Procedural displacement

[prodviz]

Hi Jim,

would it be possible to have procedural displacement, where the procedural gets converted to an image map, on the fly? (as the Cinema4D plugin).

cheers,

Steve

[dionysiusmarquis]

Yeah I was asking for it some time ago too:
http://render.otoy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=38489

[prodviz]

Cheers for the link.

So, we just need some way to rasterize Maya's ramps, procedurals etc., saved out as a certain resolution and then piped back in as a texture file. Sounds so easy …That's all way above my head, unfortunately.

Does look sweet in Cinema4D and Lightwave.

[Wenneker]

You can bake procedurals to texture in maya with "convert to file texture" but you would have to properly UV your models for this to work.
Something automatic that retains the link to the procedural would be really nice. Although I would rather have a proper gradient texture like the maya ramp.

[prodviz]

Cool, cheers for the info.

The only issue would be you wouldn't be able to interactively see the displacement and make subtle tweaks, like Lightwave and C4d.