Tsoidahl Prad Project Thread

If you feel like you're up to the challenge of building your own Ages in Blender or 3ds Max, this is the place for you!

Re: Tsoidahl Prad Project Thread

Postby Justintime9 » Thu Jun 19, 2014 11:25 am

Well yeah, when the game itself is rendering shadows it's a graphics card thing. It's just hard when the images themselves turn out like that. Is that typical? I guess a lot of people use vertex paint (which I still don't fully understand how to apply to lighting) and that usually isn't so jagged. I'll experiment.
User avatar
Justintime9
 
Posts: 1188
Joined: Sat Sep 29, 2007 5:37 am

Re: Tsoidahl Prad Project Thread

Postby Sirius » Thu Jun 19, 2014 11:57 am

Janaba: Blender computes lightmaps with its own rendering system, it doesn't use the graphic card at all. Tweaks in the GC's control panel only apply to real-time shadows, not pre-rendered lightmaps.

Justin: yeah, it's a big issue with baking lightmaps. The only solutions are Photoshop, rendering at twice the resolution and then downscale the texture (x2 resolution = x4 baking time), or putting a high soft size.
Annoying, isn't it ?
Using vertex color is simple, but doesn't look good on most objects. To use it, enter vertex color edit (v key), click "Paint→Set shaded vertex color" (don't forget to disable your textures in the material panel, otherwise it will interfere). You can also use "Self Shadow VCols", which is AO, but it generally looks good only on terrains.


BTW, to come back to what Janaba said, Plasma can smooth real-time shadows itself (it's used on the big pillars in Gira). For instance, it's possible to tweak the avatar's shadow to be smoother and fade less. However, PyPRP does not have this setting, unfortunately.
User avatar
Sirius
 
Posts: 1506
Joined: Mon Jul 26, 2010 4:46 am
Location: France

Re: Tsoidahl Prad Project Thread

Postby Tweek » Thu Jun 19, 2014 1:47 pm

Sirius wrote:Using vertex color is simple, but doesn't look good on most objects. To use it, enter vertex color edit (v key), click "Paint→Set shaded vertex color" (don't forget to disable your textures in the material panel, otherwise it will interfere). You can also use "Self Shadow VCols", which is AO, but it generally looks good only on terrains.


Really? In what way does it interfere? I'm curious cause I never disable textures I just paint away (usually in wireframe mode so I can get into all the nooks and stuff).

But yeah, Vertex painting is an alright way to go. I've started using it way more in my stuff than I used to.

For example, these two images are of the GoW pub I'm building. No lighting added yet all the "lighting" you can see in these images are painted on with vertex paint.

Image

Image
Beneath - IC Blog.
Beneath: Ages of Tweek - FB Age Dev Page.
User avatar
Tweek
 
Posts: 692
Joined: Sat Sep 29, 2007 6:37 am

Re: Tsoidahl Prad Project Thread

Postby dendwaler » Fri Jun 20, 2014 12:50 am

@Tweek

Arent you mixing up terms 'texture 'paint and 'vertex' paint?

Vertex paint , realy does what it says.
It changes a vertice, with has normaly a grey value , to a color value and does not have a face to paint on.
One face only has 4 vertices.that spreads its vertice value over the face.
Its does not result in any way into a texture
As soon you paint on the face enclosed by four vertices ,you are texture painting which is something completely different!
I cannot give an example now, because i am on holidays without my pc.
what i see in your pics is texture painting in its best ! (it is absolutely beautiful but it does not contain vertex paint)
Vertex paint seems to work only on high poly models because there so many vertices near to each other.

Vertex paint can be used to give some (colored) light on certain areas because it has a fade away effect over the distance to the next vertice.
Those wonderfull Worlds are called " Ages" , because that is what it takes to build one.



Watch my latest Video Or even better..... watch the Cathedral's Complete Walkthrough made by Suleika!
User avatar
dendwaler
 
Posts: 936
Joined: Mon Jun 22, 2009 10:49 am
Location: Nederland

Re: Tsoidahl Prad Project Thread

Postby Tweek » Fri Jun 20, 2014 1:55 am

I don't know, I select the option "Vertex Paint" and I paint. I don't use the "Texture Paint" option in the drop down.
Beneath - IC Blog.
Beneath: Ages of Tweek - FB Age Dev Page.
User avatar
Tweek
 
Posts: 692
Joined: Sat Sep 29, 2007 6:37 am

Re: Tsoidahl Prad Project Thread

Postby dendwaler » Fri Jun 20, 2014 2:09 am

Yeah, it is a bit confusing, that is what makes it difficult to grasp for me. I look again to it when i am home again.
Anyway ,its the result that counts.
Its beautifull!
Those wonderfull Worlds are called " Ages" , because that is what it takes to build one.



Watch my latest Video Or even better..... watch the Cathedral's Complete Walkthrough made by Suleika!
User avatar
dendwaler
 
Posts: 936
Joined: Mon Jun 22, 2009 10:49 am
Location: Nederland

Re: Tsoidahl Prad Project Thread

Postby Tweek » Fri Jun 20, 2014 2:47 am

Ok this is the process I use;

Image

I select what I want to work on and click vertex paint in the menu. I select all or any of the faces I need to work on and the paint colour I need. I switch to wireframe view (it allows for better viewing and will show you sections of the object that is hidden behind others). I paint what I need (in the case of the pedestal it was all the shadow on the trim) and then switch back to texture view (the finished result you can actually see in the first image as I didn't actually paint anything in this example as I had already done it.).

This is the process I use any time I use vertex paint.
Beneath - IC Blog.
Beneath: Ages of Tweek - FB Age Dev Page.
User avatar
Tweek
 
Posts: 692
Joined: Sat Sep 29, 2007 6:37 am

Re: Tsoidahl Prad Project Thread

Postby Sirius » Fri Jun 20, 2014 4:12 am

Textures only interfere when using the "Set shaded vertex color" option. When you use this option, Blender applies lighting and material color to the vertex. Since your texture affects the material color, Blender will apply light and then mix it with the texture value on this vertex.
In Plasma, this results in the texture being colored with a color that is close to its average color (for instance, a blue texture will look even blue-er and also a bit darker)
I also noticed another issue with not disabling textures: the color applied to a vertex is the one of the pixel uv-mapped on top of it. In other words, if you have a blue texture with 1 red pixel uv-mapped on a vertex, the vertex will be red, coloring the texture around it red. It doesn't look really good.

When painting directly on your vertices, however, neither lights nor material color have any effect.


What I do in most of my test Ages, is setup the light using only the Blender render. Then, I use "Set shaded vertex color" to apply lights to vertices colors (which removes any existing color on the vertex col layer). After that, I use "Self Shadow VCols" on specific objects, which applies AO on top of existing color. Finally, I re-enable the texture if I have any on the object.

Texture paint is more efficient because it doesn't use the vertices but a texture to register all these infos. Lightmap baking is basically automated texture paint.

Vertex light is tricky to use because of the number of vertices required and of smoothing groups. In later versions of Blender, you even have to make sure it works nice with shadows. When baking AO, you also have to watch out in case you're using an edge split modifier, because the script doesn't work fine with it.

But if you can manage all this, you can have very interesting lighting, like you'd see in Relativity (best example around, if you ask me).

Here's an example of baking vertex color in Blender 2.6. It's slightly better because it can also handle shadows. The scene is just a simple canyon mesh with buildings on its sides.
Attachments
tmp-vertex.png
tmp-vertex.png (317.08 KiB) Viewed 4697 times
User avatar
Sirius
 
Posts: 1506
Joined: Mon Jul 26, 2010 4:46 am
Location: France

Re: Tsoidahl Prad Project Thread

Postby Justintime9 » Tue Jun 24, 2014 5:53 am

A bit of an update. I've been experimenting with the room with the beds, and I think it's making progress. I tried a little vertex painting and it was too dark. So I'll have to see. You can probably see in the right wall I made a modified tapestry that's green to fit the decor. But I'm not sure about it. That wall might actually be a really good place for an imager. With the success of imagers in the Messenger's Pub hopefully it shouldn't be too difficult. Anyway, I'll probably post the updated blend and age files soon to get your overall opinion on the updates. My feeling about the sleep room is that it's too bare and should be more interesting. And that the doorway leading to the second staircase should have another door or something.

Image
User avatar
Justintime9
 
Posts: 1188
Joined: Sat Sep 29, 2007 5:37 am

Re: Tsoidahl Prad Project Thread

Postby Deledrius » Tue Jun 24, 2014 5:55 am

That's lookin' really good. :)
User avatar
Deledrius
Gehn Shard Admin
 
Posts: 1377
Joined: Mon Oct 01, 2007 1:21 pm

PreviousNext

Return to Building

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 0 guests

cron