Problems with diffuse textures in DX9

blakboks

Hi everyone,
It seems what better place to ask such a question than the developer's forums...

I'm trying to create a track from scratch using a combination of Bob's Track Builder and 3DS Max (although foregoing the former for the most part). Anyhow, I'm trying to work on my track some more after having upgraded my computer. Since installing 3DS Max 9 on Windows 7, and using the appropriate gMotor tools, things aren't exporting like they did before on WinXP. Now, however, it seems as though my texture stages are getting screwed up for some reason. My diffuse stage doesn't seem to appear at all in DX9. It looks like the only thing I'm getting is the specular component. My DX7 materials, which only have the diffuse stage, are working ok, though. Below is a pic of the issue I'm having.

View attachment 132

I'm using the 'Bump Specular Map T1' shader. The status on all three texture stages are 'green'. I've double-checked the folder I'm exporting to, and the texture is in the right place (besides, I don't think the track would even load in the Viewer). I've tried re-creating the material from scratch. Nothing seems to work.

I'm using gMotor 2.54c, 3dsmax9 32-bit, Win7 64-bit. I've searched these forums a bit, I've done google searches, I've checked the documentation and a tut or two. I'm really at a loss here.

Any help you guys might be able to offer would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks in advance,
-Chris
 
Ok, attached is my material editor. I've included the gTex's as well, just in case there's something in there, but it doesn't seem like it. This gMat is in slot 1 in a Multi/Sub-Object material.

I know this probably isn't related to the issue I'm having with the diffuse textures... Since I have 2 different road surfaces, for now, for play-testing I've named the materials roada and roadb. Which is how I should be naming them, correct? All of my drivable materials should have names that are defined in the .tdf, correct?

View attachment 134
 
You should name them road*

Your materials look okay... there's a few things that should be done differently, but I'll mention them when sober ;)

Erm, not really sure whats wrong, try just doing T1, to see if that works okay, then just Specular Map T1, then Bump Specular Map etc. I presume one of the maps must be a bit weird.
 
Yeah, I agree that some things should be done differently for optimization, but I'm just trying to get it working for now.

One thing that I noticed that may be related is that in the viewer, I'm not getting any 'light'. Almost everything is very flat and doesn't have much shading. For some things that do, such as the armco, it looks as though it's being lit from directly above. The time of day buttons in the viewer don't do anything, either. Finally, when I coped the DX9 shaders into the DX8 slots, I started getting better results, but it still looks off (very dim coloring). I have a nVidia GeForce 465GTX, so it doesn't make any sense that they'd be dropping down from DX9 to DX8.

I don't have a sky in my scene at all, either. Could this be causing some of the issues? Anyone have a tut. for sky's?

-Chris
 
Max9 and below has issues with dds images on win7. There was a post about it somewhere in an rfactror related forum, but I can't seem to find it now.
 
Well, I think I found out what the problem is...but I don't really know how to fix it.

For some reason, when it's outputting to GMT, the maps are getting switched around. I found the following order to look mostly correct: Stage 1: Spec., Stage 2: Normal, Stage 3: Diffuse. (As opposed to 1: Diff, 2: Spec, 3: Norm) It's very weird, because the tiling is correct for that stage, just the references are getting screwed up (i.e. if I have the tiling for the Spec in the gTex set to 5x20, the Diffuse texture comes out tiled by that much in the viewer). Any ideas what could be causing this mix-up?

I'm downloading the Max 2011 trial now to see if it's fixed in that version.

Thanks for your continued help on this, guys.

-Chris
 
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Is anyone modding with Windows 7 64-bit? If so, what versions of 3DSMax/gMotor are you using?

I tried creating a test track from scratch just to see if I could get things to work, but without success. I'm convinced either my configuration is screwed up or the gMotor tools that are available on the website just don't work with either Max 9 or Max 2011 in Win7x64.

Thanks again for everyone's help so far!
-Chris
 
Max 2009, Win 7 x64, 0 issues. Make sure you are installing 32 bit max. The ISI tools are only for 32 bit.
 
I use Max 9, and Max 2010 on Win 7 64-Bit with Zero Issues.. Only thing I need to do is check incompatible in the Material selection screen to get GMotorTools to show up. Just be sure you install the 3 files from ISI in the 32 Bit install, and extract all the files out of the Coreshaders.MAS file and drop them into the HardwareShader folder in the 32Bit install of 3DS Max..

Hope this helps...
 
Man, I am really stumped... I definitely cannot get this to work correctly.

I'm running 32-bit Max, have coreshaders.mas in C:\Program Files (x86)\Autodesk\3ds Max 2011\hardwareshaders (and extracted per ShawnB's suggestion). The Converter.dlu, Material.dlt, and Texture.dlt are installed in: C:\Program Files (x86)\Autodesk\3ds Max 2011\plugins. I'm using the appropriate plugins from the rfactor.net website (the max2010 plugin for max2011, though).

The really puzzling thing is that any other track opens in the Viewer just fine, so I know it isn't just a setting there.

Here's some quick screen shots of my little piece of test track (100m x 100m).
T1 has no tiling or offset. The spec map has tiling set to 5x5. Bump tiling is set to 5x5 with a .6x.4 offset.

Here is T1 only:
View attachment 135
BumpMapT1:
View attachment 137
SpecMapT1
View attachment 138
BumpSpecMapT1
View attachment 136

From these pictures, it looks as though whatever texture is in the first stage is being propagated to the other stages, yet retaining the tiling settings of those stages.

Thanks again for your guys' help.
-Chris
 
Firstly you have to eliminate any possible causes.
This is what I would do if I was in your position.

Try a different bump map, make a new bump map from a white background and use that.
Also try creating a new material with the same textures, but don't adjust any values, just create the material and add the images.
If that fails, try it on a fresh new mesh. Try both original material and the new one you just made.
 
Well, I was able to get my test strip to work, but not until I copied DX9 into DX8. It doesn't make any sense, though, because I have the Viewer set to use DX9...

I've also been able to get the sky and most of the lighting to working properly now. Well, I got it to use the default one, anyway. I still can't get it to use my own properly.

The issue I'm having now is that my objects that are only using DX7 materials (i.e. T1 only) aren't being lit at all. It's as if they're using the "no lighting Tex1" shader. They're just a flat, unlit texture, I mean...

This is all very very strange, and there doesn't seem to be any reason why this stuff is happening. I really can't understand why I'd be getting these problems when all my installs have been fresh. I honestly don't think I'm doing anything 'wrong'. I've tried things from scratch, I've tried non-.dds textures. I've eliminated just about everything I possibly can think of. I just wish I could get inside the converter or .gmt's and see exactly what's going on.

The only thing I can think of now is if maybe when the GMT is being made that it's processed through the GPU, and for some reason that's screwing things up. I'm running a GeForce 465GTX. What GPU's are other people using?

-Chris
 
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