could we have like one big tutorial to solve everybodies problem? these enviroment maps are driving me crazy… or anything that makes a reflection, I was wondering if someone could explain all the fake “refraction” methods they use?
oh ho ho
spun reflection maps your going to have lots of fun!
I thought of a method useing the sequence editor (im sure someone else has thought of it tho) i havent tried it yet tho.
My EnvMapping mini tute Part 1:-
Ok lets add a sphere, scale it up to 15 times original size. Go to side view, use B selection tool, to select all verts in lower half of sphere. Hit X to delete, then exit Edit mode and press Set Smooth in the Edit buttons. This will be our ‘Sky dome’.
Go to Materials, add new mat, then new texture. Load image into texture channel. Ideally use a photo JPG (this is sort of faking HDRI in Blender) any photo will do. ( free HDRI link. )
Now return to Material buttons, hit the Sphere texture mapping button, then hit CSpec in far right buttons. Now on the left increase the Emit slider to 0.5 or higher.
Return to Top view. Add a Plane. Scale till larger than the sphere’s diameter. Colour of the floor plane is down to your choice. Exit edit mode.
Use side view and add another sphere. Scale up in size slightly, then exit Edit mode. Grab the sphere and move it upwards, so the bottom is now sitting on the plane. Use Shift S to open the Snap menu, Snap cur->Sel.
Now add an Empty. This will be the reference point for the reflection.
Re-select the small sphere, and go to Edit buttons. Hit Set Smooth, then the 2nd layer button, so everything except the small sphere is on layer 1. The sphere will have disapppeared from the 3D window. Hold Shift and press 2 (Not numpad 2!) the small sphere will now reappear. Now add a new Material and Texture to the small sphere.
In the Texture buttons, select Envmap. In the Obj: text box Type " Empty ". If the text disappears, you haven’t typed the name of the Empty correctly, this is because Blender won’t use anything that isn’t in the scene as a reference point. Hit the " Don’t render Layer " Button for Layer 2 as this is where our reflective sphere is. Increase the Cube Res value to 300 or greater. (This gives us an envmap of screen res 300x300 pixels or greater, higher res=more detail.)
The clip start and Clip end, are similar to that of the camera and Shadow lamps, increase Clip end to 150 for now.
Now return to the Material buttons. Change the usual green button that says Orco to Refl. This will put the reflection from the Envmap into the reflection mapping mode. Further to the right of these buttons, next to the already pressed Col button, are Cspec, Cmir and Ref. Hit all of these so again the reflection will be displayed correctly. By default the Mix button below these is depressed, but I like to use the Add button. (Personal pref here tho.) Finally hit the Sphere mapping button. If you want a coloured reflection, decrease the Col slider on the right, change the normal colour of the material to suit your needs. Tweak Spec and Hard sliders to suit needs but I tend to leave these set at the default levels.
Before you press render, we need some Lamps. Using top view add and position a Lamp so it is inside the large sphere and points at the small sphere. Turn on Spot function, and increase Spot SI and distance values as needed. Increase the shadow Buff button to 1024 or higher, increase samples to 7 or so, decrease Bias and increase soft. If need to increase Shadow clip end too. 3 point light tute if needed.
Position your camera so you have a nice view of the smaller sphere.
Now hit F12. The Envmap will render first. From memory it renders forward, up, down, behind, left then right. Then the main render begins.
If all went well 
you should now have a rendered image with a reflection of the ‘Sky dome’ (large sphere) and the floor plane in the small sphere.
If you return to the Texture buttons for the small sphere, there are 5 buttons for the EnvMap called:- Static, Anim, Load, Free Data and Save Envmap. If you are happy with the Envmap result, you can save it so it doesn’t have to be rerendered when you reopen the Blend file. Static is self explanatory, if you are animating the Envmap use Anim. Load a previously saved EnvMap using Load. (The res of the map you are loading has to match the Res value in Envmap buttons)
The Free Data button will delete the Envmap saved in memory. If you change your scene or have 2 Envmaps you want to reflect each other, use the Free Data to recalculate the Envmap.
I hope this is of some help to you and that it makes sense. If you want a mini tute on how to get 4 spheres each with envmaps to reflect each other, I can write something here, let me know.
Sonix.
Ok, hang on, I’m going to have to try your tutorial be4 I comment
weee! I just haven’t used enviroment maps in FOREVER I feel so happy now! Mah fursted wender oh da unvyromhntallitty tingy!
don’t ask-
THanks aGaIN- DMBadCat
ok, now how do we make a texture “not” sticky?
How do you mean ‘not sticky’?
Sonix.
well you have sticky textures, how do you get them to not be sticky? so they move?
you add an empty to the scene and under the materials for your other object you put the empties name in the texture position buttons. then you move the empty around.
Here is my envmap tutorial. It is in PDF format, so hopefully you can use it:
http://mysite.reblended.com/bgdm/spherical_envmap_tutorial.pdf
It is also very good for getting a nice chrome material too, as I have given the material settings in the document.
Hope that helps.
BgDM
weee! now I not only know how to use enviroment maps in many ways! I can use hsv! and day by day, I find that they aren’t useless 8) ahhhhh much better- so now I can do more reflections- thanks for the comments and tuts guys! (as I was too lazy to find them myself) preciate that pdf thing-