Iterative parallax mapping

Funkdude · Post by **Funkdude** » Wed Sep 12, 2007 8:17 am

Hi! i searched the internet for iterative parallax mapping, but havent seen any demo's unfortunately, are there any? would be neat, that way i can test my textures in 3d (anim8or doesnt support parallax, only normal and bump)

iterative parallax mapping looks kinda like interval displacement mapping, in my opinion better than reliefmapping, because it looks smoother (no more slices of texture atop of eachother) does it feature interpolation? (as in muddy terrain wigh a wall on it, does the mud texture become a flat line? or will bumps be displayed on the intersection of wall/mud?)

grtz

Makrond · Post by **Makrond** » Thu Sep 13, 2007 3:00 am

Try searching for just "parallax mapping", without quotes. That should get you the answers.

Or just go straight to Wikipedia

I don't exactly know what the difference is between parallax and iterative parallax. I'm sure there is one, though.

Ultimatum479 · Post by **Ultimatum479** » Thu Sep 13, 2007 8:02 am

Why without the quotes? ^_^

Makrond · Post by **Makrond** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 2:15 am

Because some of them come up as parallax occlusion mapping, or just parallax maps. Without quotes, it finds both, thus you get more results, thus you get overall more information.

Funkdude · Post by **Funkdude** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 3:41 am

Well,

ordinary parallax mapping has a nasty texture " swim" (best seen in oblivion in caves) iterative parallax mapping is (as far as i know) like relief mapping (no swim) but instead of a layered cake effect its smooth, more like displacement mapping, so thats why i wanted a demo, i have a reliefmapping demo but thats a bit ugly, so with a iterative parallax mapping demo i could more effectively test textures (remember the textures in my mod? terrain ones i mean, i can make those with normal and heightmaps as well, for parallax, looks awesome in 3ds (trial) but my trial ended :S :S and anim8or or other freeware apps dont feature that)

Here' s a decent parallax mapping demo, (these arent the original textures, i made these, the other ones were more low res) if you look closely you see the nasty swim, perfect dark zero and oblivion have that a lot, and iterative parallax mapping doesnt have that as far as i know, so kudos to wolfire for picking a batter (perhaps more difficult) solution

LINK

Makrond · Post by **Makrond** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 7:16 pm

Well, from what I've read, parallax mapping is actually less intensive per cycle - that's including occlusion - than relief mapping. Basically all it does is adds a heightmap call that then does some stuff and 'displaces' the co-ordinates so that it looks like there's actually a 3D shape there. More than anything, it's an extension of bump/normal mapping that displaces the texture more based on the viewing angle, so that if you look at it from the side, it doesn't look 2D.

Post by **David** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 9:57 pm

The kind of parallax mapping that I am using does not have occlusion, but it also has less swimming than many implementations. I think the nicest parallax mapping I have seen is cone step mapping.

Funkdude · Post by **Funkdude** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 3:02 am

David wrote:The kind of parallax mapping that I am using does not have occlusion, but it also has less swimming than many implementations. I think the nicest parallax mapping I have seen is cone step mapping.

well, it certainly looks neat, but the downfall is the (in my opinion) hard to make cone step-maps, normalmaps can be made in seconds, but those are tough, curved reliefmapping is very nice as well, you can have less " intervals/iterations" (cant come up with the right word

) and you have smooth occlusion, it they were to make curved parallax-occlusion maping, that would rock (due to better self-shadowing)