3D Ripper DX - question concerning normalmaps

[THE 5]

So I tried this tool today, capturing Starcraft 2.
Now the normalmaps that it creates are just partly correct.
The ground textures seem allright but for other objects some of the RGB channels are blank. Any thoughts on this, maybe sollutuions?
http://i296.photobucket.com/albums/mm198/Nightterror5/Polycount/starcraft2normalmaps3dripperdx.jpg

EDIT:
I am sorry if that whole 3D tripping storry is a nono on PC D:
Feel free to kill this thread then.

[felipefrango]

Weird. I've created orange normal maps like this with Nvidia Texture Tools 2 command line DDS exporter but only when I put in the wrong commands. Never saw this happen with 3D Ripper though. Is there any chance they would intentionally store only one channel worth of normal information?

[Bal]

Because of the DXT5 compression for normal maps I think? They stick one channel in the Green (the channel that is the less degraded in DXT compression I think?) white in red, black in blue (not sure why, probably again, gives the less artifacts in the green channel), then put the other channel in the Alpha (stays super clean after compression in DXT5). They ditch the blue altogether, as it's not necessary.

I think the ground textures look more like uncompressed normal maps because they are compressed in DXT1.

[felipefrango]

Hmm, that sounds feasible indeed. THE5, what's in the alpha channel of the orange map, if there actually is one?

[THE 5]

(sorry for the late response)
Yup it's inside the alpha :D
Strange I did not see the alpha was not just pure white.

Now I got one more thing to ask.
I,d like to view the mesh inside 3ds Max with the 3 Point Shader.
The problem is that the correct Mapping channel for the textures is channel 5. The 3 Point shader is using channel 1 by default. Normaly when assingning a bitmap to a standart material you cna select what channel it is supposed to use. How can I get the 3 point shader to use channel 5, or even better, how can I swap texture channels in general (exchange 1 for 5)?

[r_fletch_r]

there is a utility in the utilitys tab called 'channel info' that will let you copy and paste mapping data between channels.

utilities - more -> channel Info.

seeing all these hacks makes me wonder why the hell there isnt dxt format that stores 2 channels specifically for normal maps. (edit DX 10 has this with BC5/3DC)

http://developer.download.nvidia.com/whitepapers/2008/normalmapdxt_id_files/tangent_lips_3Dc.png
http://developer.nvidia.com/object/real-time-normal-map-dxt-compression.html

[THE 5]

OK, thats it!
Thanks guys!

[Bal]

r_fletch_r, that site is a good read.
I can't test cause I'm still on DX9, but what's the memory difference with the BC5 compressoin? Is it less than DXT5, or the same? It's not obvious from the description (for me anyways).

It's strange that there's DXT1 and BC5 in UDK, but no DX5nm (or maybe they removed it when BC5 was added, thus ignoring the DirectX 9 crowd).