3d1 THEORY

opacity maps
common mistakes

DIGITAL ARTS AND ENTERTAINMENT 1

3d1 THEORY
OPACITY MAP
WHAT DOES OPACITY MEAN?
WHAT DOES
Opacity is theOPACITY MEAN?
opposite transparency.
Opacity is the opposite transparency.

WHAT
WHATDOES ITDO?
DOES IT DO?
Determines what isisvisible
Determines what visible(true = white)
(true and what
= white) andiswhat
not (false = black).
is not (false = black).
Grey = semi-visible.
Grey = semi-visible.
Opacity map for the
Opacity
wheels of map
our for the
bike.
wheels of our bike.

Only a quarter
Only a quarter is needed.
is needed.

This object only has 8 triangles

Thisin object
stead of only hasobjects
separate 8 triangles
per spoke
in stead of separate
which would objects
have resulted pertoo
in way spoke
many
which polygons.
would have resulted in way too
many polygons.
3d1 THEORY
OPACITY MAPs
Because the object I’m trying to
make has lots of small, curved
detail, I need a lot of polygons to
model this… Right?
3d1 THEORY
OPACITY MAP
Because the object I’m trying to
make has lots of small, curved
detail, I need a lot of polygons to
model this… Right?

Not if we use a little trick:

We can use an additional texture
map in our material to make
certain parts transparent.

We call this texture the opacity

map.
That being said, you don’t have
to use an opacity map.

A lot of the time it is a choice,

the answer depends on what
will cost you the most and how
much detail is needed, etc.
3d1 THEORY
OPACITY MAP
3d1 THEORY
OPACITY MAP
3d1 THEORY
OPACITY MAP
3d1 THEORY
OPACITY MAP
BENEFITS
The advantages are clear: we can use this to cut down the
polycount significantly for certain objects.

On top of that, we can now make half transparent materials

such as glass etc.

PROBLEMS
But using opacity maps for your materials is not without
its disadvantages:
-Using transparency will come with a significant
performance cost
-Sorting issues (Zdepth)
-The object might look bad from certain angles
3d1 THEORY
OPACITY MAP
3d1 THEORY
OPACITY MAP
 3d1 THEORY
OPACITY MAP
SITUATION
The renderer does not know what to render first/on top.
This is also referred to as a Zdepth issue, as it relates to
the depth, the distance from the camera.

There are several ways to fix this, but this is also why we
like to split off our transparency parts of the object as
a separate material, so there can be no issues between
the solid parts and transparent stuff.
3d1 THEORY
OPACITY MAP
3d1 THEORY
OPACITY MAP
CONCLUSION
The opacity map can be very useful, but you will not use it for ev-
erything. If it can be avoided, games will shy away from using
transparency as much as possible.

But in some cases, it is a necessity:

Very complex or expensive shapes
Glass windows etc.
Hair strands
Particles
Vegetation
…
Let’s start by taking a look on how to
approach props like these.

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We need terracotta, soil and plants.
This is from textures.com

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Before we can start, we also need to
render ambient occlusion and make a
UV snapshot.

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Since i had not combined my objects, I had to photoshop the 3 different AO bakes into one
Put the uv snapshot in photoshop as well, so you can see the boundaries of your uv islands.

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On to the fun part, now you can copy and paste your photo textures in here.
Finish off with some dirt brushes, or photo textures of moss.

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On to the flower parts!
Here we make the textures first, and then the models.
You put all the flowers together in one photoshop file. Their background colors match up
with the diffuse colors. Afterwards you also make a black and white map.

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In Maya you make a 3D plane, and texture it with your new flower textures.
Afterwards, you cut out the different planes with your multi cut tool.
You can select a face and extract it so it becomes a different object.

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You can cut the plane in multiple parts to curve it.
Place your planes (also called cards) inside of the flowerpots.

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3d1 THEORY
preserve uv's
When you transform the vertices of
an object the UVs do not move in UV
space by default.

As a result, textures on your object

may become warped. To avoid this,
turn on the Preserve UVs option in
the Tool Settings Editor for any of the
transform tools you are using.

Double click the move tool button and

toggle on the preserve UV button.

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3d1 THEORY NO PRESERVE UV’S PRESERVE UV’S TURNED ON

preserve uv's
No need to re-unwrap when you’re cleaning
up and optimizing texture planes. Just turn on
preserve UV’s.

Work smart, not hard

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 3d1 THEORY
common mistakes
Let’s take a look at the most common mistakes. A good skill to
have is the ability to criticize your own work.

• Don’t forget to look at the reference when modeling and

texturing!
• Proportions of parts from the object itself
• Proportions compared to other objects (Use the
Dummy Character model!)
• Unfinished props, don’t just leave out details (ie.
Lamp, brakes, … on bike).
• Soft/hard shading.
• Find balance between optimising and good
silhouet. Don’t go too low poly either.
• Unoptimised curves

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3d1 THEORY
common mistakes

SEPARATE
ELEMENTS

DIFFERENT SHAPE NOT SO GOOD GOOD

TOO MANY TOO MANY OPTIMIZED

POLYGONS POLYGONS
SAME FEATURES
NOT EVERYTHING SHAPE IS NOT AS REFERENCE
IS MODELED SIMILAR TOO
REFERENCE

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3d1 THEORY Smoothing Groups
common mistakes
Proportions

Random rust

Through the wheel

Interesting way of pedalling

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 3d1 THEORY
common mistakes
• Too much texture space is being wasted in general

• Bad packing (puzzling)

• It is ok to upscale the smaller clusters a little when

you made the puzzle the best you can

• Weird stitching, think about the next step and avoid

lots of seams

• Align/straighten when possible

Example of how NOT to unwrap.

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3d1 THEORY 05
common mistakes So small that there is no possibility to
add detail. Can probably be optimized.

Straighten and align clusters

when possible

Overlapping polygons, a big no-no.

Lots of lost space

Leave some breathing
room between clusters

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