?Normal Maps Sub Skins?

[rcjonessnp175]

im a noob but from that pict this looks promising, so is this basically just a edit a config type file to activate this, or is thier much more to this puzzle? Either way goodjob tracking down what has been found

[l3th4l]

Originally Posted by rcjonessnp175

so is this basically just a edit a config type file to activate this, or is thier much more to this puzzle?

that and creating the texture itself of course

A normal map is not the same as a height map. I can go ahead and explain everything but there's a many good resources out there.

i'm aware of what each is. the heighmap usually is the basis from which a normal- or bump-map (after all normal maps are basically more detailed bumpmaps because all channels are used to store information) is calculated.

question is, what is that "heightmap" used for by sh4? sh4 doesn't support prallax or displacement mapping (where a heightmap of some kind would be required) and the bump-mapping is done via normalmap as far as i know. That's why i thought it's not a heightmap at all but used for another purpose like specularity for example.

as for the light-(or rather shadow-)map: did i understand correctly that it is used the put pre-calculated shadows on objects like a multliply layer in photoshop?

edit:
for anyone interested, i've made a normalmap for the porpoise class. if you're new to this you can use it as a guideline for creating new normalmaps :
http://files.filefront.com/NSS+Porpo.../fileinfo.html
this is just a demonstration - right now i'm not planning to do each and every sub and its parts. unless i change my mind, of course the png is there to see how the heightmap i created the normalmap from looked like before to give you a better idea.

[skwasjer]

Maybe you are right. I have not tested all texture types/channels using my model renderer yet. I have no 3D software and am a modeller nooby, so I can't test it in such software. My conclusion is only based on looking at some textures and testing them in a custom written renderer. Maybe it also has to do with a fallback effect (possibly based on a SH4 gfx setting), normal mapping can be expensive - performance wise - on older gpu's.

As far as the lightmap, yes, it's indeed blended over the diffuse map.