displacement - zbrush

[Robert]

I think this has been asked many times and for long time too, but do to the fact that a lot more people use zbrush or mudbox now and still Vray has no support for 3D displacement bitmaps (3D not 2D!!!) I would like to ask if there is a future plan for such an improvement.
It disturbs a lot that I have to use MR for displacement...

[studioDIM]

what exactly do you mean by 3D bitmaps?
I managed to displace correctly any ZB sample that i ever put my hands on, tbh.
May be missing something here...

Lele

[instinct]

i think what is meant is that mr displacement allows for an additional RGB map that specifies the XYZ-Direction (relative to the surface normal) of the displacement.

Regards,
Thorsten

[Morbid Angel]

this is a strange request indeed. First of, if we are talking about arbitary displacement, yes mr does support it. But not by default, but rather through a custom written shader. Secondly, as far as I know, mudbox or zbrush do not generate proper maps to take advantage of that for the renderer. Infact most of them are designed to calculate the difference between low res and high res and output black and white image.
Last, I have rarely found a need for arbitary displacement. And I use displacement a lot.

[Robert]

Completely disagree. Ever seen the difference between a bump map and normal map?
Arbitrary displacement makes a big difference to normal displacement!

Also you are wrong, both mudbox and zbrush make perfect displacement maps 32bit depth and rgb information.

It's quite simple, whenever you displace something in a direction other then z you will need the rgb information. For example you can paint horns on a character that will look boring without that information.

Indeed an arbitrary displacement is an displacement with a normalmap information.

Well and finalrender + mentalray support it.

[vlado]

This feature is planned, but I cannot say when it will be available in V-Ray.

Best regards,
Vlado

[studioDIM]

Oh, XYZ normal displacement, yes.
They're still 2d bitmaps, hey
I'd agree it would make a difference when coming from very simple shapes very heavily displacement-painted.
But for a character, you'd hardly do an ear, or an horn, starting from a sphere.
It makes a lot more sense to start from a rough shape, and add detail.
In that case, normal displacement doesn't matter as much...


Lele

[Morbid Angel]

Also you are wrong, both mudbox and zbrush make perfect displacement maps 32bit depth and rgb information.

can you show me an example of that?

[cpnichols]

Completely disagree. Ever seen the difference between a bump map and normal map?
Arbitrary displacement makes a big difference to normal displacement!

Also you are wrong, both mudbox and zbrush make perfect displacement maps 32bit depth and rgb information.

It's quite simple, whenever you displace something in a direction other then z you will need the rgb information. For example you can paint horns on a character that will look boring without that information.

Indeed an arbitrary displacement is an displacement with a normalmap information.

Well and finalrender + mentalray support it.

Please show us an example of this.

From all my experience, I have found that most people get away with 2D displacement in Z-Brush just fine.

[studioDIM]

http://www.luxology.com/whatismodo/301/

They have a special tool (shown in the 1.2 gb video) which "copies" displaced objects' parts, like an ear, into a normal map.
Then, a single brush stroke recreates the 3d displacement (XYZ) on a different object.
It IS useful, to be honest...

Lele

[Morbid Angel]

Completely disagree. Ever seen the difference between a bump map and normal map?
Arbitrary displacement makes a big difference to normal displacement!

Also you are wrong, both mudbox and zbrush make perfect displacement maps 32bit depth and rgb information.

It's quite simple, whenever you displace something in a direction other then z you will need the rgb information. For example you can paint horns on a character that will look boring without that information.

Indeed an arbitrary displacement is an displacement with a normalmap information.

Well and finalrender + mentalray support it.

Please show us an example of this.

From all my experience, I have found that most people get away with 2D displacement in Z-Brush just fine.

lol...