Hey there, just had this thought. Currently all of the renders exept mental ray and render man do not support directions in displacement. Besicly you can only go positive or negative way. But, in render man you can also specify XYZ direction of the actual displacement so it can bend as its beind displaced. My idea is simple, however I dont know if its at all possible. Idea is this: what if you could have displacement follow a spline... Like when you do extrude along the spline with editable poly, same king of idea but for displacement, then it will give the ability to bend it and many directions allowing to creating lots of cool effects....
just a thought
just a thought