Hi everyone,
I'm working on a prop to share with everyone via my freebies section, and it seems I'm spending more time in the forums, asking for help, advice, etc, than anything else. Can anyone shed some light on this latest hiccup, for me. I'd really appreciate it - and I pray that it's a simple fix.
Here's a pic of the model I'm working on, with a "blank" M3 character for scale. Notice that the motor on the right side (the one over M3's left shoulder, that is) has been textured, and then the whole thing rendered to test it out. Obviously you can see the result. And the funny thing is that the motor over M3's right shoulder has no texture applied, yet it seems to have picked up something from the other side.... I didn't even think that was possible.

Now here's the original texture map saved from UV Mapper Classic.

And here's the texture map I created....

Does anyone know what's up with this? The model itself was created in Wings 3D, the orignal texture was saved from UV Mapper Classic, the texture I made was done with PSP 6, and it was all put together and rendered in Poser 5, if that's any help. Thanks in advance everyone.
Signed,

Frustrated in Florida

It looks like you have some reversed normals (on the black polygons). Not sure how you fix this in Wings

Oh geez , I've heard of that, and I was afraid that's what it might be. I've got no clue how to fix that, if that's what it is.

Generally your modeler should have some function "Align Normals" or "Unify Normals".

I don't see anything like that in Wings, but I'll jump on over to the Wings 3D forum and see if anyone more familiar with that program, than myself, knows. Thanks -

UVmapper  has an 'align normals' feature, if you can't find one in Wings.
It should work well on those shapes, which seem to be basically spherical. 

(It doesn't work on complicated structures where "inside" and "outside"
may be hard to guess.)

Or you could have two-sided polygons.

try Normals Forward in the material room.

I don't see anything like that in my materials room. I'm using Poser 5.  Is "normals forward" hidden somewhere, or is that not an option in version 5?

I'm pretty sure the Normals Forward choice wasn't in P5.  It was
added in P6 because the new renderer was more fussy about normals.

In Wings try the Object Menu "invert". Not sure if this will align your normals or just switch them so the ones that are facing out will be in, and the ones that are facing in will be out.

This is what it says in the wiki manual: "Invert will flip all the normals of the model, in effect turning it inside out. This can be useful if an imported model loads into Wings inverted, i.e., the normals all pointing inwards instead of outwards. Invert will fix the normals so that they all point outward. It can also be useful to fix model parts that are created via Extract Region on inward facing"

Yeah, there's no "normals forward" in Poser 5. And I've looked thru UV mapper and I don't see an "align normals" feature.... that may be available only in UV Mapper pro.... I'm using the classic version. Now, I did find the invert feature in Wings... I think I'll take the rendered model, gauge the normals that are inverted, and go to Wings, and invert only those ones. I did a quick test and inverting the whole model dorks the whole thing up. Thanks for the help -

Here goes...................

ok.. add a slight amount of displacement.. that was the fix back in 5... if that works then you have zero width double sided faces... or you could have 2 copies of the mesh at the same point...

Hmmm.... Ok I'll give it a try.

the BEST option is to fix the normals in the modelling program. select polys individually and check the normals. it goes pretty fast .  If there is a pattern to the flipped polys you may be making a basic mistake in the modeller. 

If you uv map in the modeller you can for example create one motor, map it and then mirror the mapped motor to the other side.

If you want some help with it zip the obj file and send it to me and I will look at it for you.

regards

I tried fixing it in Wings, where I made the thing, but in that program it's either the whole model or none. I can't select individual polys to fix. Selecting the whole thing and inverting it screws the entire model up.
I just downloaded a trial version of UV Mapper pro and I'm working with that, but if you're serious about your offer, just let me know your e-mail and I'll zip and send it. I've got a lot to learn about modeling and anyone who's got more experience than myself... well, I'll welcome the help.

I'll also be glad to align the normals.  I use Amapi which does a good job
with normals....

Send the zipped OBJ to occam24@aol.com

It is a shame you do not have UV Mapper Pro.  It will fix this easily with the invert facets command.  Tools/Facets/Invert  The other reason for black facets is usually more than four sides to your facet and it also is easily fixed by triangulation in UVMP.  Tools/Facets/Triangulate

you can send to marks542004@yahoo.com , its a spam trap but I will fish it out , just have a clear subject line please.

Huh? I haven't got Wings in front of me, but is there no invert normals in Face mode? Which version of Wings are you using?  99.04 (I think) is the latest. Also, you might check in the Wings development forum on the home site for them; if they can' t do it, nobody can. PaulJs and PuzzledPaul are also 2 gurus to check with.

Huh? I haven't got Wings in front of me, but is there no invert normals in Face mode? Which version of Wings are you using?  99.04 (I think) is the latest. Also, you might check in the Wings development forum on the home site for them; if they can' t do it, nobody can. PaulJs and PuzzledPaul are also 2 gurus to check with.

No Pakled, I didn't see a command like that. I'm using Wings 99.0.
Ockham and Markschum, thanks for the offer - I'll definitely take one of you up on that. As a matter of fact, I just started composing an e-mail to you, Ockham, so I'll continue on that line and send them right now. And, I hate to ask this, but.......
The props that you see earlier in this post were like version 3 or 4. Would I be able to impose and ask you Markschum, to have a look at the earlier versions of them, and do the same (invert the normals that are messed up)? I haven't tried them in Poser yet, but they're all based on the same geometry that I created in Wings, so I'm sure they're messed up, too. I'm already sending the props from above to Ockham, and I don't want to ask too much of any one person. I feel like I'm being a major pain with this as it is....
Oh and by the way, once it's corrected, it'll be going into my freebies for anyone to download.
Please let me know.
Ockham, they're on the way right now... thank you!!!!!

Oh Pakled I was wrong. There is such a command, but you can't be selective with it. You either invert every single one on the model, or none at all. At least in the version I have. I'm going to go have a look right now at te Wings website and see what  can find out. Perhaps, come income tax refund time, I'll go ahead and buy UV Mapper Pro.

After playing in Amapi, I can see that your problem is two-sided facets,
not reversed facets.  Each facet has two polygons occupying exactly the same space.
There's no way for any normal-aligning procedure to fix them.  I tried aligning by
hand, and after all of them appeared to be outward, the result still looks weird
in Poser.

The best cure is to rebuild the 'barrel' part, being sure to set Wings for
one-sided facets.  Shouldn't take long ... it appears to be a relatively simple
extruded shape.

I'm sure Wings has a way to select one-sided, because I've looked
closely at quite a few Wings meshes, all done with one-sided facets.

I think ockham is right & the best thing would be to rebuild your model. 

But...Out of curiousity.. Did you try running the Wings cleanup & remapping the object?

If you need any help with the modeling, let me know.. Not an expert &  I'm horrible with tuts but I'm always happy to try.. 

hmm ok it's exactly what I thought it was :(

here's a thought; make a copy of the geometry, then cut out 2 different parts out of it, and put the pieces together?

Like; make an object consisting of the 'signeage' , texture that, then the rest, you just put a generic texture on it. Bring the 2 together, then combine. Wish I had access to Wings...this is getting annoying...;)

I hate two faced facets.  Those dirty dogs!!!

Aaaaaoooooaaooaoaooooooo!   (that's the sound of me wailing).
Well thanks for having a go at it, Ockham. First I'm going to go pound my head against the wall for a few minutes. Then I'll go ahead and rebuild it in Wings and see what happens, and see if I can indeed set the facets as one-sided.
Rayvnsworld, I haven't tried to clean it up, but I'll give that a try before anything else.
Pakled, I haven't tried that, but I'll give it a whirl.

I'm going to try every one of these things and see what happens. The law of averages says that ONE of them has to work, right?!?! Hahahaha! .... Sorry, I'm a bit loopy after all this.
It's a shame, too, because I really like the way the motor looks... the shape, I mean. I hope I can get it to look as good this time.
Thanks for all the help and advice everyone. Keep an eye out on my freebies... or on the forum. I may have to ask some more questions before this is over! Thanks again!

select all of the faces on the outside of your motor where you have the problems then use the "move" tool just a little.

If they are double sided that should be fixable in the modeller. If there are two polygons you should be able to merge points and unify polys , then flip the result whichever way it needs to be .

I can certainly have a look at it . marks542004@yahoo.com is my email .

I'm not familiar enough with Wings to know how to do that... yet. I'm still learning. I'm working on rebuilding the motors in Wings right now... trying a few different things. I'm really disappointed by theis whole experience though, because I was really happy with the shape of them.
I'll go ahead and e-mail them to you in just a minute.... maybe you'll have better luck. Here they come...

ok, got your email.
I use lightwave 8 and this is what I did

1. there was a group of polygons that 'capped' the intake of your motor, deleted those.
2. merge points - which reconnects all polys and removes duplicate points . 
3. unify polygons - removes any polys in the same places 400+ poly eliminated
4. selected and did an align , if needed flip , to get all polys facing out.
5. deleted an inner 'plate' and two rings of polys at the motor exhaust.
        I rebuilt that part by selecting the bottom ring of points, create a polygon , and then doing two bevels to build the exhaust .
6. rebuilt the rotor vanes to add thickness .
      - moved them to new layer
      - deleted all but 1 blade
     -  extruded it for thickness - very small amount
     - radial array - 16 copies around center point
      - moved back to original layer

mirrored the left motor to make the right motor.
saved both as obj files
tried to preserve the uv mapping - not sure its correct though.

emailed back to you as a zip file .

Lightwave uses layers to isolate parts of the model to make working easier.

Took maybe 10-15 minutes to do once I had messed up a few times ... it was late :)

Unsolicited comment:
you seem to have 36 points on your circles, which is ok. BUT
your total polygon count will be lower if you go to 24 or even 16 sides.
Poser smoothing will make it look good.
Its worth trying a few tests to see the result if you are modelling for poser.
Its a compromise though because the edges may start to show in the shadows.

I just did a test render and it turned out perfectly! I can't believe you went to so much trouble for me on this, and I can't possibly thank you enough! I'm really grateful. Thanks so much! I replied to your e-mail about it, too.

Steve

your welcome steve.

when typed out it may look like a lot of work but it went very fast.
Lightwave has some nice tools so it wasnt a big job.
It would have been faster to have rebuilt it completely :)

I have no idea what created the duplicate polygons so I cant suggest how to avoid them.  You may want to post a question on a forum specific to your modeller. 

Many of the people here are willing to help out so keep posting if you have problems.

perhaps a quick render of the model when you have time  ?

Truespace 7 is available for free from www.caligari.com , you might find it nicer than wings although wings has a nice user base.