LOL, here is the picture 
Wow!
this material Is neat to play with!
This picture looks llike it was molded out of used chewing gum LOL
Looks realy cool to me I like this new material!
Thanks again Pixolator!
I think I may be missing something here. We create a 2.5D image with this normal map material and MRGBZ grab it…so then what do we do with it?? How is this translateable into a normal map that can be used on a 3d exported object for example??
too bad an instant email didnt go out to its 5000+ members at every pix post! i hate to think i missed just one!! 
OMG!, Zbrush rules.
<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>ZBrush could be a great tool for authoring normal mapped (flat) terrain / level textures for games, since it’s really easy to make the textures tileable (how would you do that in a 3D modeller?), and it’s possible to paint massive amounts of detail into them without having to bother with jerkiness coming from high polycounts.
All we need is a way to extract the information that is embedded into the pixols, into a normal map.
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
OK I see where you were going with this now. So the question is…how can this be applied to a 3d character model for example? I have been following along on Bay Raitt’s thread at Spiraloid and I would like to give it a try…it just seems it would be sooooo much easier if ZBrush could export a normal map in the same manner it does with textures now. Can this be done currently or is this something we will be seeing in the upcoming release? (crossing fingers…)
Mentat7;
<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>OK I see where you were going with this now. So the question is…how can this be applied to a 3d character model for example?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
For that I guess you’ll have to wait for the next version / upgrade of ZBrush.
What the RGBNormal material that Pixolator just posted does, is suitable for normal mapped flat surfaces in applications like Tenebrae Quake. That is, games. Stone walls, reliefs, dirt and grass, futuristic metal panels - any flat surface texture that could benefit from normal mapped detail - can now easily be created with ZBrush.
But for characters, you have to wait a little bit longer.
I just found a great utility for testing normal mapped surfaces: the CryTek PolyBump previewer (free evaluation version). I haven’t tested it yet, but I’m going to test it right away when I get home. It seems capable of reading .OBJ format, so you should be able to model a simple scene in ZBrush and use that to preview the normal map textures made with ZBrush.
Hi Skaven
The Half-way is realised, isn’t it 
Maybe Pix is an extraterrestrial 
Pilou
Just found this tutorial Normal Maps & C4D . Actually I had seen it before but now it is all coming together. This tutorial explains how to make normal maps work in C4D and it uses the flat terrain as the prime example. I will check it out tonight when I get home.
Yep, that’s actually the same article I referred to earlier in this thread.
(my apologies for an unclear link, the link was labeled “this page”)
lol
I read throught that tut but it appears it is just geared towards normal mapping planes and such. It looks as if normal mapping characters is still a little out of reach for the average Joe. Having read a thread about it at CGTalk there don’t seem to be many afordable plugins capable of it. 
Cool Pixolator, I’ll be trying this out later. Thanks a lot
Regarding affordable solutions for normal mapping a character(or a plane), there is a great set of free plugins by Marvin Landis which makes it possible to use and create NormalMaps within Lightwave.Lightwave Normal Mapping plugins
And of course the modified ATI NormalMapper by Michael Bunnel, which also creates displacement maps. NormalMapper
Geez skaven just ask and you shall recieve. I’m going to have to play around with this tonight…Nice going pix…btw, is it possible to get that Talent button working…I really need it…
D.T.
The PolyBump Previewer works! Here’s a screenshot to prove it:
This utility allows you to view any .obj file you have created, view and illuminate it from different directions, and see how it could look if used in a game.
I created some little test scenes, as seen in the above screenshot, that allow you to view your ZBrush artwork on a 3D plane. The procedure goes as follows:
:small_orange_diamond: Download and install the [CryTek PolyBump Previewer](http://www.crytekfiles.de/PolyBumpPreviewer.exe)
:small_orange_diamond: Download [Test Scenes.zip](http://www2.zbrushcentral.com/uploaded_from_zbc/200307/user_file-1054833726mce.zip) and extract them into the <b>Samples</b> directory under the directory where you installed the PolyBump Previewer. The test scenes include a <b>Plane3D</b> (simple square, textured flat plane), a <b>Plane3D_43</b> (a plane with 4:3 aspect) and <b>Plane3D_Tiled</b> (a square plane with 4x4 tiling of the texture).
:small_orange_diamond: Open or create a new ZBrush document.
:small_orange_diamond: Switch the Render Mode to <b>Flat Color</b>, and Export this image as <b>colormap.bmp</b> over the existing BMP file in the Samples\Plane3D directory (or whichever scene you prefer).
:small_orange_diamond: Switch the Render Mode to Preview, and apply the [NormalRGBMat](http://www2.zbrushcentral.com/uploaded_from_zbc/200307/user_file-1054797697bpz.zip) material to the whole canvas, either by replacing all the used materials with it, or by drawing/applying it onto the canvas.
:small_orange_diamond: Nice colors, eh? Export this bitmap as the <b>normalmap.bmp</b> in the scene directory of your choice.
:small_orange_diamond: Start the PolyBump Previewer, open File --> Specify Source Objects, and select the scene of your choice.
:small_orange_diamond: Presto! You can rotate the object by left-click-dragging the mouse, pan by right-click-dragging, and dolly in/out by mousewheel-click-drag.
And then it’s time to get confused. The Object Space normal mapping seems to be shaded 90 degrees wrong, and Tangent Space normal mapping seems to be shaded upside down. Did I do something wrong? Or is the NormalRGB Material wrong? Or does the PolyBump Previewer read the normal maps in a peculiar way?
My guess is the latter, because the NormalRGBMat material seems to work exactly as described in the Normal Maps with Cinema4D page.
And so it is! Take a look at this discussion on Mankua.com. Apparently different rendering engines use slightly different normals. In CryTek’s case, the vertical (green) channel is inverted. (I guess this justifies the “PolyBump” title, as opposed to the standard “Normal Mapping”? )
Could the Pixologic team please release the texture used in the NormalRGBMat material so that users could flip / rotate it if needed?
(I guess a new texture could just as well be done in Photoshop, but I’m not sure how precise the gradients need to be?)
DIY. Here’s a standard normal map bitmap (zipped BMP and PSD) for y’all to use and modify. The PSD file uses gradient fill layers, so the olders versions of Photoshop may not support it.
Big big thanks to the Pixologic team for creating the Normal Mapping material. It opens a world of possibilities! 
Hi im new here and like Skaven, very interested in the way, how normalmaps work and can be created.
Well i found Zbrush pretty nice for adding details to the highres objekt,but im quite new to Zbrush, so first need to learn this nice piece of software.
However i reseached a lot the last few days and weeks and my personal tip for getting objekts wrapped into is using the freeware tool ORB (Open Render Bump), it loads the uv mapped .obj files (high and low poly) and generates a nice normalmap, fast and with lots of options.
dl it here http://www.soclab.bth.se/practices/orb.html
I also have a question to Skaven:
You described a way to get the model into crytek’s polybump viewer. I got that viewer too, but dunno how to bind my normalmap to the .obj so i can see it in the polybumpviewer… what about this .mtl stuff ?
(btw i use maya for modelling and texturing)
There is also a plugin on Nvidias site for Photoshop, to make normalmaps out of greyscaled images.
And there is also a software called “Texture Maker” that has some nice export option, similiar to Photoshop plugin but with much better control over quality.
Thx for help
The current version of ZBrush is fully capable of creating displacement and normal maps for planar surfaces. This is, for example, extremely useful for creating game environments.
The beauty of using ZBrush vs. other programs is that with ZBrush you can use ANY combination of 2D, 2.5D and 3D in order to create your maps. In the illustration below, a combination of techniques was used which included deformed 3D primitives and even an imported mesh.
It’s very powerful, and extremely fast!
Hey
My main question about normal maps is how to actually use them. I have 3D Studio Max, so do I just put them in the Bump Map slot? or Displacement slot? or do I need a plugin?
I also heard about a method where you use a normal map combined with a displacement map on a low poly model, but I don’t know much on the matter.
The main reason I wanted to know this, is so I can easily animate my ultra high zBrush Models.
Maybe I should just use a Displacement map, and increase the polygons on render in the meshsmooth modifier. Then I could animate with my low poly model, and render a ultra high poly mesh so the Displacement map would work fine without the use of a normal map, but it would render slower I guess. BTW I’m talking about in 3D Studio Max.
Thanks, zBrush rocks!