Quote: "My question basically is how can a normal map be generated from a texture? Isn't this similar to the way alot of artists create their bumpmaps from textures by converting them to greyscale (and sometimes negative)? "
Yes it's a very similar technique. Basically it's doing some work with the red and green values, and the default blue value is always a full 255.
Quote: "This is an easy technique, but inaccurate. Wouldn't the normal map be better produced from a properly produced bumpmap instead?"
A normal map would be better generated from polygons. This method however is much faster concerning development time and resources. Unfortuantely, many developers don't have time to generate high polygon models, the tools to do so, or a powerful enough computer to make a million polygon model.
Quote: "Also, does the process take into account the angles of the polygons when the map is computed? For detailed meshes I usually set my edge smoothing to be around 20 degrees, and between 35-40 for low poly meshes. It looked to me like a lot of the hard edges on the guns were being smoothed over when some of them should have been preserved. Being able to set an edge crease angle would be very useful, but maybe I'm mistaken about how the resulting normal map gets used."
Currently there is only one way to generate the normal maps, in which I have a basic alogrithm to make the normal map. However, I'm currently working on an editor that will allow you to have greater control over the edges and strength of the normal map generated.
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Today I did some more work. I've implemented the code export function, and the program now generates a project file where everything is packed into.
A book? I hate book. Book is stupid.
(Formerly Yellow)
