I don't want the wood planks.

[Aanker]

At the moment, I am playing around with the textures for ships, and I cannot seem to get the wood plank lightning pattern to go away. I have tried editing the '_normal.ddt' files, but to no avail.

More specifically, I am trying to create actual iron plating for the Ironclad, but even though the '_diffuse.ddt' textures work nicely, the problem with the lightning makes the iron plating look less like metal, and more like wooden planks.

So... How do I get that pesky '_normal.ddt' to actually obey my orders and make the ship's new metal hull have proper lightning effects?

[lastex0dus]

Not that I've looked in there, but might I suggest looking for either A: a shader file, or B (if it has one): a specular map file. Those are the two things that are going to change the effects of lighting simulation on a texture, rather than the Normal map.

[Primergy]

make shure you did saved them as xyz_normal.dds file instead of ddt .

Besides that it might be useful to show us a pic of the ship and the normal texture. Also what changes did you made to the normal map? Did also edited the alpha_channel, since there is the green channel stored you still get a bump effect, even if you painted the rest of the normal map in RGB(128,128,255).

[T.C.]

This should help. One other super-old thread that should be stickied

[Primergy]

This should help. One other super-old thread that should be stickied

Indeed, i searched for this countless of times, but i don't think it will help much with the normal map .

[T.C.]

Indeed, i searched for this countless of times, but i don't think it will help much with the normal map .

The lighting is controlled from the gloss map channels, so I doubt if the problem is anything much to do with the normal map.

[Primergy]

Depends on Aankers actual problem... i understand him this way, that he still has a wooden plank bump effect, and not some reflective dots spread over the model.

[T.C.]

I cannot seem to get the wood plank lightning pattern to go away.

the problem with the lightning makes the iron plating look less like metal, and more like wooden planks.

make the ship's new metal hull have proper lightning effects?

I think it's a lighting issue

[Primergy]

Well, a normal map affects affects lightning (the bump effects are nothing more then the illusion of darker and brighter spots):

Wiki

To calculate the Lambertian (diffuse) lighting of a surface, the unit vector from the shading point to the light source is dotted with the unit vector normal to that surface, and the result is the intensity of the light on that surface.

Ben Cloward:

So how does lighting work? How do we tell how dark or bright to make each point on the screen so that the object looks like it’s being lit by the lights in the scene? First it’s important to know the direction that each point on the surface is facing. The direction that a point on the surface is facing is called a normal. You can imagine a normal as a line extending from the surface point. The line is perpendicular to the surface. Next we need to know where the light is in our scene. We create a line from the point on the surface to the position of the light. This line is called the light vector. (Vector is a fancy math term for line.) So now we have two vectors coming out of our surface point, the light vector and the normal. If we measure the angle between the two lines then we know how to light the point.



If the angle is small (the two vectors are pointing in a similar direction) then we know that the surface point needs to be bright because it’s looking almost straight at the light. If the angle is large then we know that the point needs to be dark because it is facing away from the light (assuming there’s just one light).

http://www.bencloward.com/tutorials_normal_maps1.shtml

Thats why i say that the normal map is the problem, since this one affects how a model reflects light and not how strong (what the gloss map is mainly doing)

[T.C.]

Well, a normal map affects affects lightning (the bump effects are nothing more then the illusion of darker and brighter spots):

Wiki


Ben Cloward:


http://www.bencloward.com/tutorials_normal_maps1.shtml

Thats why i say that the normal map is the problem, since this one affects how a model reflects light and not how strong (what the gloss map is mainly doing)

Ah, I see. Well in that case wouldn't copying the normal texture from something like a cannon barrel help?

[The Hedge Knight]

Dont know, but aanker knows about normal mapping and does them pretty damn well by hand (seriously) so i doubt thats the problem.

[lastex0dus]

I wouldn't use wikipedia as a resource for anything - even when it appears relatively correct.

And, considering the OP's post, it's a Lighting issue, which is in and of itself distinct from normal maps.

He really is looking for specular related maps, or as someone said (and it may be called in the the NTW file) gloss channel maps.

[Primergy]

I wouldn't use wikipedia as a resource for anything - even when it appears relatively correct.

I assume you can explain it better how normal maps work?

Anyway, it's really hard to tell what his actual problem is... does it still have the structure of wooden planks (=normal map) or still the same reflection (not lightning!) (=gloss map)