topic Re: Normals or Render Setup issue? in 3ds Max Modeling Forum

Normals or Render Setup issue?

M3SH3D — Sun, 13 Nov 2022 14:35:03 GMT

Moin,

I do not know whether my problem is caused by missaligned normals or something else.

Some polygons of the sphere in the scene have been cut out (as element).

As can be seen in den viewport, the normals are aligned so that the reflections are showing undistorted at the edges of the cutout.

Unfortunately the rendered image does not. The cutout is clearly visible. The reflections are distorted.

My intention is to have the sphere and cutout sperated as two independent objects with aligned normals. When the cutout parts are in place, there shall be no visible seam.

My setup

3ds Max 2021.3.8
- MAXtoA: 5.0.1.4
Renderer: ARNOLD
- Physical Camera Exposure
- Physical Scale: 200
- Background: HDRI Environment
1 ARNOLD Light (sky dome)
- Color Texture: HDRI light
- Intensity: 2
- Exposure: 2
2 SPheres
- Physical Material: GOLD
1 Plane
- no material

Re: Normals or Render Setup issue?

CiroCardoso3v — Tue, 15 Nov 2022 07:35:15 GMT

Is related to the smoothing groups and you can see it in the viewport as well

If you apply a smooth modifier to both surfaces, you can see it disapear

Re: Normals or Render Setup issue?

domo.spaji — Tue, 15 Nov 2022 14:58:07 GMT

Wrong-all.

Re: Normals or Render Setup issue?

domo.spaji — Tue, 15 Nov 2022 15:14:50 GMT

Add Edit Mesh modifier to sphere and check vertex normals.

You could fix that with by adding "Welder" modifier with default settings...

"Welder" modifier - not Vertex Weld mod.

But there's no effect than can't be done other way than splitting that mesh in first place.

What do you want to achieve with that?

Re: Normals or Render Setup issue?

M3SH3D — Tue, 15 Nov 2022 18:13:37 GMT

Moin,

thanks for your replies. I´ve found a solution myself. Normals had been aligned beforehand the render. And the reflections have been as expected in the viewport. So, Smoothing did not do the trick.

For wireframe overlay renderings I used to have the "Geometry Translation" set to "Always use Quads". The quads caused the problem. I´ve switched to "Automatic" - no more seams. All my headaches dissolved into thin air.

Regards,

M3SH3D

Re: Normals or Render Setup issue?

CiroCardoso3v — Wed, 16 Nov 2022 07:42:56 GMT

So the Edit Mesh modifier solution was wrong-all as well.

Interesting solution. The setting I had was also in Automatic and I was still having the same issue as you.

Re: Normals or Render Setup issue?

M3SH3D — Wed, 16 Nov 2022 17:07:04 GMT

Moin,

many thanks to all who replied anyways.

In fact I stumbled across the solution just by accident. After I had posted in the first place I was so frustrated, I switched to scanline renderer to see whether another render engine would do any better. It did. When I switched back to Arnold the "Geometry Translation" was set to "Automatic". And the issue was gone.

Don´t know why the Automatic setting did not work out for you. Here is how I have aligned the normals:

I had selected both objects,
applied an "Edit Normals" modifier and
aligned each pair of normals by hand ("copy value" & "paste value" in the modifier rollout)

It´s a tedious way and was done so only for testing. For higher counts of normals I use a plugin.

Regards,

M3SH3D