getting normal to work well how ?

Support Materials and Textures
1

i made a bump map from ax external photogtaph and loaded that onto a plane for now

so waht is the sequences you need to get it to work in blender
like

add a plane first text slot add the color picture maybe then what ?

and how do you set the nor values for the normal/ bump map

and is there anyway to get from this bump a mesh by using let say some displacemetn modifier may be?

thanks for any help

2

Under the Map To panel, you activate the normal button. Also, you should make sure the Map Input is set to UV.

3

If you can upload the image you want to use as a normal map, and I will create a .blend file with tequnequies I use and upload it here.:evilgrin: Or p.m. me the image.

4

I hope that works, it’s just that I’m not very sure what you’re saying.

Ah! Ninja’d!

5

If you put the image in the Texture Node it can be converted to Normal Map easy. You just need to apply the texture as Normal Map right?

http://i1135.photobucket.com/albums/m626/cabby24/Blender%20Pics%202011/tex_node.png

6

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ok here sample file i did in 2.49
but i also check it out in 2.5 and have some problems

first here are the 2 pics i tried to get some 3D effect
1- with the note editor i got this bump map
it’s black and white ==> bump map
normal map should bluish!

with file hope the textures images are included

i set the first as the bump map no color and the second image as color image
tried with simple NOR low value if set very high seems to distort a lot ?

about the normal node
if you use a bump instead of normal map is it going to work normally ?
see file with sample node normal
and can you add a second color image to make it look normal but with some color and how ?

now in 2.5 i don’t even see the normal box clik !

in general i would like to see what is the limit of this effect in 3D
like is it about 10 % of Z dimensions of more ?

i’ll make a test file and try to make a real normal map and bump map to compre
but not certain how to get the bump map in blender or if i a way to make it from blender!

i can sort of bake a normal map or use the reg green blue method to make a normal map

thanks

7

Afaik, that is really bad way to make normal map, it just looks wrong.

RickyBlender, It is a bit difficult to make ‘perfect’ normal map from such a image you have packed in that blend.

I used program called njob to make these bump and normal maps.
http://etanaisen.net/braB.png
http://etanaisen.net/braN.png

If you use 2.5 you can preview bump maps with glsl view in 3d viewport. Just add that braB as a image texture, at the influence panel,
enable bump mapping:
method - best quality
space - texture space
and then you can just adjust normal value to your liking.

To add a normal map in 2.5 add it also as a image texture.
At the image sampling panel, enable
Normal map and from the dropdown menu enable tangent.

At the influence panel, under geometry adjust Normal value from -1 to +1 to your liking.

Afaik, there is NO good way to make normal maps from images in blender, you have to use external application for that. And also, that picture is really small, normal map from it will not be nice because of that.

8

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is that program nhob free ?
or is there a good free soft that can do bump and normal + other type like spec reflection et…
or may be there are some script that can do that in blender ?

i tried to apply a color picture after the normal map but don’t get a good render
is there a special way or do i have to put the color before

i cannot get the NOR to work on normal normal map
anything else to make it work with bump ?

Height map
i did find a way to make a height map but the 3D effect is not good at all!

i think i’m gone slowly prepare a tutorial on this subject
it is not well covered in wiki!
but need to find good pictures to use with no copyright issues
i’ll see what i can find but probably not a person more like some 3D objects

thanks

9

There is an art to making a good normal map, and everyone’s idea of what makes a good normal map is different.I can tell you that there is no “push button” solution for making the perfect normal map. You have to test it under the lighting conditions in which it will be used - load it into your game and see how it looks. Tweak the details and try again.

Normal mapping resources:

Nvidia’s photoshop plugin:

Njob (as mentioned)

Crazy bump
http://www.crazybump.com/

Normal map tutorial (go to Tutorials - Recovering detailed normals from photo textures)

Xnormal (haven’t tried it)
http://www.xnormal.net/1.aspx

Baking normal maps tut:

10

thanks for the list i’m taking note of this one!
by theway not all of these are free!

i feel that normal map seems to be very sensitive to parameters i’m i right ?

but still how do you make it work on a plane ?
it does not look like i can do it unless you need to make it a UV image
and cannot work iwth normal mapping ?

see file i include last image on bottom right
it does not give any 3D effect

i’ll try to make an example on how to get max 3D effect from these map later!
but i’m certain it is limited but to what extend?

happy 2.5

11

can anybody help tog et thsi normal map thing work again!

thanks for any help

12

can anybody help tog et thsi normal map thing work again!
Ok, do you want to use normal maps for a real time application, or in renders? If you want to use normal maps in your game, you’ll have to use GLSL mode. I can help and provide example file(s) if you answer that question.

by theway not all of these are free!

I never said they were. But most are.

PS. You may want to proof read your posts. Just my snarky 2 cents.

13

well yes GLSL normal would be another way and interested to know how

but see included file look at the last pic on the bottom right
which is supposed to be normal mapping but it does not work

how can this simple mapping work for normal mapping if possible !
or do you need to use UV mapping to make normal map work well?
mind you i want to ahve an example also using UV mapping

i always had problems with normal mapping
don’t know if this can work on my GPU intel chip set
may be it cannot work at all!

so if you have a sample file with pics showing results i can see if my GPU can do it!

Note:English is not my first language but i can give it to you in french!

thanks for helping on this subject

14

@ricky:

for the use of the

gray-color-picture as a normal-map?

Did you use?
mapping “generated” (thats no uv-unwrap map)
normal: 0.16
bump Mapping Method: “Best Quality”
and! Space: “TextureSpace”
this looks
a lot like the bump-mapping with the blue-violett-colourde
picture set as a normal-map in tangent-space
(like the blender-generated bump-maps are made)

15

file with normal ordinary mapping

i tough you could use ordinary mapping to use as a normal map in blender !
so your saying it’s impossible ?
now i have 2 maps one is a bump map black to white and one bluish which was done by somebody else with
Jnob i think and i use it to try to use it as a normal mapping with ordinary mapping!
the file has one where i use this normal map on the bottom right picture if you have this last file as example in post 8

and for now i’m using 2.49 to test it but after i will open it with 2.5 and see where things are and how it works
cause there are so many changes in 2.5 for normal mapping and i’m not use to it yet!
i know how to get the bump map to work but no the normal map!

ok here is the normal map for this guy i used
but it should already be in the file i hope as an image texture!

[ATTACH]140130[/ATTACH]

thanks happy 2.5

16

i found some interesting infor on noob to pro site

like how to make with blender an RGB normal map for 3D objects in scene
a bump map
a height map

but this does not show if possible how to apply a color normal map
still have to find how to apply this normal map with generate mapping if possible!

thanks