Decaling a bottle

[jakerupert]

Hi there,

 

I have some difficultie in labeling a bottle.

I modeld the bottle with a doubleside-wall and put the fake glas mat on it.

But then the label disapears. (See bottle in middle)

I tried different versions with a liquid inside (Left) and no transpereny at all (right),

doesnt look good.

Also I tried the flatten command in applying the label. Is cyulindrucal here the better method?

 

Any hints to get better results?

 

I enclose the proj done in AM13.0 t

 

Thank you

 

Jake

BottlelabelTest.zip

[jakerupert]

...and here are the pictures!

 

(Uh, does it make sense, that you are not allowed to upload tga files? if it`s AM`s main medium??)

[jakerupert]

Ups, excuse my grammar, please. I am a bit sick today...

[Rodney]

(Uh, does it make sense, that you are not allowed to upload tga files? if it`s AM`s main medium??)

 

Unfortunately TGA isn't the internets main format.

I almost wish it was but there are good reasons to use lossy images like JPG.

At least the give faster viewing times.

 

Its interesting you bring up decaling a bottle here as I just got done viewing an old video tutorial on just that subject.

 

I'd definitely recommend using cylindrical.

Also, you will generally want to hide the parts of the bottle you don't want to have effected by the decal.

 

I'll download your file and see what there is to see.

 

 

You image makes me think you need to apply the decal to a second group that doesn't have transparency applied to it. If you add it to group with Transparency you get a transparent decal.

 

Make sense?

[John Bigboote]

Jake- Hope you feel better!

 

I recently went down the same path! The glass material is making the decal transparent. What I ended doing---copy and paste the geometry that the label is over, and make sure no transparency or materials apply to that geometry/patches. I also scaled it UP a smidge.

 

I tried cylindrical application first, and could not get what I wanted so then I did this old trick:

 

Make an action and flatten the label geometry so the label will apply without distorting... apply the label and assign it 'cookie-cut' so the alpha defines the shape and transparency... go back to the model and admire!

 

HERE is the silly wine/water labels I made for some bogus products...

[heyvern]

John, did cookie cut work well? I mean all the speculars and reflections weren't effected by the "overlapping" geometry? I haven't done that label trick in ages and had problems with cookie cut decals on a mesh over another mesh. I ended up using a set of masks for transparency specular etc.

 

I created all the decals in one photoshop document so they were all lined up. The label with alpha was the color. I then created masks for transparency and specular etc etc with the label area masked out or adjusted (specular) to give a different surface quality in AM for the label area. Then dropped all the images into one decal.

 

It's been a while since I did it I may have missed a step.

 

-vern

[Pengy]

Maybe this link will help,I faced the same dilemma http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?showt...=4673&st=15

[John Bigboote]

John, did cookie cut work well? I mean all the speculars and reflections weren't effected by the "overlapping" geometry? I haven't done that label trick in ages and had problems with cookie cut decals on a mesh over another mesh. I ended up using a set of masks for transparency specular etc.

-vern

 

 

OOOPS! I missed a step... once you copy/paste, you will need to offset the new patches 'slightly' in front of the glass CP's...ever so SLIGHTLY.

[heyvern]

Yes, but.... in the past... it would still have adverse effect on the reflection and specular of the underlying mesh because of shadows. It could be that is no longer the case with more recent versions.

 

-vern

[John Bigboote]

Yes, but.... in the past... it would still have adverse effect on the reflection and specular of the underlying mesh because of shadows. It could be that is no longer the case with more recent versions.

 

-vern

 

Shadows can be turned ON/OFF group by group...no? This is my workaround...I am still waiting for someone to chime in with a !DOH! simple solution.

[HomeSlice]

HERE is the silly wine/water labels I made for some bogus products...

LOVE! the products. Where can I get some Drunkin Pumpkin?

 

It think a transparency decal will work. Copy your decal/label and paint the parts you want to see white and the parts you don't want to see black, then apply it to the same geometry as the glass material. Don't forget to change its Type to "Transparency".

 

I just tried it and there is one tricky bit. The black part of the transparency decal will turn the geometry under it 100% transparent. That isn't a problem if you want a 100% transparent bottle, but usually you don't want it totally transparent. I turned the "percent" down on my transparency map to "75%" and it blended perfectly with the rest of the geometry, which had 80% transparency.

 

So I think a Transparency map is the way to go.

[heyvern]

Now I remember!!!!!

 

I used an alpha channel on the transparency/specular maps!!!

 

If the label is perfectly "square" or rectangular the alpha is not needed. If the label is an odd shape or circular you need the alpha in the color decal and the masks.

Create the surface attributes for the bottle as normal, just the way you have. Make a color decal with an alpha for the label, same as the transparency and specular. Using the same alpha to mask out the decal images!!! The masks of course will be rgb instead of grayscale. Now the decal will work on the bottles surface but still show the label without having to worry about "matching" the transparency mask to the bottles surface properties.

 

 

 

-vern

[jakerupert]

Hi all,

 

Thank you very much for your help.

An added Transparancy map did the trick.

Its quite consoling that even the "old hares" around here forget some of their tricks once in a while.

guess that happens when you change your focus to another part of this great progam,

let`s say riging or animating and go back to decaling after a while.

 

So good to have this invaluable help here.

 

And John, very nice labels for your new drinks.

Can we see pictures of the whole bottles as well?

[jakerupert]

Sorry, I still have problems with it.

 

The two bottles in the middle still have transparent labels and I simply cant understand why?

 

I even copied the bottle with the solid cream label and just changed the decal to

the wodka-label with " ad image", so no change should occur, but nevertheless the

wodkalabel turns out transparent. Drives me crazy.

 

Could somebody please take a look at my project please and tell me what`s wrong?

BottleTest2.zip

[heyvern]

They are all transparent. The darker bottles don't show it as much. You still need a completely separate RGB image that is totally white with the same alpha channel as the labels. Add this to the decal images folder and set it to "transparency". this will cause just the label area to be 100% opaque (it's white no transparency).

 

That is how I did my sample. Just a plain white TGA the same size and the same alpha channel as the color label.

 

I created one from the "latte" label. It's a tga so I zipped it.

 

label_transparency.zip

 

p.s. The beauty of this is you can change the value of the decal image (transparency, specular etc etc) by just changing the opacity of the image in the properties. By using a decal image this way you can have irregular shaped variable values for anything OVER an already defined base surface attribute. Easier that creating the whole mask in photoshop and having to go back all the time to make small adjustments.

 

Transparency gets a bit wonky around the edges. It doesn't play well with soft edge alpha channels.

 

-vern

[jakerupert]

Hi Vern,

 

Thanks a lot: You saved my day!!!!!

 

;>))))) Jake