Transparancy Issues.

[DeathNinja]

It sounds like you are trying to mirror your normal map. If that is the case then I suggest that you don't mirror it or find a less conspicuous place for you seems. It would help if you could show us your UV layout and maps.

[SpiralFace]

Its not actualy Mirrored in any way shape or form. Everything has its own placement and the normal map looks fine. Its the transparancy map that I'm haveing issues with. The transparancy is rendering fine in Software render mode, but software rendering does'nt support the normal maps.

here are the normal maps so you can see the layout.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v641/shadow_s1ayer/ChosenCultistClothAndTeeth_MasterPS.jpghttp://img.photobucket.com/albums/v641/shadow_s1ayer/ChosenCultistBody_MasterPSD_001.jpg

[DeathNinja]

Well that is odd, I am out of ideas (scraches head). I don't think its your renderer because your transparency is working on the other areas.

I forgot to say before that your character is pretty sweet!

[Ivars]

Sounds like a sorting problem. If that is one solid mesh, the alpha-sorter in the maya-viewports will have problem sorting wich faces should be rendered first. You could try to split it up into separate objects.
You could also try render it with maya hardware render, wich has better alpha sorting.

But that semi transperancy looks odd....

[SHEPEIRO]

for the purpose of realtime view port shaders, i find that changing my transparency to 1bit (on or off) really helps with sorting issues, (welll it works in maxes viewports) you can keep your 16bit greyscale alpha for renders.

hope that helps.

[SpiralFace]

Sounds like a sorting problem. If that is one solid mesh, the alpha-sorter in the maya-viewports will have problem sorting wich faces should be rendered first. You could try to split it up into separate objects.
You could also try render it with maya hardware render, wich has better alpha sorting.

But that semi transperancy looks odd....

This is actualy rendered with Maya Hardware render, as its the only thing that can render normal maps to my knowledge (Does anyone know if Mental Ray can handle normal maps and what I whould have to do if it does?)

So if I seperate them into different objects, do I base it off of there texture and UV placement, or their function like the legs or the extra overlapping cloth I'm haveing problems with?

[SpiralFace]

Divideing it up seemed to work, Thanks for the advice. Is looking like it's working just fine right now.

Thanks for the help guys, you guys have been much more helpfull then the Maya help forums.

[Jerkazoid]

ill just add another 2copper.

the sorting issue is (im 95% sure) based on the Objects Bounding-box centerpoint, (not pivot point in anyway.)

u can fake sorting problem sometimes by combining a single triangle with an object and moving the trianlge around to hand control the object_Boxs' centerpoint.
obviously objects with the centerpoint closer to camara = on top

this wont help you with everything.. especially with full camara motion but its another option for atleast environments

some engines (older ones) will still have crazy sorting engines and require a great deal of headaches to fix. you may want to be carefull and make sure the camara would never see 2 or more alphas ontop of eachother.

so.. well u can sorta check things out by viewing in BB mode..turn the obejects to bounding box's. the robe may still render ontop of the belt in certain angles.. if the robes center is at his knees,, and the belt is above that... looking from his feet up could cause sorting flashs

[schlook]

to view normal maps in software or MR you can download the js_normalizer shaders from www.pixero.com.
I´ve had the same transparency problems but i solved it by assigning two materials with the same textures to the object. One material to the faces which is not supposed to be transparent and on that material i locked the transparency attribute and one more material for those faces supposed to be transparent.

//Magnus

[SpiralFace]

Thanks for all the help guys.

As I'm a modeler and not an animator, I just need to pose this model for my demo reel. He will eventulay be placed in a Half life 2 mod, but I assume the engine will probably not have the same problems as maya will.

Thaks alot for the help again guys.

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