NormalMaps in Maya -- View, not Create

# 1 16-12-2005 , 07:16 AM

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Join Date: Aug 2004

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Just wondering how to render in Maya using Normal Maps -- googled it for the last couple weeks... maybe I'm just blind but its not seeming to come up... all I get are tutorials how to CREATE Normalmaps in Maya...

Yea I know I didn't properly word my post... but I'm tired and partly drunk (Drunk3d woot!) so I apologise for when I sober up :p

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# 2 16-12-2005 , 01:18 PM

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I *think* that Maya 7 now allows you to apply the normal map to the material's bump map channel and then turn on the HighQuality Rendering option under the Shading menu of your camera view to see the normal map's affects in your scene.

But, as I keep trying to tell everyone, normal maps are not really for rendering anything. They are real-time shaders. If you're rendering stuff, might as well use a bump or displacement map instead.

-Mike
The Maya Toolbelt

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# 3 17-12-2005 , 02:56 AM

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Originally posted by mtmckinley
I *think* that Maya 7 now allows you to apply the normal map to the material's bump map channel and then turn on the HighQuality Rendering option under the Shading menu of your camera view to see the normal map's affects in your scene.

But, as I keep trying to tell everyone, normal maps are not really for rendering anything. They are real-time shaders. If you're rendering stuff, might as well use a bump or displacement map instead.

Originally Posted by

Only have Maya 6 and not enough money to warrent the upgrade unfortunately.

And actually they're for realtime applications... though unfortunately UT2007 doesn't come out for a while so I won't be able to get a rough idea about normalmap resolution until then unless I do renders. (And being that I don't have any other game with normalmapping and modding capacities, I was hoping Maya would be the answer)

So nah -- don't have the liberties of displacement/bump maps unfortunately... wish I did :p Though if worse-comes-to-worse I could always convert the normalmaps to bumpmaps for a rough estimate... but that's kinda sketchy as to what quality I would expect in the final product (which honestly is the whole reason for doing it).

Last edited by Phopojijo; 17-12-2005 at 02:59 AM.

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# 4 17-12-2005 , 06:43 PM

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I dont know, but I have a pelting tool that once it pelts a model, the normal map is displayed in the viewport of the origional object's normal map on the 2-d pelt. I dont know exactly what it is, but maybe a little research might help you find out how they do it....???

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NormalMaps in Maya -- View, not Create

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