Generating Normal/Height maps in Blender 2.36

Post by **nfz** » Fri Dec 31, 2004 7:14 pm

With Blender 2.36, it is now possible to easily generate planar normal maps for doing standard Dot3 bumpmapping in Ogre, and generate normal height maps for doing parallax mapping in Ogre.

Here is a NH map I generated in Blender:

Here is the result when used in an Ogre Parallax mapping material:

I am working on a tutorial on how to generate N and NH maps in blender.

Post by **nfz** » Sat Jan 01, 2005 2:55 am

I changed the images above since the original ones posted were generated using just a normal map. The images posted now are for the NH map.

bana · Post by **bana** » Sat Jan 01, 2005 5:09 am

Wow, awesome results there. I was just playing with this myself yet I am guessing it still does not support normal maps (or normal heightmaps) for complete unwrapping of 3d objects, I am guessing that is what this is referring to in the changelog as to what still needs to be done:

1) "Object space" versus "Tangent space"

By only storing the normals in a map with a positive Z component, you can also wrap them around a model, where the map-normals will be applied (rotated) according to the orientation of the face. Although Blender uses and creates such "Tangent maps", it currently doesn't apply it using "tangent mapping". Current mapping is to "Object space" only.

Meaning; normal maps in Blender now only render correct when applied on a flat plane.

Note; there also exist normal maps storing all normals (also with negative Z) based on Object Space. Creating such maps is quite difficult though, certainly in Blender.

Keep us posted on that tutorial though

Post by **nfz** » Sat Jan 01, 2005 7:11 am

Ya, no support yet for generating a normal map from a high poly model and applied to a low poly model.

As far as Blender not being able to generate normal maps in tangent space, well they are wrong. The NH maps I generating using Blender are in tangent space.

Post by **nfz** » Sat Jan 01, 2005 7:15 am

Played some more with the texture sequencer in Blender. Here is slightly modified NH map of the first one:

This is what it looks like when rendered in Ogre:

Robomaniac · Post by **Robomaniac** » Sat Jan 01, 2005 7:18 am

r u a god?

Looks amazing

bal · Post by **bal** » Sat Jan 01, 2005 11:34 am

It's like real plastic omg. Looking forward to your tutorial, really!

semicolon · Post by **semicolon** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 7:15 pm

Hi everyone:

I am a bit confused between Bump map and Normal map. I am trying to differentiate the twos. I have tried experimenting Normal map but the result seems to effect the same thing as Bump map, doesn't it?

Semicolon

bal · Post by **bal** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 7:36 pm

semicolon wrote:Hi everyone:

I am a bit confused between Bump map and Normal map. I am trying to differentiate the twos. I have tried experimenting Normal map but the result seems to effect the same thing as Bump map, doesn't it?

Semicolon

I think a normal map is used to create the bump mapping effect, isn't it?

semicolon · Post by **semicolon** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 9:27 pm

Well, I still think Normal map can do something else useful enough to worth the extra effort for creating it. Since I can create bump map easily by creating grayscale texture. By the way, I read about some extra information that the DDS file contains like MIP-MAP. And especially, it seems to work very closely to Cgfx function. Any additional comments are very welcome.

Semicolon

Post by **nfz** » Mon Jan 03, 2005 12:01 am

Here is a link that gives a good description of the differences between bump map and normal map :

http://www.pinwire.com/modules.php?name ... int&sid=82

Post by **nfz** » Mon Jan 03, 2005 3:32 am

I re-read the article at the link I posted above and tried the lighting method to produce a normal map rather than using the new Blender 2.36 method. The result is a more accurate normal map which is much easier to set up and is more flexible. The second NH map and associated pic above have been updated using the lighting method.

semicolon · Post by **semicolon** » Mon Jan 03, 2005 5:05 am

Thanks for the help. nfz I can see how they work now. By the way, can Orge load the normal map (.DDS) as bump map?

Thanks,
Semicolon

Post by **nfz** » Tue Jan 04, 2005 2:24 am

I have been able to use Dxt4 and Dxt5 .dds for normal maps in Ogre. I used DxTex which is a DX9 SDK tool in DXSDK/BIN to convert from .png to .dds Dxt5. I also use GIMP with the .dds plugin to do the conversion which is a little more flexible than the DxTex tool.

semicolon · Post by **semicolon** » Tue Jan 04, 2005 5:01 am

I see. I found some set of tools in Nvdia and ATI to create the normal map and some other helping stuff. Right now I can see only a few games using this off-the-shlef technology. But in the future there will be a lot of games or real-time 3D using this showing off. Fortunately Orge does support this technology as well.

Semicolon