blurry skins
by Very Interactive Person · in Artist Corner · 08/20/2001 (11:28 am) · 7 replies
i skinned a model and put it ingame. it looks very blurry, but the texture used isn't blurry at all. When i import tribes2 vehicles they look somehow sharper. is this just my video card? or the fact that i dont have bm8 files or somethin? or is there somethin special with the tribes2 png files? or is it just me who makes bad skins :)
#2
Go to the intern V12 forums and check the tools and engine sections...
08/21/2001 (2:18 pm)
there was a post on that in the internal forums.. and I cant paste stuff from the intern forums in here... I may get into trouble.Go to the intern V12 forums and check the tools and engine sections...
#3
This is from the photoshop help files - You can create alpha channels to store selections as 8-bit grayscale images. You use alpha channels to create and store masks, which let you manipulate, isolate, and protect specific parts of an image. Saved selections in alpha channels can be loaded in ImageReady. Alpha channels lets you store selections as grayscale images called masks. In a mask, selected areas appear white, deselected areas appear black, and partially selected areas appear as shades of gray. When you use an alpha channel to apply optimization settings, the white areas of the mask describe the highest level of image quality, while the black areas for the mask describe the lowest level of image quality.
.... yeah.
08/21/2001 (2:18 pm)
Are you thinking of the RGB channels?This is from the photoshop help files - You can create alpha channels to store selections as 8-bit grayscale images. You use alpha channels to create and store masks, which let you manipulate, isolate, and protect specific parts of an image. Saved selections in alpha channels can be loaded in ImageReady. Alpha channels lets you store selections as grayscale images called masks. In a mask, selected areas appear white, deselected areas appear black, and partially selected areas appear as shades of gray. When you use an alpha channel to apply optimization settings, the white areas of the mask describe the highest level of image quality, while the black areas for the mask describe the lowest level of image quality.
.... yeah.
#4
Basically as you know most graphics that we see on the web and in games are RGB images (Red, Green, Blue). The colors that we see on the screen are created by mixing values of red, green, and blue channels together on each individual pixel. Typically each channel that we see is made up of 8-bits of data (or a value between 0 and 255).
Alpha channels are a fourth channel of 8 bits and are typically used as a transparency layer with images. The transparency works by reading the pixel value of the alpha channel, anything that is 0 (black) is invisible and anything that is 255 (white) is visible, values that are betweet 1 and 254 have different degrees of translucency to it based on its value (so the closer to 0 the value is the more transparent it is).
Hope this helps explain a few things, keep asking questions if you want to know more.
Logan
08/21/2001 (3:19 pm)
Welcome to the world of graphics Ward, you are in for a bumpy ride :)Basically as you know most graphics that we see on the web and in games are RGB images (Red, Green, Blue). The colors that we see on the screen are created by mixing values of red, green, and blue channels together on each individual pixel. Typically each channel that we see is made up of 8-bits of data (or a value between 0 and 255).
Alpha channels are a fourth channel of 8 bits and are typically used as a transparency layer with images. The transparency works by reading the pixel value of the alpha channel, anything that is 0 (black) is invisible and anything that is 255 (white) is visible, values that are betweet 1 and 254 have different degrees of translucency to it based on its value (so the closer to 0 the value is the more transparent it is).
Hope this helps explain a few things, keep asking questions if you want to know more.
Logan
#5
08/21/2001 (4:51 pm)
If you could post a screenshot of your model i may be able to help. but if i cant see, then i cant help
#6
I could be wrong though.
In Tribes2 the same thing you're talking about was present (vehicle skins were sharp, player skins were blurry), all of the default player skins looked very blurry, as did allot of user created player skins. I guessed it was due to texture map size rather than anything else. The skins i'm talking about were 256x256 pixels.
Switch to a 512x512 skinset and the blurriness vanishes.... but you sacrifice some video card compatibility since some cards don't support textures of that size and it can cause a performance hit on some mid to low-end computers (but then the V12 wasn't meant for low-end systems anyway).
08/22/2001 (10:31 am)
As far as I know, alpha channels on player and weapon models are used for reflectivness and nothing more.I could be wrong though.
In Tribes2 the same thing you're talking about was present (vehicle skins were sharp, player skins were blurry), all of the default player skins looked very blurry, as did allot of user created player skins. I guessed it was due to texture map size rather than anything else. The skins i'm talking about were 256x256 pixels.
Switch to a 512x512 skinset and the blurriness vanishes.... but you sacrifice some video card compatibility since some cards don't support textures of that size and it can cause a performance hit on some mid to low-end computers (but then the V12 wasn't meant for low-end systems anyway).
#7
The v12 doesn't impose any fixed texture scale value on the TS shapes (dts files). The resolution of the texels at render time is going to depend on the size of the texture and the scale at which it was mapped in Max. You can use your Max mapping widget thing to scale the texture up and down and check out the results. If you have a texture which must align with the shape (and so can only be mapped at a fixed scale and can't wrap), the only way to increase the texel resolution is to increase the size of the texture.
08/22/2001 (11:11 am)
The max exporter (and the v12) does support "normal" translucent alpha textures, but it can also use the alpha channel to blend the environment map. The default player skin is an example of an environment alpha channel. I believe there is some property in max that you set (probably on the material) to indicate it's a translucent textures, otherwise it will use the alpha for the env. map. The env. map thing also has to be turned on in the object's datablock.The v12 doesn't impose any fixed texture scale value on the TS shapes (dts files). The resolution of the texels at render time is going to depend on the size of the texture and the scale at which it was mapped in Max. You can use your Max mapping widget thing to scale the texture up and down and check out the results. If you have a texture which must align with the shape (and so can only be mapped at a fixed scale and can't wrap), the only way to increase the texel resolution is to increase the size of the texture.
Torque Owner Josh Albrecht