HOW SURFACE NORMALS IMPROVE YOUR 3D ART

Ant Ward explains how to quickly change the way a polygon model looks by adjusting its normals

- Ant Ward

As discussed in previous issues, a polygon model is made up from vertices, edges and faces, but there's more.

Hidden within the model you'll also find UVs and Vertex Colour Data, which we will discuss in future instalments, but in addition to this you also have Surface Normals.

A model's normals dictate how light will travel across its surface, effectively softening or hardening its appearance. Changing the angle of the normals can make a flat, polygon plane look almost rounded and it's because of this that you usually can't see the individual polygons that make up a mesh, giving it the appearance of being more complicated than it is.