[Bf-committers] Displacement mapping oddity

Meino Christian Cramer bf-committers@blender.org
Wed, 14 Jan 2004 08:07:14 +0100 (CET)


Hi,

 from my point of view there are some issues with displacement
 mapping, which should work better in the "final" release of
 Blender 2.32...

 As I understand the whole thing, a vertex is taken and according to
 the texture applied to the original coordinates of this vertex, it is
 moved to its new coordinates for calculating the rendered
 image. There is no "real" or "physical" move (which could be an
 interesting feature: Apply texture with displacement mapping, convert
 to (new) mesh (when my memory serves me right, the hotkey is ALT-C
 ??) and TADA! -- the mesh is "real").

 But currently a good looking displacement is only working on meshes
 with many vertices, which are nearly equally distributed over the
 mesh. An UV-sphere is a good example here.

 Furthermore, applying a displacement mapping to a simple mesh like a
 plane will warp the plane to hyperspace far beyond Pluto...a newbie to
 blender will never find it back again...;)

 This is due to the limited count of available vertices and due to
 another issue, which I want mention next.

 This second issue is the somehow "over sensitivity" of the "VAR"- and
 "NOR"-slider when ist comes to displacement mappings (an extry
 "DISP"-slider may be an additional idea...)

 To get good looking and smooth displacement mappings instead of "mesh
 explosions"  one have to handle microscopic values for both sliders like 
 0.05 or such (depending on the applied texture).

 Furthermore: When trying to animate a displacement mapping there is
 not much "room" left to act, when the maxima are such low values.

 Kind regards,
 Meino (mcc)