High Quality GI lightmapping

Game Engine Game Engine Resources
1

Hi, this is my first contribution to the community, it is a script for Blender that let’s you export your meshes to the .MQO (metasequoia) format used by the Parthenon Renderer (FREE APP), which is a biased global illumination engine assisted by GPU (Directx 9) and has lightmap baking. You can download Parthenon from here http://www.bee-www.com/parthenon/ the script io_export_mqo.zip (3.67 KB)

NEW: Added video tutorial.

https://youtu.be/9sqpRzLzSvE

Here is a little description on how to use the script.

The script will export one file per object, and it takes some time to export complex scenes, so I do recommend testing with simple scenes before exporting. Follow the next steps.

1° Use materials.

only diffuse, alpha cutout and bump textures are supported, use the first three texture slots, all the textures you use must be placed in the same folder as your exported file
the specular intensity is equals to reflection, “0” value means non reflective
the transparency alpha value is for glass surfaces, values below 1.0 are refractive

2° Use any objects for lighting the scene.

activate the shadeless checkbox
the emit value is equal to the intensity of the light

3° Avoid multiple materials per object.

4° When you export activate the single File checkbox for testing your lighting and adjust the scale if you have problems with shadows.

5° Make a shortcut for the Parthenon, go to properties and add a resolution for your lightmaps.
http://s9.postimage.org/jph6u1awb/resolution.jpg

6° Execute Parthenon, you can load multiple files at once for a batch render, change the mode to lightmaps, go to settings and adjust the iterations parameter for a cleaner image.
http://s13.postimage.org/w9xjjz3j7/iterations.jpg

7° Go to rendering > run. The maps are saved in the same folder as your “.mqos” files.

And here are the lightmaps back to the BGE.

http://s18.postimage.org/vlayjg0dh/pic1.jpg
http://s9.postimage.org/mjz1fgf3f/pic2.jpg
http://s9.postimage.org/3rrrpm82z/pic3.jpg

and an animation I made, rendered with Parthenon.

I know this is not a one click solution but I hope this helps someone!

2

Pretty nice script, though as I suspect there are not a lot of Maya users here on Blenderartists do you think it would be possible to write an exporter for Blender as well?

And Parthenon is very fast indeed but it also seems to be very inaccurate, I have no idea what’s going on with the light bouncing in the cornell box example. But it is very nice for producing clean and flicker-free animations and it is certainly good enough to bake lightmaps for game engines to use.

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Yeah I think it would be possible, I’m really new to blender but I Love it, I’m learning python, eventually I will be writing the exporter for blender so, I’ll be posting here.

You are right I think parthenon is not ready for production and as you said it does a good job at baking lightmaps.

4

Was parthenon abandoned in 2008?

5

Hi guys! I want to show you some progress, I have the exporter working for Blender, at the time you can only export a single file, materials are supported, you can set lights activating the shadeless checkbox of a material and increasing the emit parameter, the next thing to do will be to add support for textures and and the ability to automate the process of baking lightmaps for every mesh.

Here are some pics using the new exporter for blender.

01.jpg1280×720 359 KB

03.jpg1280×720 291 KB

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Looks interesting.

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Thank you for your work on the Blender exporter, I gave it a try and had to uncheck “example boolean” to get it to export but the materials doesn’t seem to work, all I get is pure white materials everywhere. Or am I doing something wrong here?

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Hello NinthJake, are you using Blender 2.64?, if you are then make sure you have all your meshes selectable, because the exporter selects, duplicates and deletes for every mesh.

For matte materials use this settings

matte.jpg387×803 121 KB

For lights use this

light.jpg386×801 109 KB

The emit value will depend on the scale of your scene so try to increase it or decrease it, also alpha values below 1.0 are refractive like glass. If the problem persist please send me your mqo file to see whats going on.

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Hi Aryok, yes I am using Blender 2.64, thanks for the help but the problem still persists, I am only getting white clay renders with AO.

Here is the .mqo file.
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/15451969/test02.mqo

And here is the Blender file that was used to export the scene.
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/15451969/Parthenon_test01.blend

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Hey, I see what’s the problem, it’s my fault indeed, material per face is not supported, that’s why the wall mesh is taken the first material which is white. You have to extract polygons so that you have one material per mesh, I hope that helps.

11

Well I have no idea why I didn’t think of that lol, pretty embarrassing tbh :stuck_out_tongue:

Works perfectly now, thank you so much ^^

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how to make the lightmapping texture for BGE?

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Once you are done with the lighting setup, for a single lightMap, go to Rendering > Mode > LightMaps and then Rendering > Run.

Parthenon will bake the first material in alphabetical order, so if you want to bake more than one you have to rename every material to be the first. Or wait until I release the finished exporter.

14

A new Update! now you can export with textures, the first texture slot is for diffuse, the second for alpha cutout, and the third slot for bump map. Place your textures in the same folder as your mqo files, use JPG format, other formats may not work, this is one limitation of Parthenon.

If you are having problems with shadows I added a scale parameter to the exporter, try to adjust it to get correct results.

15

I’ve finished the exporter, I’ve edited the first post and removed all the Maya stuff, enjoy. :slight_smile:

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Thanks a lot Aryok for the Christmas present :wink:

I will have a lot of fun with this I’m sure.

17

i followed your instruction and change the mode to “Lightmap”,but i got no pictures in the Mqo folder.I still have no idea how could i get a lightmap picture ,sorry i am still beginner,could you help?

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Make sure your models have UV’s in order to work and that they are in 0 to 1 range coordinates, and you can try first rendering the image and then change it to lightmap mode, I hope that helps.

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Hi,finally i got it worked.
The problem come from the Exporter,i don’t know why ,your exporter always export another material as the 1st material but not the object which i want to bake

So,what i did is open the exported file and edit the text by MS word,then it work…………

Is there any way to solve this problem by your exporter?

question:
1 should i ctrl+j all the mesh in my scene?now ithere are 2 object in scene,1 main mesh and 1 light,but the exporter always export the light’s material as the 1st one,so when i bake lightmap,the parthenon always bake the light objects UV
2 i saw you said the exporter export the mateiral by the order like a b c d e f ………………，i named the material so,but not work.i don’t know way

20

Well, if you have two or more objects I recommend to untick single file checkbox, then you can delete the light mqo and you should be good to go, because single file mode is for testing your lighting and for design issues it takes whatever material as first.

And no, do not join meshes unless they share the same material and UVs don’t overlap.