Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?ForumID=107&Form.ShowMessage=333018&Reply=334998#15

I wanted to comment on AgentSmith's shield work, but I'm a bit late in the day and the thread is about to fall off the edge of the world (I hate that about Renderosity). So I've started a new one. Please use the link above to refer to the original. First off I'd like to say what a brilliantly successful shield model that is. The texture work is terrific. A couple of technical comments: Bryce's 'greyscale to height' modelling is utilised for two object types - terrains and symmetrical lattices. Symmetrical lattices are simply terrains mirrored through the horizontal plane. For making 'closed' objects (such as the fish mentioned), the symmetrical lattice is best. For 'open' objects, like shields, it's better to use a straight terrain. A shield made from a symmetrical lattice would look like a flattened sphere when seen from the side. In the picture, it can be seen how the terrain is open and hollow when seen from below. AgentSmith has made great use of bump mapping to suggest the detail on the shield, but it is actually relatively straightforward to use the terrain editor for this. Having 'real' raised detail rather than the render effect you get from a bump map is often essential when objects are seen close up or from oblique angles. In the pic I used the small snippet of texture AgentSmith showed in his tutorial image, in the terrain editor. It's just a quick and dirty effort on my part, but the plain textured version shows the detail is there in the mesh and not from a bump map. I also threw some basic textures on the thing for the 'finished' example. The only 'filtering' done in the terrain editor was to 'lower' so as that the image in the 2D work window became very dark with hardly any contrast. That gets rid of the spikes in nearly all cases, and no smoothing is needed.

Hey, all and any comments on this type of work are welcome, since it gives us all a better insight on how to do this in the future... Thanks...

Other then the color (texture)difference between the top image and the bottome image.. What is supposed to be the difference?? I can't see it.

One is the bump map and the other is the rendered shield...

Not trying to be a smart @$$, but what is the difference supposed to be?? "Having 'real' raised detail rather than the render effect you get from a bump map is often essential when objects are seen close up or from oblique angles." was this supposed to show the difference??

Both squares in the above image are the same, apart from textures. The top one is plain white, the bottom is with image map and specularity, etc. Neither uses bump maps. I used a plain texture on the top one to show that the raised detail is in the mesh, not from the textures. I will render up another one to illustrate what I mean about 'real' detail being more useful than bump maps in certain conditions.

Ahhh ok.. thanks. Yeah I understand the difference between Bump and textures affects.. Thanks again for the clarification

In this picture, the top two items are duplicate '2D face' primitives with the same image texture (including bump map)applied. The duplicate on the right is tipped over to show an oblique angle. The bottom two items are duplicate G2H terrains with the same image texture applied (but no bump map). The duplicate on the right is tipped over to show an oblique angle. As can be seen, the bump map stands up well when seen approximately face on, nearly matching the 'real' raised detail in the terrain for realism. But when the flat primitive is tipped over, the bump map pretty much fails. The raised detail in the tipped over terrain is obviously 'real', and is throwing shadows and giving off specular highlights. Note also how the edges of the terrain match the ups and downs of the surface, even when seen nearly face on. This isn't the case on the 2D face, and that's another tell tale of bump maps. Hope this rambling explains my point. :-)

Oh, here's a work window shot to show I'm not shitting you guys about what's in the pic. ;-)