Hi guys,

I am so happy with my plug-ins, I will plug them a little...
This is made with two planes above an infinite plane. I will post the shader of the iron ironey-thingy behind the CG sign.
The suggested geometry with Deeper (from inagoni) is much richer and 'real' than Carrara's bump could do. And it renders very fast. I can recommend it!
(For you PC people, there is a free Nvidia plugin that transforms bump maps in Normal maps.)

The 'height map' of the CG sign was 'handmade' from the EPS file in Photoshop and made a normal map with Baker.

I manipulated some contrast and non-antialising of the normal maps in Photoshop.

I also used Lists' Real World Metal on the infinite plane (with a Veloutbump) and to create the depth map for the iron I used the excellent MAP|Zone FREE from Allegorithmic (it's free!) in a bump, that I made a normal map with Baker, after I used it on a Anything Grooves plane. Oh, and I used an HDRI from Dosch Design for some reflection. And a metal texture from Total Texture CD 1.

Where would we be without additions, plug-ins and software that understands each other...
I just wanted to show how all this software and experimenting results in stuff I can actually sell and use in my design work.

The shader (with the Deeper logo part missing because I had to paste two halve screen grabs together and missed a part)

Cool! I'll buy Deeper for sure in the next days... Great work Ruud!!! -TOXE

I'd recommend Baker too. This is a plain sphere with a normal map applied. I used ZBrush to generate the normal map but you could do it in Carrara using AGrows and Baker. Baker is also very useful for its texture baking of light maps etc., all of which can considerably reduce render times.

On the inagoni site there are a few examples, maybe more images can help better understanding how much is useful in different situation. Lately i need to create a rubber sole for a shoes, but anyhthing grooves require a lot of memory and in this case it's not enough precise. Thanks Mark for sharing your knowledge once again! -OXET (with shader ops invert operator)

A variation. I am going to use this material as 'building blocks' for something that involves a lot of Carrara. And some Hexagon! And loads of other tools.

That's great work, Ruud! (Apologies for hijacking your thread...)

TOXE, if AGrows is using too much memory then Deeper or Baker is a good way to go for a compromise (at least, until Carrara supports rendertime displacement sometime in the next decade... ;-) ) The thing to do is to use geometry for the large scale stuff and then use a normal map for the detail. This image uses a blob of about 8000 polys (roughly equal to a 1000 poly sphere with 1 level of smoothing). On the left, the plain blob; on the right a Baker normal map applied for perfect dino-skin! Note: Baker is the more versitile plugin.

Message edited on: 05/19/2005 04:51

Mark, at this point... What's the difference beetwen Baker and Deeper, i'm a bit confused... With Deeper i can apply a normal map on a geometry, with baker i can extract the procedural shader then convert it into a texture. Right? Both can apply normal maps?! -TOXE

You can use both Deeper and Baker to generate/apply normal maps but the type of normal maps differ. I confess that I am a bit hazy on the difference. Julien provides a couple of links at his site. But for generating normal maps, Deeper does it as a renderer, so you can only get a normal map that applies to a plane or flat surface, whereas with Baker you bake a texture map that depends on your UVs and so you get a normal map that wraps nicely on to your object. But in order to get a normal map using either plugin you need geometry. So this has to be modelled, or generated using AGrooves. The pipeline might be as follows: model your object; apply the detailed displacement using Anything Grooves; generate normal map using Baker; switch off AGrooves; apply normal map and render. [Edit: as you noticed, for AGrows above read AGrooves. :-)

Message edited on: 05/19/2005 08:42

Urgh! Ok, i'll buy both plugins. But, a doubt... Why Julien don't create only one plug? Thanks Mark -TOXE

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=839401&Start=1&Artist=falconperigot&ByArtist=Yes

I think it was simply an historical thing. Julien started with Deeper, then produced Baker when he'd got to grips with normal maps and baking textures. But the type of normap map differs too which is why if you get both you'll see there are two options in the shader tree. I used Deeper to generate and apply the detail to the coins in my money box image (see link).

Ok, wait a moment i'm at the shop of Inagoni... Uh? There's not a bar?! I really need a cool beer!! Today in Italy is too hot!!! -TOXE

Phew, commission earned! ;-) (only joking)