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Displacements animated in 3dsmax!

ZBrush Artworks
#1

  • Hi again. Been testing zbrush2 little bit on evenings this week (busy finding a place to live in…)

  • I have read many posts talking about how cool it is / would be to use displacement maps in 3dsmax / or any other 3d package - but yet no single animation test with displacement maps here!?! (…or have i missed them :slight_smile: ?)

  • So, i thought i would try to do it myself :slight_smile: - before Z2 generating displacement maps for organic shapes without custom tools would have been too hard :slight_smile:

Workflow:

  • Took my old quick model, which i posted earlier

  • Made continuous UVs in 3dsmax

  • Calculated and exported displacement map

  • Skeleton setup and skin weighting in 3dsmax - Sorry for quality! - i did the skeleton and skinning in 30 mins after i came to home :slight_smile:

  • I find this technique to be quite ok for animation and still shots.

  • It is not suitable for objects with sharp displacements, that stuff is for micropoly displacements (rendertime)

  • Seems like displacement map pixels hold their directions quite well even with extreme displacements - But i’m new to displacements - have to test more :slight_smile:

  • I have also done tests with fullbody characters, detailed in z - I will do a test animation with mocap animation, but i think i won’t have time to test it before next week :frowning:

  • Please check the animation too! it’s in DivX 3 or 4 format (200kb):

Animation

  • For those without video, random still frames…

    [img]http://www.cgmill.com/ss/temp/images/20040422_smiling_man_anim2.jpg[/img]

Original zbrush cage object and displacement mapped object in 3dsmax:

CnC welcome!

-S-S

#2

Well that’s pretty cool! Thanks for sharing the test.

Sven

#3

Since you used the scanline renderer, I assume you used the displacement map in the material’s"displace" map slot in the material editor??? Great work!!! :+1: :+1: :+1:

#4

Nice work Sami :+1:

#5

Svengali, Cezar Souza, Fouad B. - Thanks! :slight_smile:

Cezar Souza: There are many ways to displace mesh in 3dsmax (without plugins) :slight_smile:

#6

without plug in?? how?

#7

Many of us are havin probs with renders, it would be a great help if you can share how your displaced your map in max :slight_smile: I hope u can share this with us :slight_smile:

#8

The displace approx. modifier can also displace meshes with images. You end up with pretty slow renders compared to vray’s displacement though :slight_smile:

#9

Very impressive Sami :+1: :+1: :+1:

Would like to know the poly count for the cage map Vs the same + displacement map.

Great stuff :slight_smile:

#10

WOnderful sami i would also like to know what is the polycount on the low poly version…

the propabilities of ZB2 seem to be endless

#11

jim coe: - what do you mean by cage map?

  • you probably meant low poly cage object?

jim coe, Ezekiel:
it is roughly 450 verts (polys won’t count with deformations)

  • Object from which the displacement map is generated, is not too detailed either - i didn’t check it today, but i remember it was about 100,000 polys (L4 mesh)
#12

Don’t be so mean!! Tell us how you did the displacement!!! there are some of us that are going insane trying to make it work with different renderers… Please!!!

#13

Thanks Sami, that’s what i wanted to know.

Hope you have time to explain your displacement techniques.

Very inspiring work!

#14

I’m not Sami Sorjonen, but its very easy to get this kind of displacement in 3dsMax, even with the scanline renderer.

Just apply a “Meshsmooth” modifier on your object, followed by a “Displace” modifier. In the “displace” parameters, pick the bitmap of your displacement texture and make sure that the “Use Existing Mapping” is checked. Also check the “Luminance Center” and keep the 0.5 value.

The displacement will be done on the existing vertices, so to have more details in your displacement you must increase the meshsmooth value. You can also tweak the “strenght” value in the displace modifier until you are happy. Decay should stay at 0 for this.

To keep fast refresh rate in the viewport, you should keep a low meshsmooth iteration value in the viewport and a higher one in “render values”.

edit: If you use a texture from zBrush, dont forget to flip it vertically!

#15

thx to reply, because Sami seem to like the suspens…

but that diplace methode make heavy model, and for animation that is bad.
personally, I speak rather about displacement resulting from technology micropolygon.

#16

I know that its not the best method, but its what he did. 3dsMax’s scanline renderer doesnt support micropolygon displacement… and neither does MentalRay as far as I know. If you want micropolygon displacement you have to buy a third-party renderer such as VRay.

#17

mental ray allows the management of the micropolygon.
but I was astonished to learn that in scanline one could make “truth displacement”

vray do not for the moment technology micropolygon.
there is indeed, a similar technology but only in mapping 2d, for 3d mapping you must divide your model.

#18

It look like you are right about vRay (I’ve never used it) but I can’t find anything about Mental Ray being able to render micropolygon displacement. Do you know where I could find more information?

Here is what the documentation says:
<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Displacement shading with the mental ray renderer is similar to displacement mapping of standard materials. One advantage of using mental ray displacement is that the additional polygons of displaced surfaces are stored only in the mental ray scene database, not in your 3ds max scene, so they do not increase the memory requirements of your scene, except at render time.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

#19

Terve,

hey sami, your taking the zbrush way all way

nice work, thanks for sharing

gonna try zbrush soon, cant wait

and since its on max, its nicer to me cause i use max too…

now letsee some lipsync on that had with some more wrinkles/bump work :slight_smile:

:slight_smile:

#20

NilreMK:

Thanks! - I thought it wouldn’t be too hard to figure out! :slight_smile: - after all, 3dsmax has good manual, and if you do a search, and read everthing about displacements in 3dsmax, it shouldn’t take many hours to find out how to do it :slight_smile:

Fouad B.:

  • I only do 3d as a hobby currently - i also have to work… and didn’t i just show you that it is possible to do, so you only had to solve the problem how? :confused:

Fouad B., NilreMK:

  • Mental Ray doesn’t actually do that - it is actually quite similar to displace approximation of 3dsmax - slow and inaccurate, i have tested it, check other thread in questions forum…

  • I think Vray could be the best alternative, as far as i know - i have seen good results, but not used it myself…

  • What do you need 3d displacement for? - you only displace mesh along one axis from mesh faces with displacement map? - are you after a solution similar to 3d texture / displacement, like lightwave’s hypervoxels?

…and i think i did already tell you how i animated it :slight_smile: - nothing to do with displaced mesh - just re-read the thread :slight_smile:

koroko:
Thanks for comments! - i think you could even animate displacements, but not tested it yet!

-S-S