Please help me remove the plastic wrap look from my texture

[Scotty8989]

Hello,

 

Ive been working on a re-texture of the Diamond city signs starting with common wealth weaponry. My texture is getting there but the game always applies a plastic wrap look over the top of the sign. I believe this is a specular map but I cant find any sign of it.

 

File im working on: diamondsigns03_d

 

Location:

 

Textures 2.ba2/textures/architecture/DiamondCity/diamondsigns03_d

 

 

There is no diamondsigns03_s so im a little confused.

 

Here is a screenshot if that helps. I am new to re texturing so my apologies if this is an easy fix im unaware of.

[ShinraStrife]

Can you upload the DDS files for both the original texture and the texture you are replacing it with. I need to compare your settings with the vanilla texture in texview2 to give you a solid answer.

[Scotty8989]

Hi ShinraStrife,

 

Thanks for the help ok, link to drop box:

 

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/spj5icbiorchx7n/AAAQrG1anYhFO2f7_wl5NARka?dl=0

[ShinraStrife]

Hi ShinraStrife,

 

Thanks for the help ok, link to drop box:

 

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/spj5icbiorchx7n/AAAQrG1anYhFO2f7_wl5NARka?dl=0

 

I'm going out for a smoke. I'll look at this when I get back

[ShinraStrife]

Okay I looked at both the files. They both used RGBA as the color format and DXT5 for the compression so it's not an issue with your compression or formatting.

I don't think the signs have a specular map because both your image and the vanilla texture appear to be flat. It could be the ambient occlusion giving it a reflective look (I might be wrong)

[Scotty8989]

Okay, well thanks for having a look.

 

I tried turning off AO in game to check but it doesn't appear to be that. Its like the games smudged Vaseline over the sign and it stands out more the higher res the texture is. It's not applied to everything metallic though.

 

very strange.

[cyberhoundMkII]

I'm no expert, so forgive me if I'm wrong...

 

But vaultsuit for example is separated into smaller pieces, like the suit itself is one texture, and the vault number on the back is separate texture. So I guess that this workflow could be used all over the game, meaning that there is some completely different texture with semitransparency on top of that sign texture. This game is full of those type of hax, where they just overlay textures if they can't achieve the effect they want with lighting.

[ShinraStrife]

I'm no expert, so forgive me if I'm wrong...

 

But vaultsuit for example is separated into smaller pieces, like the suit itself is one texture, and the vault number on the back is separate texture. So I guess that this workflow could be used all over the game, meaning that there is some completely different texture with semitransparency on top of that sign texture. This game is full of those type of hax, where they just overlay textures if they can't achieve the effect they want with lighting.

 

If that's the case Bethesda should be ashamed for being that lazy. It's not that hard to make a specular map for christ sake.

[throttlekitty]

Looks like it uses a generic spec/gloss map for all those signs as defined in materials\architecture\diamondcity\diamondsigns03alpha.bgsm but there are variations for flat normal map and flat normals w/glow.

 

interiors/building/bldconcreteceilinggross01_s.dds <that's the spec map you'll want to edit, or define a new one in the .bgsm material file.

 

 

And what's lazy about overlay textures? They're plenty useful.

[jet4571]

Using a base overlay for many models is not really lazy. The reason for doing that is to save memory, textures get loaded once into memory and can be used a million times and have the same footprint as just 1. If you can use the same specular map for a dozen items rather than each having their own that's a considerable dent in memory usage that can be used to add a few more items. It I smart game design to make textures that can be used with multiple models for themed settings like in Skyrim or FO3 interior building kits, many reused textures for those items allowing for more clutter and decoration with no increase in memory compared to each part using it's own textures.