Well this sample from the Ptex website says it better than I ever could:
"Ptex is a texture mapping system developed by Walt Disney Animation Studios for production-quality rendering:
- No UV assignment is required! Ptex applies a separate texture to each face of a subdivision or polygon mesh.
- The Ptex file format can efficiently store hundreds of thousands of texture images in a single file.
- The Ptex API provides cached file I/O and high-quality filtering - everything that is needed to easily add Ptex support to a production-quality renderer or texture authoring application."
While that all sounds nice it is hard for someone new to the business to understand. I am not that tech savvy so learning what all this means is an endeavour within itself. However, learning is part of what I do and I will be learning new technologies for however long I stay in the creative industry (which is hopefully up until I retire). Right now though I am still a student and learning all of this is my job.
So in the 3D modelling pipeline there is a stage where the models must be unwrapped and textured. This requires the use of UV unwrapping and UV mapping to ensure the model can be accurately textured and painted in an external program like Adobe Photoshop. The task is long and tedious and can be difficult depending on the model but it is a crucial part of the development of a 3D model.
In production this process takes a lot of time and so Walk Disney Animation Studios produced a more efficient method of producing high quality texture models called Ptex in 2008. The first film made using this method was Bolt and from there is caught the attention of others in the 3D modelling field.
Bolt from Bolt (2008) by Walt Disney Animation Studios
While Ptex is a good texturing method in the film industry is is not applicable in the gaming industry. But as this method was designed for film I believe if the game industry wants technology like this then they will have to implement their own method.
Ptex may possibly become the primary method used for texturing in the film animation industry as it creates highly detailed textures and does not show any seams across different faces, takes less time as there is no UV unwrapping needed and each face and have a different resolution.
An image providing an example of Ptex from the Ptex website
However there are still disadvantages to using Ptex like:
- Changing the geometry of files requires the Ptex to be rebaked onto the model with the possible loss of quality, however, this problem is solvable but is an extra step to be worried about.
- Renaming your model will also require you to rename your Ptex file as the models corresponding Ptex file must have to same name (although this is not much of a disadvantage. It's actually helpful in keeping files organised).
All that said. Ptex is simply a different way to texture models than using the UV unwrap method. It's a faster and more efficient method for anyone who knows how to use it and it is extremely useful in film.
References
Belvins, N. (2012). CG Education. Neilblevins.com. Retrieved 4 July 2014, from http://www.neilblevins.com/cg_education/ptex/ptex.htm
Masters, M. (2014). What is Ptex? Texturing with Ptex. Digital-Tutors Blog. Retrieved 4 July 2014, from http://blog.digitaltutors.com/understanding-ptex-is-it-the-future-of-texturing/
Ptex.us,. (2008). Ptex. Retrieved 4 July 2014, from http://ptex.us/index.html
0 comments:
Post a Comment