KenH Posted January 17, 2006 Posted January 17, 2006 Displacement is in realtime so interface response is affected. Am I missing something? I don't get realtime displacement display.... Quote
Paul Forwood Posted January 17, 2006 Posted January 17, 2006 Of course!! Thanks again, Will! Ken, I get it sometimes and at others I don't. That might be why things speed up suddenly. At other times everything turns black and it is hard to tell if displacement is drawn or not but it all renders correctly, I think. Saving and reopening the project can often clear this black out. Quote
markeh Posted January 17, 2006 Posted January 17, 2006 Ctrl+D to toggle decals Good grief - all this time without knowing this. I've been progressive rendering all this time to see my displacement. Edit: Oh but it doesn't work obviously on a material with a displacement percentage. But still good to know. Is there another Ctrl+something that does that too? Quote
nixie Posted January 17, 2006 Posted January 17, 2006 Dont displacements only draw on screen when your views 'quality' is at maximum i.e. page up to the max! I dont have access right now or I'd check. Nixie Quote
aaver Posted January 17, 2006 Posted January 17, 2006 "Now you can set it as either a bump or displacement map." With the new displacement, I question the need for bump or normal maps.[...] You are probably right if you use 16-bit displacement maps, but with just 8 bits the dynamic is to low. Has anyone done tests with 16-bit displacement maps yet? Quote
KenH Posted January 17, 2006 Posted January 17, 2006 How do you do 16 bit images? I can only export them either as .Tiff, .psd, or .raw. None of which I can get into AM.... Quote
aaver Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 How do you do 16 bit images? I can only export them either as .Tiff, .psd, or .raw. None of which I can get into AM.... I have exported some synthetic terrain data to a 16-bit gray scale PNG. I think A:M should be able to read that, but I haven't had any luck yet. Quote
zandoriastudios Posted January 18, 2006 Author Posted January 18, 2006 I saved a 16bit out of Photoshop as .exr and that worked OK Quote
aaver Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 I saved a 16bit out of Photoshop as .exr and that worked OK Yes, that'll do the trick! Thanks Will!! Quote
oakchas Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 Stoopid Noobee question... I think I know the answer If you place an object on the patch that is being displaced... Is the object "raised" to the level of the map? In other words, if you put a (splined) tree on the mountain, is the tree placed on the map displaced patch where it should be in elevation? Probably not, I think... but what happens to the tree? is it covered by the "mountain"... or does it muck everything up? I'm not in a position to try from here... but even a box on a displaced surface would show what happens. Curious noobees wanna know! Quote
oakchas Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 yeah, well... One could always hope... It is still a bodacious new tool! You could always put your tree up in the air... and adjust the map to reach it? Or not, it really doesn't matter... it would just be fun to try. I may have to give it a go... Quote
heyvern Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 Charlie, Even before this cool displace ability... the old one had the same problem. I would expect any displaced material is going to have similar difficulties. Displace does push the surface out so you would need to account for that when placing other objects. A while back I was working on a model that needed "quilted" puffy tube shaped "ribbing"... like the Michelin Man or a down vest... or a padded space suit. I tried both techniques... modeling and displacement. They both had advantages... I really liked using displacement though. It was actually better and easier to implement. I had total control over exact placement of the ribbing. I didn't need to worry at all about complex spline placement because I just used very simple mesh shapes... well simple in the placement... they were dense to aid in the displacement. I could easily add or move the ribbing by changing the image. The renders from the modeled version and the displaced version were so close in appearance it was hard to tell the difference. I did have to view in shaded mode with the poly display on the highest setting to "see" where other parts of the model should go so as not to intersect the displacement. I also had trouble with the directionality of the splines... but that appears to be all gone now. Let me tell you... once I get this v13 up and running... it is going to be a piece of cake to finish that project... Worrying about other shapes near displacement is always tricky... but it is worth the price of admission. Vernon Zehr Quote
3DArtZ Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 I wonder if you used a surface constraint.... that said "tree" might follow the surface where ever it went.... in a "Boldly" type fashion..... I don't have v13 yet so I can't try for myself Mike Fitz www.3dartz.com Quote
markeh Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 I think if there's going to be interaction with specifically a terrain, you're still going to need a semi dense mesh to get trees on it and to constrain objects to its surface. But with pixel displacement, you can get rocks and crags like never before. Pixel grass? On the right is with displacement set to 0 and the cactus are where they should be. On theleft has lots of displacement and the cactus have no home. This cactus is from a hair material. Quote
zandoriastudios Posted January 18, 2006 Author Posted January 18, 2006 Balrog V13! I did notice that I had to be careful when I made a displacement map from my bump map--the black creases pushed the eyelids into the eyballs. I also got some wierd lighting where the displaced surface seemed to catch the light from the internal light in his head... So I adjusted so that my displacement was only adding detail outwards (128-255 greyscale) and then still kept my bumpmap. I think it will just take a little adjustment to get used to the new rules Quote
rusty Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 My goddness that's awesome. I can't begin to imagine the impact on modeling this may have -- how much geometry will this be able to replace? And I thought 13 was an unlucky number. Rusty Quote
heyvern Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 You know... I get a funny feeling Martin had this up his sleeve for a while now and just kept it a secret... I kind of like that a LOT better than waiting for something I know is coming. I think all new features should be kept totally secret... ... and then just casually released. This is as cool as hair... go ahead and disagree with me... but I really think this is as good as hair as far as a new feature... as important as dynamic constraints. When a feature has the potential to be used in practically every situation easily... by anyone... even new users... it is important. Displacement in AM just went from hardly ever being used to... displacing everything... p.s. Someone "displaced" my car when they hit the bumper in a parking lot. Vernon "!" Zehr Quote
markeh Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 openexr plugin for saving and opening in photoshop 7 here. Quote
trajcedrv Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 I have been following this thread with uttermost interest... This feature is (IMHO) one of the MAJOR improvemets that will AWESOMELY enhance A:M's usability... (Google out what TARON did using Zbrush and Messiah studio - however, while reading about it I was under impresion that setting up the displacement was quite tedious process, or it was just lack of understanding how things are done there... can't tell)... It is even possible to imagine situation in which one may use some totaly generic (rigged) character and just swap displacement maps to create different faces and clothes... Having in mind other features of the A:M... what we could do will be limited only by the imagination! Drvarceto Quote
Admin Rodney Posted January 18, 2006 Admin Posted January 18, 2006 I think if there's going to be interaction with specifically a terrain, you're still going to need a semi dense mesh to get trees on it and to constrain objects to its surface. But with pixel displacement, you can get rocks and crags like never before. Pixel grass? On the right is with displacement set to 0 and the cactus are where they should be. On theleft has lots of displacement and the cactus have no home. This cactus is from a hair material. Excluding programming solutions, I think this is probably where A:M Composite comes to the rescue. By rendering these elements out separately and compositing either in a choreography or via A:M Composite we can place them whereever needed. (can we adjust location/translate image objects in yet? I don't think so.). Shadows would still be problematic of course... Rodney Quote
Paul Forwood Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 Can someone explain how to animate the displacement value? I've tried adjusting the distortion value over time but it doesn't seem to work. Does it have to be done with an image sequence/moviefile? Here is another example of the clipping problem: [attachmentid=13375] The terrain is one patch and the water is a six sided box. Quote
KenH Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 You have to change the displacement value for the image in the action or chor. Not in the model window structure. You'll need to use the "show more than drivers" to see it. Quote
Paul Forwood Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 Thanks, Ken, but that is what I have been doing, adjusting the displacement value on various frames in a choreography, but I can't see any effect. Quote
KenH Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 So, you click on the "show more than drivers" on the shortcut to the model in the chor and animate the displacement in there? I just tried it and it works. Plus, I can see the displacement in realtime at the highest resolution. Quote
Paul Forwood Posted January 18, 2006 Posted January 18, 2006 Thanks, Ken! Haven't been in there in a looooong while. Quote
NEKOSEI Posted January 21, 2006 Posted January 21, 2006 O.o Please tell me I didn't just plunk down 500 US for DarkTree 2 only to have something just like it become native to AM and come out only a few *days* later... Please tell me there's still something worthwhile to have DarkTree for now... Quote
heyvern Posted January 21, 2006 Posted January 21, 2006 DarkTree? No, I don't think DarkTree has anything to do with pixel level displacement in AM. Dark tree does textures/materials. If a DarkTree material has displacement.... BANG! It will look that much better using it in AM now. If I am wrong someone please correct me. Vernon "!" Zehr Quote
Karl Posted January 21, 2006 Posted January 21, 2006 Please tell me there's still something worthwhile to have DarkTree for now... You'll find creating custom materials in DarkTree much more powerful and intuitive than A:M's combiners. It takes a few hours of learning up front, but it can really be worth it in the end if you want/need sophisticated materials. I've had it for a few months and used it to create the following things, that I just couldn't get to my liking in A:M 1. Beautiful, but artificially colored eye iris's 2. Starfields with blue and red shifted stars and star to star size variance 3. Replacing skin decaling on characters with a material skin to my liking 4. A leopard skin material Quote
luckbat Posted January 21, 2006 Posted January 21, 2006 Please tell me I didn't just plunk down 500 US for DarkTree 2 only to have something just like it become native to AM and come out only a few *days* later... Note: Darktree is not the same thing as Symbiont. Quote
NEKOSEI Posted January 22, 2006 Posted January 22, 2006 Okay, so long as Darktree still has it's uses. A beautiful starfield, and iris's you say...? I must learn and make some for myself. Quote
Karl Posted January 22, 2006 Posted January 22, 2006 Okay, so long as Darktree still has it's uses. A beautiful starfield, and iris's you say...? I must learn and make some for myself. I found it best to go thru their tutorials and then to start off by modifying existing materials. After some of that, you should have the hang of it enough to get more creative, I suspect anyway. THERE'S SOME A:M BUGS RELATED TO ANIMATEABLE TEXTURES AND TWEAKS, HOWEVER... I DON'T KNOW WHERE THESE ARE IN TERMS OF BUG FIX PRIORITY THOUGH... Quote
Fuchur Posted January 23, 2006 Posted January 23, 2006 I think, that subpixel displacement means, that you don't have to pay attention to the patch-count, when you try to set a displacementmap... it will look good, even on 1 patch only, where you would have to set several patches in the past. Please correct me if i am wrong... (I cant use the link to martin's explanation neighter...) *Fuchur* Quote
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