ofer Posted July 11, 2008 Share Posted July 11, 2008 Hi, This is something that is no clear to me. Is there any reason I would prefer to use a normal map instead of displacement and bump maps in an offline rendering? I understand the benefits of normal-maps over bump-maps in real-time rendering, but I guess displacement maps will give better results, right? I guess it sounds a bit of a silly question, but I see many tutorials and articles which describe the use of normal maps in offline rendering, and I don't understand why. I guess it is faster, but if someone here has some experience with this stuff I'll be glad to hear. Thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michael Posted July 11, 2008 Share Posted July 11, 2008 normal mapping is bump mapping (give or take) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normal_mapping Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ofer Posted July 11, 2008 Author Share Posted July 11, 2008 I know the technical details. Im asking more about practice. When I come to render a model in Houdini, I can either use disp maps, or normal maps. Whats practically gives better results, is there any advantage to normal mapping? Maybe its a question with no correct answer, or maybe I do not ask it properly. I'm just trying to figure out a good workflow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michael Posted July 11, 2008 Share Posted July 11, 2008 normal maps seem to be the way things are going...lots of modeling apps spit them out now... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stu Posted July 11, 2008 Share Posted July 11, 2008 Personally, unless there are some other mitigating factors, displacement maps are the way to go - it's the only way to legitimately shade the surface as if it actually has the additional detail. Otherwise, the silhouette and the shadows are unaffected and the illusion isn't as effective. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jason Posted July 11, 2008 Share Posted July 11, 2008 Personally, unless there are some other mitigating factors, displacement maps are the way to go - it's the only way to legitimately shade the surface as if it actually has the additional detail. Otherwise, the silhouette and the shadows are unaffected and the illusion isn't as effective. There is no reason why normal maps can't affect displacement... they don't have to be bump. If you have a half-decent renderer (like Mantra, PRMan, etc), displace away:) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ofer Posted July 12, 2008 Author Share Posted July 12, 2008 Interesting. Thanks. The best thing , of course, is to try it, and see what works good. And I will. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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