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FPSC Classic Models and Media / The joy of Shader and Normal Maps

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bond1
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Posted: 13th Nov 2006 19:28 Edited at: 13th Nov 2006 19:29
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If you've been following the TGC newsletter, I've been writing a series of character modelling articles on a Fantasy Pack I'm making for FPSC, to be completed next year.

I finally took the plunge into normal mapping, and the results are awesome! Take a look at my recent peasant character, the model on the right has 70,000 polys, and the textured model on the left only has 3300 polys with the normal map, and they look identical! (By the way, I did the high-poly in max, no ZBrush!)

For those that care, in January's newsletter I'll have a tutorial on creating the high poly in max and generating the normal map. In Decemeber's newsletter there will be a high-resolution face/hair texturing tutorial.



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"Your mom went to college."
My FPSC stuff at http://www.hyrumark.com
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Luke314pi
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Posted: 13th Nov 2006 19:55
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Will this work for objects as well, or is it too taxing on the system to have normal mapping on everything?

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bond1
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Posted: 13th Nov 2006 20:01
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It's basically whatever your computer can handle. The main reason the game F.E.A.R. is so power hungry is because it uses shaders on EVERYTHING. Instead of loading one diffuse texture into memory, you also have to load 2 additional textures, one for normals and another for specular.

This is also the reason I'm really excited about FPSC x10, with enhanced shader support, running on a dual core CPU with a Geforce 8.

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"Your mom went to college."
My FPSC stuff at http://www.hyrumark.com
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Errant AI
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Posted: 13th Nov 2006 20:06 Edited at: 13th Nov 2006 20:19
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Great work there, Bond1!

I'm looking foreward to your next newsletter write-up.

I honestly have to say that if not for the shader support that it does have, I wouldn't be using FPSC at all.

One of the things I found odd was how shaders were behaving in FPSC. Perhaps it is an issue with my 6800 video card...



I found that FPSC would display spec or normal map effects depending on what was in the directory but not both smultaneously.

If I included only the spec map, It would blend between _D and _D2 maps based on specularity but if I had only the normal map or both the spec and normal maps, it would ignore spec. info and render the character using the _D map only and add the normal mapping "bumping" effect.
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filya
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Posted: 13th Nov 2006 21:35
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You know, one of you should probably write a simple tutorial on shaders. It wouldnt take too much time I suppose (if its not too detailed).

It could include things like :

1. What are shaders and how they work
2. Shader use in FPSC
a) how to make different kinds of maps
b) how to use them in game
c) what do the different .fx files in fpsc do
3. hints and tips (when to use shaders and when not to)


It would be great if you could just make a combined tutorial since Jan is a long time to wait for something so beautiful


-filya

-- n00b at playing games...and now at making em too :p --
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AaronG
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Posted: 13th Nov 2006 21:50
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yeah i want to get into modelling real bad but don't know where to start.

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bond1
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Posted: 13th Nov 2006 22:15 Edited at: 13th Nov 2006 22:29
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Thanks guys!

Quote: "One of the things I found odd was how shaders were behaving in FPSC. Perhaps it is an issue with my 6800 video card...

"


You're not alone, I haven't been able to completely figure out the way FPSC handles shaders either, and how they are blended. You really need spec + normal. One of the biggest criticisms I read about over at places like polycount is how normal mapped games make everything look like shiny plastic. And I definitely agree with that, the additional shading from the high poly is definitely cool, but I'm not a fan of the ultra-shiny look. Hopefully a well thought out spec map can tame it down, and I need to spend more time with that aspect.


Quote: "It would be great if you could just make a combined tutorial since Jan is a long time to wait for something so beautiful "


Thanks, but this month's tutorial has already been written, there's some good textuing info in it, if I were to add the normal mapping info it would run too long. But I plan on making a good step-by-step tutorial for January's article.

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