BAKING PROBLEM!
Can't seem to bake properly 
I understand I make a high res and a low poly retop, but baking the detail on just never seems to happen accurately or decently. Ive followed videos, Ive followed help and trawled through the wiki but never get a good result;
Any ideas?
PROBLEM:
I understand I make a high res and a low poly retop, but baking the detail on just never seems to happen accurately or decently. Ive followed videos, Ive followed help and trawled through the wiki but never get a good result;
Any ideas?
PROBLEM:
Replies
Its literally a test.
I just made a square; slightly beveled top, and a center slightly pulled out - onto a low res square. Its not overlapped; i just want a better result of a bake; its not being baked properly; or rigid, not smooth and doesnt look like the higher res.
Cheers Perna, it was a bump on the last image; forgot to change to Tangent.
Any idea how to improve this bake guys.
Do you mean the silhouette doesn't look like the highpoly? Normal maps do not deform the geometry of your object so you have to be aware of that when modeling. The extrusions coming off your cube wont show up in the side view, only on the straight on view.
I also seem to have no curve or bevel on the outter shape as in the higher poly.
That is what Bardler was saying. That curvature in the high poly is a modification of the silhouette. In order to get a curve in the low poly, you'll have to actually have the curve in the low poly. Normal Maps only tell the engine how to light certain parts of the model, which gives off the bumpiness/small details. And like Bardler said, Normal maps are really only effective if you're looking at the model straightforward.
Ah great - thanks
Then any idea whats happening to the middle of the low poly?
Obviously not going to change the silhouette, but I'm pretty sure you know a normal map doesn't do this anyway. See example:
In Max, to get the error you're getting I think I'd have to set the projection cage up wrongly, in the above example the cage sits above both the high and the low (ever so slightly, of course)
What you really want to do for anything more complicated than a cube is set it to "Inside Only" and set up your envelope properly, though.
SORTED IT
Thank you everyone for this help; I learnt alot during these practices, as I've never really managed to normal map properly - it was GREATLY APPRECIATED!
Kudos To Internet Friend for the Settings, Perna for the quick and informative replies and to GeeDave for point out my major problems - and even testing my theory.
THANK YOU!
Guys if anyone has this problem;
1. Ensure that your High Poly and Low poly match the silohuette as close as possible - don't expect a curve however slight that maybe; if you havent got any extra topology or a slight curve there on your low poly to help define that. - the shape DOES not change in a normal, only the light that bounces off it (this should be obv but you never know who reads this)
2. Ensure your settings for the baking are correct; make sure your targ mesh is your low poly/source is the high (again fairly obv) and make sure the advanced settings option is set to "Inside Only" and Set the Envelop to JUST cover the model.
I hope my points are correct; I'm sure they are - as thats what worked for me, but again I'm new to this!
What you really want to do for anything more complicated than a cube is set it to "Inside Only" and set up your envelope properly, though.
You learn something new every day haha.
So ideally I just need my low poly UVED? It doesnt matter how its laid out; or uved in anyway just aslong as they don't overlap I'm guessing?
The only situation where your highpoly needs uvs is if it has some sort of texture applied that you want to bake down as well, but even then the uvs do not need to match.
If your edge isn't a UV edge it should always be soft. Having hard edges where you shouldn't will result in nasty seams. Having soft edges in the wrong place will result in lighting problems when rendered.
Right now you're just using a cube with some unneccesary loops, and it doesn't match the highpoly at all.