[Video] Adding Spec Maps to your models!!

[nanobuds]

[Brawl Hacks] Tutorial: Adding Spec Maps to your Imports!

Materials needed:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/n0ledsl3inx4dzg/Spec%20Maps.rar

[DarkPikachu]

can't watch the video, but this seems about as useful as bump-maps

I think I'm getting the 2 confused though...
could you post a short gif of a spec-map

[nanobuds]

I don't make GIF's.

but they're basically the same as bump maps.

[Vaanrose]

Bump maps and Spec maps are actually pretty different, but the differences shrink if you're just using a greyscale version of your texture and not a true map painted specifically for the model.

A bump map simulates displacement. Say you have a bump map featuring a scaly-skin pattern; the bump map tells the renderer which parts of the skin are higher or lower set. Only virtually, no actual displacement occurs, but it looks the same from a distance.

A specular map determines the shininess of an object. If you have a texture that features scaly-skin but also metal or cloth, you wouldn't want all three parts to have the same shininess, you want the scales to be shiny and the cloth to not be, so your spec map would have high value over the scales and low value over the cloth.

[nanobuds]

Ahhh interesting. Thanks!!

I'm not sure if Brawl supports bump maps though.

[Gamma Ridley]

I've tried implementing bump maps, though I don't even know if I ever got them to work. Other M uses them, so if anyone is ever interested in fitting them to work with Brawl, that would be a good place to start.

[DarkPikachu]

brawl should be able to support bump-maps... :/
it supports reflective textures using the XF and BP registers...
bump-maps should have a similar interface :/

for some history...
the N64 was able to support bump-maps

@vaanrose:
ah, thanx, that helped

[BlackJax96]

I'm not sure about bump maps (I've never seen them used nor referenced), but I know that the MDL0 format does support Normal Maps.

If you look in a material and go to the property "IndirectMethod1-4", you can see NormalMap and NormalMapSpecular. "Indirect" textures are used by the shader for displacement. Generally it's just set to "Warp" for regular displacement(?)/spec maps like this.

Also under the material properties, there's "NormMapRefLight1-4" which specifies which SCN0 light to use for the normal maps. So there's definitely hope there, the only problem is no games ever use it. So we're on our own to figure it out.

I've been meaning to work on it, but idk how to make normal maps and I have other stuff to do D:

I've tried implementing bump maps, though I don't even know if I ever got them to work. Other M uses them, so if anyone is ever interested in fitting them to work with Brawl, that would be a good place to start.

hit me up with some random files

[Vaanrose]

Normal Maps and bump maps are closely linked. If you look at a bump map, it's all black and white, while a normal map is in three colors: cyan, magenta and green. With a bump map, black equals negative distance (displaced in), white equals positive distance (displaced out), so it's all one direction (X), while a normal map is more advanced and tells you the exact displacement amount for all three directions (X,Y,Z), which are all linked to one color.

Bump maps are usually converted to normal maps during the rendering process, so while bump maps are smaller files, they actually have larger render foot prints. This is in general, mind you. I have no idea how Brawl handles it.

But if Brawl supports normal maps... that interests me GREATLY. With Maya you just subdivide your low poly model a few times, sculpt in the details and then it's literally two buttons click and you've got a high-poly normal map all ready to go for your low-poly model.

That's the "proper" way to make normal maps. But you can easily convert your grayscale bump maps to normal maps with nvidia's photoshop normal map plugin. It's free. https://developer.nvidia.com/nvidia-texture-tools-adobe-photoshop

[Gamma Ridley]

hit me up with some random files

Done.

Are there really no mdl0 games that use normal maps? I'm almost positive someone mentioned one that did, and think that'd be interesting to get working.

[Leon Exodio]

nice video i have to do this and see how much better it will look on models