Losing quality when baking

[Martin Bergwerf]

Hi Harris,

I haven’t been looking at this as long as you have, and (as well-organized as your file is) I don’t have complete knowledge of what is what and so…And I also don’t know exactly where to look , but from first glances, I cannot find any problems.

Here’s a comparison (sorry I didn’t get the viewing angles identical) of the two:

Versus:

There seem to be some decals missing on the second one, but as far as graffiti and so are concerned, I don’t see too much difference (again, I don’t know where to look exactly…)

[Harris Clook]

Also, regarding the sixth tile in the udim images… ignore what I’ve done. I’m aware it’s an absolute waste of space/data/what have you. I did have uv islands taking up most of it that were for the noodle cups inside the vending machine. I had initally envisioned that I’d be able to design my own packaging to wrap around the cups, but quickly realised that it was unnecessary would take more time.  I ended up deleting the geometry after I found a perfect set of noodle cups on blender market. The uv islands that are in the 6th tile are for such a small component inside the vending machine. I could reposition them to an earlier tile and quickly repaint them – I’d then just need to rebake everything, which to be fair is absolutely doable

[Harris Clook]

Cheers Martin,

I must have turned off the decals in the second file (with the ‘master’ material that has the baked bump map).

If i’m correct, the first image you’ve posted is from the second file? And the second image is from the first file?

The issue i’m trying to work out is why the bump map is looking pixelated – in comparison to the second image you’ve posted.

Here’s some examples of specific differences where a lot of bump detail has been lost after baking!

Lost detail after baking:

Detail that was there prior:

Lost detail

Detail prior

From further back, most of the bump detail seems to look alright. And ultimately it is up to me how close I position the camera when rendering.
Perhaps I’m being too ambitious, it’s just these more apparent issues that I’m trying to resolve

Cheers

[Martin Bergwerf]

Ah, I found some problem areas…

I’ll be experimenting a lot; never used UDIM before, so this might take a while and I can’t even guarantee that I will be able to find what’s wrong, but I’ll do my best.

[Martin Bergwerf]

Oh and you posted more images! Those will be really helpful!

[Harris Clook]

I’ve just been reading into texel density here. 
And I’ve just watched this video from Chunck’s Relic course.

I’m becoming more suspicious of the fact that perhaps I didn’t scale my uv islands appropriately (I did the unwrapping a good few months ago I believe).  I could be losing texture to the pixels resolution.

I’m sure I’ve heard Jonathan discuss texel density somewhere within one of the fundamentals courses (Probably the texturing course). Perhaps after I finish the pothead course I’ll go back and finish it…

[Martin Bergwerf]

Yes, you might be right there!

That’s not a lot of Pixels for that area…even with 8K Textures.

[Harris Clook]

[Harris Clook]

Whelp, this is definitely going to act as a reminder for next time!

Is there anything I could do to save it? What comes to mind is moving the uv islands that are disproportionately too small to another UDIM tile and repainting them (carefully). Or is there another solution?

[Omar Domenech]

Wow this escalated quickly, this got long fast. Your models is looking incredible Harris, from the images I saw. You know we are all waiting to see the final result, it’s amazing how much you’ve learned in a short time. How close would you say you are to finishing? Are you at 90%? 85%? 97%? You want some pressure and deadlines? Those are great motivators. Ok Harris, the director came by, he said he needed you to give him a delivery date, the production needs the model, the animation and rigging team are waiting for it because those shots need to be rendered pronto. So give me a date. 

[Martin Bergwerf]

Right,

I am no specialist, but three solutions that I can think of are:

– not Baking…(apart from the 10000’s of experience points you gained, is there really an advantage? It’s not a game-ready model anyway…)

– your suggested solution of moving parts to another UDIM Tile..(a lot of work, but best result if Baking is necessary…)

– leaving it as it is now. As Omar said, it is looking amazing already, even with the Baked Textures.

[Harris Clook]

I did realise that I definitely don’t need to bake it. I’ve learnt where I went wrong and how to fix it. And I reckon I’ve got a pretty good rundown of the fundamentals of baking now.

If I don’t bake it prior to rendering, I’d like to bake it later – I’ve been dared to create a walk cycle for it by a friend (this of course will happen later down the road). Am I correct in that a baked model provides better performance when rendering an animation?

I had a thought in regards to rescaling the UV islands, hear me out. I’ve identified which islands can do with being larger.

If I’ve thought this out in my head correctly (I’m currently on the train on the way to work), I might not need to re-texture paint them. I’ve looked through the materials and the bump is not influenced by the texture painting. I don’t need to rebake the colour, metal, or even really the roughness throughout the model. Could I rescale the problematic UV islands and only re-bake them specifically (or the objects as a whole)? I wouldn’t need to rebake the entire model either. Again, this could be bonkers, but bare with me.

In regards to how close I am to finishing – there’s nothing else I can think of that I need to do with Noodlehead – the materials are all finished. I do want to go back into pothead and recolour him so he better matches NH. I imagine I can just slap on a mix colour node and call it cool. Maybe give him a sticker or two.

I had also envisioned that I’d create an environment to render them in, but I think I’m going to cut my losses on that one and do something like an infinity wall (they’d probably look pretty good on a plain background anyway).

Otherwise that’s it. Provided life doesn’t get too much in the way I would like to think I’ll be done this weekend! (Minus any time given to baking/rendering)

[Martin Bergwerf]

Well, you can have more than 1 UV Map, so you could indeed have a different UVMap for the Bump, with the rescaled parts and keep the original UV Map for the rest.

[Omar Domenech]

Alright, by the end of the weekend it is. We are lucky to have you as part of this studio Mr. Harris. The director will be expecting to see the final results. Looking forward to it. 

[Harris Clook]

I can finally confirm that I have finished all the modelling, texturing, colouring etc etc across both Pothead and Noodlehead!

I am commiting to calling it finished.

Now all I am allowed to do from now is set up the render and submit it.

Please inform the rigging and animation teams that I’ll be home in time for dinner!

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