Question about Velothi doors

Post » Tue May 17, 2011 12:25 am

So I've noticed misaligned textures for YEARS, regardless of which texture pack I use or whether I'm using one at all, especially on interior doors. To my knowledge there hasn't been any fix for this made to date, which makes me wonder if I'm the only one. http://i55.tinypic.com/rrrw1x.png using Connary's textures... might be sslightly hard to see so I pointed at it with a big green arrow where the wood grain appears on what should be a metal strip.

So, is this something only I have observed? Has anyone ever fixed it? If not, I can fix the UV maps without much difficulty.
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Luis Longoria
 
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Post » Tue May 17, 2011 12:18 pm

To my knowledge there hasn't been any fix for this made to date ...

Has anyone ever fixed it?

Yep, recently. ;) But by making my own retex. Since I'm too new to have been privy to Connary's textures before they were all pulled officially, I've not yet seen his Velothi doors to know how badly misaligned the texture was with the mesh. But having worked from the MW Visual Pack one, I can believe how bad it might have been. :biggrin:

http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1173024-velothi-doors-texture/

The textures need care aligning with the existing mesh, but the mesh problems are at the top of the door, where the arch shapes aren't symmetrical and the low-poly count (both in the door and the surrounding arch) looks awful. The worst thing about all these doors is often the interior strip, as your screenshot shows. If the "raised" section of the mesh is supposed to be a metal band, then is the 3-D edge of that band metal or wood? In your screenshot it's something else entirely, which makes no architectural sense. Making sense of the ridiculous over-recessed meshes to retexture them realistically is extremely hard.
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Erich Lendermon
 
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Post » Tue May 17, 2011 8:23 am

Mismatched edge-to-metal-strip issues are probably due to my not installing and uninstalling texture packs carefully. I assume that they're meant to match, but when two different modders make two different texture packs and things get mixed up, sense goes out the window.

If nobody's fixed the actual UVs of the model, though, that might be worth doing.
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Albert Wesker
 
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Post » Tue May 17, 2011 11:04 am

Mismatched edge-to-metal-strip issues are probably due to my not installing and uninstalling texture packs carefully. I assume that they're meant to match


Don't count on it LOL! The same sort of light-green doorstrip (neither metal nor wood) is present in the Hlaalu doors in the MW Visual Pack. It's explicitly a Hlaalu "doorplank". So unless the doors in that pack were sourced from more than one modder, someone chose it deliberately... You just have to decide what looks right. The other issue is that the Velothi doorstrip (the recessed edge bit that looks green in your screenshot) is also referenced in the meshes of the Vivec jail doors and sewer grates (used for the metal bars) as well as the door-handles, so a wood texture was clearly not what was intended by Bethesda. It seems obvious that it should be metal, and that it ought to match whatever metal texture is used for the main door banding. Changing that means far more work updating unrelated meshes to use a separate texture for those metal bars, and there may be more we are still unaware of.

If nobody's fixed the actual UVs of the model, though, that might be worth doing.

It depends what gets fixed though. I'd suggest it would be better to fix the textures to match the mesh rather than changing the mesh to fit a preferred texture, since that breaks all other retextures that are designed around the original mesh. Unless it is a radically different mesh, of course, for use with a substantially redesigned texture.
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Alexis Acevedo
 
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Post » Tue May 17, 2011 1:06 am

It depends what gets fixed though. I'd suggest it would be better to fix the textures to match the mesh rather than changing the mesh to fit a preferred texture, since that breaks all other retextures that are designed around the original mesh. Unless it is a radically different mesh, of course, for use with a substantially redesigned texture.


While for most cases I would agree, I still have yet to find a Velothi door texture replacer other than yours that follows the door's true UVs rather than the placement of details on Bethesda's door textures. A UV fix would improve the look of almost every texture replacer that currently exists. The other problem I've noticed is that the exterior and interior door meshes actually have different UVs, but they take the same texture... part of the problem; a replacer designed with exterior doors in mind might be incorrectly mapped on interior doors.
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Adam Kriner
 
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Post » Tue May 17, 2011 12:51 am

The other problem I've noticed is that the exterior and interior door meshes actually have different UVs, but they take the same texture... part of the problem; a replacer designed with exterior doors in mind might be incorrectly mapped on interior doors.


That's probably the fundamental problem with all the other replacers, they worked on one mesh and forgot or were not aware of the other one. I know I had to substantially retweak the positions of the horizontal bars on mine to fit both doors successfully. I began by laying out my retex on the plan of the MW Visual Pack door, and was shocked by how badly misaligned it was.

Please let me know if you rebuild the mesh though. ;)
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Latino HeaT
 
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Post » Tue May 17, 2011 7:45 am

Even if you work on one mesh and ignore the other, the fact that they use the same texture with different UVs makes things ridiculously difficult - I can't believe Bethesda set up the UVs for those doors such that the horizontal strips actually display at different heights! I imagine the only reason your doors work at all UV-wise is that the wooden panels' UVs don't actually cover the entire wooden panel area of the door texture... metal strip areas could be filled in.

Either way, door meshes need a re-do so the outside and inside doors aren't offset from each other. Even Bethesda's textures had the same problem.
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Katie Pollard
 
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Post » Tue May 17, 2011 10:50 am

I imagine the only reason your doors work at all UV-wise is that the wooden panels' UVs don't actually cover the entire wooden panel area of the door texture... metal strip areas could be filled in.


It's a bit hard to see, but the metal edges are actually slanted (on all sides). So the wood area is quite significantly covered by the slant edges. If you look at the door textures, you'll see that they have painted shadow under the bars and the top raised arch, but that's completely covered by the sloping edges of the raised section. That's why it's possible to fudge one texture to fit both doors, because of the large hidden section under those edges.
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Wayne W
 
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