Hi blender artists.
Okay here is the situation, I loaded up an image as a Background Image
that is 100x100 pixels and set the Scale to 1.0. I also set the Grid spacing
in Display to 10 and 1.0. Now with those settings you would think 0.1 BU (Blender Unit)
would equal 1 pixel but it doesn’t or does it?
I also used the Add - ON Images to Planes and that’s supposed to make the plane the same size as the image. When I did that it made a plane that was 2.0 BU along the X, Y Axis. Then I did a measurement with just an Edge and it was 0.2BU
So what’s the deal here? Shouldn’t it be 1.0 BU or 0.1?
Warning Long Rant!
The reason for all of this is because for years I have been making all my textures
1024x1024 , 1536x 1536 and even 2048x2048 because that’s what I kept reading
and being told to do from people in the 3D community.
" just make the textures in multiples of 2 like 512x512, 768,768 ,1024x 1024 and so on."
or
“Just make them big so if you get up close and render it won’t be pixelated.”
Okay so now I’m thinking why would I make a texture 1024x 1024?
I’m not making a game and more importantly…
if the textured object is only going to take up 300 pixels of space in the final render
what’s the point in that? That’s a huge waste of resources using an image that 1024x1024.
End of Rant!
Here is my image texture. If you know something I don’t please do explain
the right way to use the View settings and what is a more reasonable way
to pick texture sizes.
Thanks for any help in advance, it’s greatly appreciated.
Regards,
not being an expert, i have never fussed about size of images for textures - as long as the resolution is enough …
So then how do you figure out how big to make the image then?
In the User Preferences is an option called 2D View Port - Minimum Grid Spacing: 10.0
Tool Tip says “Minimum number of pixels between each grid lines in 2D View Ports.”
If I set everything to 1.0 shouldn’t a Plane that is 100 BU x 100 BU
equal 100 x 100 Pixels?
What I’m looking for is a way to set the grid spacing in a 2D View Port
so that every grid line is spaced 1 pixel apart or 10 pixels apart.
What I found out after doing some tests and messing around with different settings.
Press N key and in the Display section there is Grid Floor.
Lines is only used in perspective view so that didn’t need adjustment.
Scale adjusts the Grid Line spacing in 3D view but also does in 2D view
like if you press the 7 Number Pad key to go into top view.
Subdivisions is the number of divisions between Grid lines.
So what I did was add a Plane mesh in top view that is 1.0 BU x 1.0 subdivided
it so there is 10 Faces along the X and Y Axis (100 face total) and mapped a
10x10 pixel checker board image on it and rendered it in orthographic view set to 1.0.
Turns out that each edge was 0.1 BU and equaled exactly a pixel.
That’s what I wanted to know how to do so I have a better idea
now of how the Grid and View Ports work and the area of a section or part of
a mesh in Blender Units and Pixels.
As for the User Preference option called 2D View Port - Minimum Grid Spacing: 10.
I changed the number a couple times but didn’t see any changes on my screen
so I don’t really understand it so I’ll look into it later on today. It must be of some use
or they wouldn’t have put it there right? Well I’d like to know and see how it actually
works.
I imagine that most people will think this stuff is trivial and not really worth
being bothered with, however I personally think it’s important to fully understand
the software your using.
From what I know of image textures, the 2x method is more precisely the 8x method.
Always multiples of Eight. Why? I believe it has to do with loading, and some other much more complex stuff.
From what I gather it is a long time Artifact from a long time ago. It is how Computers work aswell. A one Terrabyte is not exactly 1000GB. It is 1024GB (although that 24 GB often becomes obsilete).
Personally I have NEVER heard of 768 or 1536 sizes. They are not a mainstream file size. And they don’t fit within the x8 method. (8,16,32,64,128,256,512,(no 768),1024,(no 1536), 2048 …ect…
Also, to space things as “Pixels” apart does not make sense. if you cange the view, then yuo have lost the whole point, havn’t you?
Yes the multiples of 2 I think was what it was referred to along time ago but like you said
more precisely the 8x method.
I do remember the classic game DOOM only used textures that were multiples of 8. Example 8x8=64, 8x8, 16x16, 32x32, 64x64, 128x128, 256x256 and finally 512x512.
Eventually larger textures could be used so then 1024x1024
and 2048x 2048 became standard practice.
The 1536x1536 is correct but I don’t know how much that size was or is used in Video Games, and yes you can use a texture like that or 1024x768.
1536 is just 1024 + 512.
512, 768, 1024, 1280, 1536, 1792 and 2048.
In Doom 2 there were some textures that were more rectangular like 32x64
or 128x256. There weren’t many of them in the DOOM map editor I had.
The whole multiples of x2 or x8 whatever you want to say are I think
because of how computers, game engines work along with the video cards and
Monitors Resolutions. Back in 98 my first screen was 640x480.
Both numbers can be divided by 2 into an even numbers.
Now my current screen is 1680x1050 and while they can be divided by 2
1050 can’t be divided by 8 into an even number so
I don’t think it really matters when doing Still Renders or Animations
only for Video Game.
“Since computer memory is designed with binary logic, multiples are expressed in powers of 2, rather than 10.”
That is probably why textures in video games are multiples of 8.
Also, to space things as “Pixels” apart does not make sense. if you cange the view, then you have lost the whole point, havn’t you?
Um not really because there isn’t too much difference between a 500x500 pixel texture and 512x512 pixel texture.
And if you change view a 512x512 isn’t going to matter as well as if it was 500x500.
But that’s not the point. The point is to make textures that fit the surface you are texturing exactly per pixel. And then you decide how big the texture really needs to be based on distance in the Still Render or Animation. Like I was saying why would you make a texture 1024x1024 that is not in a game and only
takes up like 178 pixels on screen in the final render? it doesn’t make sense to use that size
of texture.
With all that said there is a sort of unwritten rule that you make the texture twice as big.
