Lighting issue (I think)

[Diriel]

Hello! I've basically given myself a crash course in Oblivion modding, just a hobbyist. I mod in a few other engines, but that's straying off topic.

I'm giving making an interior a shot, so far everything is fine, but I can't get my interior room to accept light. It's a custom model, and if I place it in worldspace it lights just fine, but when I place it in an interior it's just black. Changing the ambient lighting of the interior does effect the model, but it still doesn't accept light sources it's just flat lighting.

Here's the model in NifSkope;

and this is what I see in TES CS (and the game)

(I included a door in there just to show that the light is working fine.)

I have no idea what's causing this, I'm hoping that It's something I've done wrong in 3DS Max, and it's just a simple fix.

If anyone could help me out I'd be all happy and such.

Thanks

Reiko

[DarkRider]

I'm not incredibly knowledgeable in modeling, but I have heard of someone encountering a similar issue. The cause was that the normals were flipped on export. This is what he discovered, perhaps it will help you:

Quote

After some hours of fiddling around with other exports and the like, trying to pin down the exact point at which everything got corrupted, I finally almost accidentally stumbled across clicking the NiExtraData for the tangent space and was literally shocked to see all normals pointing inwards! The .obj files are by default using the "double sided" property, so they get a NiStencil property on export, so I didn't realize it earlier. But after doing "face normals" the tangent space was correct again and lo and behold the darkness was gone!

If this doesn't help, our modeling masters will be about before long!

Good Luck!  

[Vince]

Diriel,

Based on your images, one possibility is the textures you are using.  As an experiment, try using any texture from vanilla Obilivion for the walls.  If that makes a difference it may be a problem with the normal maps for your textures.  If it doesn't make a difference, try the following:

Right click on the NiTriStrips block for the walls then Mesh > Face Normals

Right click on the NiTriStrips block for the walls then Mesh > Smooth Normals

Right click on the NiTriStrips block for the walls then Mesh > Remove Duplicate Vertices

If the number removed was greater than 0, repeat the three steps above, otherwise

Right click on the NiTriStrips block for the walls then Mesh > Update Tangent Space

(Repeat for the floor, etc.)

If using a vanilla texture worked, try reading ***Texturing101*** in the Texturing forum here.  You may have an issue with your normal maps.

Good luck and please do report your results.

[Diriel]

Hello!

Using a vanilla texture from Oblivion made lighting work on that surface. As you said I thumbed through the texturing 101, but it was more an overview of what each map does, not how each map should be configured, etc. I can't see anything I'm doing wrong. I've been using normal mapping with one or two engines for a while now. I'm using the same method with Oblivion. Would it be possible for you give me a brief run though of how to compile a working texture?

Thanks again

Reiko

[HeyYou]

wild guess here.... but, checking the lighing properties for the cell in the CS. Also, if you press "A", in the cs, does the model show up correctly?

[WillieSea]

Textures should be saved as DXT5 with 4 mip maps. Or DXT1 if you don't need the alpha layer.

Normal maps should be saved with the normal map check box checked as well as either DXT5 or 8.8.8.8 format with 4 mip maps.

Black usually means your normal maps are not set up correctly, or are not being loaded becuase you have them in the wrong folder or you gave them a different name than the texture file.

[WindmillTilter]

The main difference in normal maps for Oblivion is that they also use the alpha channel as a specular map (VInce's Texturing 101 has the details.). If you're certain you have an appropireately named normal map in the right directory, check the alpha channel on it, it's probably missing or pure black. Also make sure you're using a DXT compression the supports the alpha channel (3 or 5 usually).

WT

[Diriel]

Right, I think I've found my problem then. I guess that's my fault for not fully reading the 101. I have created an alpha channel on the normal map and set to full white as a test, however now when trying to save the texture the Nvidia Photoshop plugin says that there are too many channels to export. Any idea why this is happening?

--Edit;

Eep, nevermind! I flatten image fixed it up.

Okay, that must have been the problem. I've added a white alpha channel to the normal, seems to have fixed it up, although now it's full spec. I'll fix that up.

Thanks for putting up with my idiocy in not rully reading. >_<