it.
Screenshots
Alchemist
#23 Old 20th Jun 2012 at 2:11 AM
Quote: Originally posted by MarcusSims91
Okay I took a break from this because I was busy.
Now I downloaded CMO tools for blender 2.6+ but only the Import and export options are showing I dont see EZ bake or the other options in the Sims 3 tool bar.After time to think I think I finally figured out what you mean by putting the faces into different part of the map
Do I have to regroup the faces that need different depth of shadow in Milkshape ?Because it would seem hard or almost impossible to separate those faces in UV mapper.
Il take another jab at it with a newer simpler sofa I just made.And post screens

Full sofa


Separating and regrouping the faces.Thats not all the faces but the main parts

Also if this is the right way do I have to do this for ever cushion and both arm parts ?I see some Sims3 sofas only do this to one and I guess duplicate it.
Are you now seeing the EZ Bake option in Blender? If not, which version of Blender and the tools do you have?

I find that MS is pretty easy to use to pull things apart into faces. If you decide to go with MS for this and are having trouble let me know and I'll post some pics showing how I do it.

For an example of mapping a sofa maybe take a look at this one that I did which was mapped using MS and then baked using Blender:

http://jaue.com/Indigo/?p=725
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#24 Old 20th Jun 2012 at 3:27 AM
Never cmo explained it to me.
I tried to open that sofa in tsrw and it crashed.
And yes could you post some pic showing how you do it ?
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#25 Old 20th Jun 2012 at 3:45 AM
Came out better but still bad
I didnt use EZ bake I did it the other way
Screenshots
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