crisp normal map

[ErianDragonborn]

Hi!

I've been messing around a bit with the Dwarven helmet, but I just can't get the normal maps to work correctly...
Since I have been changing some parts in Blender (including the face, which I hate) I had to remap the textures.

The new textures don't line up with the old ones, so I cut and pasted the sides but my textures look nowhere near as crisp as they do on Bethesda's helmet.
Does anyone have an idea why? I litteraly copied their normal maps and rearranged them...
(p.s. because of rearranging, the indents now stick out, but I first want to solve the strange look before getting into that)

 

[thumbincubation]

I'm not sure why it's doing that for you, but my guess would be something in the copy/pasting changed the normal map quality, or maybe it doesn't align with the texture the same way now.

 

Do you have GIMP with the .dds plug in? Might be better to just do the texture the way you want, and then make a new normal map.

[ErianDragonborn]

_{I have been trying, drawing, painting and thatever this whole day and I found that doubling the texture size definitely helped. I am not sure why, though, since the original seems to have the same texture size as the one I was using... Anyway, I've hand-painted (yes, hand-painted) the normal map. I might make a video or tutorial on how to do that. Gave me better results but takes way longer too.}

Edited November 25, 2017 by ErianDragonborn

[thumbincubation]

Holy crap, that sounds intensive. I have GIMP with the .dds, and I usually make the normals right from the diffuse map. If I can help with that, let me know. I have a pretty good handle on shine vs bump, for the normal. Still not up on the separate shine-determining maps, I forget what they're called, but I can usually get decent results with the normals.

[ErianDragonborn]

Holy crap, that sounds intensive. I have GIMP with the .dds, and I usually make the normals right from the diffuse map. If I can help with that, let me know. I have a pretty good handle on shine vs bump, for the normal. Still not up on the separate shine-determining maps, I forget what they're called, but I can usually get decent results with the normals.

Thanks for the offer!

I used the same 'program' but for photoshop. It's supposed to work the same way, but for some reason didn't manage to get good results. Admittedly, increasing texture size from 512 to 1024 did help a bit. I guess I'll have to play around with it a bit more.

The shine map (environment map) is generally speaking not the problem. It's armour, so it's supposed to be quite shiny. Only now, the fabric is as well O:)

Here again the original and the new version...

The thing still looks a bit plasticcy, when compared to the original... But it's a lot better than the thing above.

 

(notice as well the shiny clean armour ^^)

 

Edited November 26, 2017 by ErianDragonborn

[thumbincubation]

Oh that does look better. One of the things I do, when I have fabric or leather, when making normal maps, is use the lasso tool to highlight the fabric. Make the normal map for that first, with maybe 5-12 pts for bump, then when I go to the eraser I take it to like 94%. (Some of the tutorials I used, when learning, cautioned against going higher, as it tends to cause problems.) 94% gives me a nice dull look to the fabric, can go as low as maybe 85% for leather. Then I'll invert my selection and do the armor with a bit less bump and more shine, like 75 or 70 % on the eraser. That way you get the shiny metal and dull fabric together. Just have to spend a few minutes with the lasso first.