Author Topic: Parallax mapping option as an alternative for displacement  (Read 16426 times)

2019-11-06, 00:39:25

Psifinity

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I have used the parallax feature Marmoset Toolbag 3 has and it's honestly pretty great imo for saving a lot of time compared to displacement, whilst still getting the same result when also using a normal map with it. If this isn't too much to ask, I would also to see this supported with Corona as a compromise for those who like the pros of displacement but don't want to deal with any inconvenient issues it may bring and/or just want to save more time. I remember several months back when I saw a message by Ondra 6 years ago saying that "This is too big fake suitable for games, but not for realistic renderer", and while it's true that it's usually good for games, that doesn't necessarily devalue it's efficiency in both games and high-end CG renders imo. I personally don't think that should be a reason to *not* include it, but that's just what I think. Either way, this renderer is pretty great, which is why I think (if it aint too much) it would be great to have both displacement and parallax options for the user.

2019-11-06, 18:08:36
Reply #1

maru

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"This is too big fake suitable for games, but not for realistic renderer"

I am afraid this is still valid, especially with the new displacement. We may consider this if more users ask for it and present some solid use cases.
Marcin Miodek | chaos-corona.com
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2019-11-08, 02:27:59
Reply #2

Psifinity

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It would be pretty aight if you don't mind explaining that in more detail, as last time I checked it has something to do with the raytrace architecture which I'll admit I'm not knowledgeable in terms like that. Also, although this may or may not prove to be a solid case, two ways I'm aware of parallax being quite useful is with eyes and city building interiors; the connection here being parts of an object that don't necessarily cast shadows upon something (and usually normal maps have helped with having parallax interact properly with lighting and shadows, at least on eye textures afaik).

2019-11-08, 14:10:11
Reply #3

maru

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Maybe this could help?
https://www.racoon-artworks.de/?p=773
I haven't tested it with Corona yet.
Marcin Miodek | chaos-corona.com
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2019-11-08, 15:04:58
Reply #4

maru

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Yep, works.
Marcin Miodek | chaos-corona.com
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2019-11-08, 20:00:54
Reply #5

Psifinity

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Ah, so there's OSL support. Well, alright that works then. I suppose it's not exactly possible yet to integrate the parallax option into Corona yet?

2020-02-01, 16:25:53
Reply #6

PastaJackal

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Am seeing this feature coming out of fstorm recently, and can definitely think of a few cases where this would be really useful - especially for animations where displacement may not always be feasible

Attached is a recent render from the developer of fstorm showing a how a totally flat surface treats parallax mapping. Shadows included.

2020-02-02, 09:58:33
Reply #7

dfcorona

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Parallax is really great for realistic renders, replaces very fake bump mapping, good for everything even short grass. I really hope we can have something like this. It's huge, Fstorm has really good examples of this.

2020-02-02, 10:37:48
Reply #8

romullus

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What map it uses as input? Height map? Normal map?
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2020-02-02, 18:54:22
Reply #9

sprayer

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Am seeing this feature coming out of fstorm recently, and can definitely think of a few cases where this would be really useful - especially for animations where displacement may not always be feasible

Attached is a recent render from the developer of fstorm showing a how a totally flat surface treats parallax mapping. Shadows included.
I think you mistaken and showing on image displacement with material projection - new feature in fstorm
here video

2020-02-02, 19:04:35
Reply #10

dfcorona

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Am seeing this feature coming out of fstorm recently, and can definitely think of a few cases where this would be really useful - especially for animations where displacement may not always be feasible

Attached is a recent render from the developer of fstorm showing a how a totally flat surface treats parallax mapping. Shadows included.
I think you mistaken and showing on image displacement with material projection - new feature in fstorm
here video
no that's parallax bump working with material projection. that's how good parallax is, you will mistake it for displacement.

2020-02-04, 01:49:23
Reply #11

PastaJackal

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On the topic of requested features, this material projection would be super handy when applying decals to further detail up surfaces. Is this possible with corona/3ds max? Or is it just fstorm

2020-02-04, 07:58:03
Reply #12

Kyle

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While the parallax mapping implemented into Fstorm is very impressive, I personally would find material projection much more useful. Since we now have 2.5D displacement, this already works very fast and uses very little RAM. You still need an accurate height map for parallax, you can't just use a bump map as far as I am aware so it's not like we could just start using it on all materials where we don't have an accurate height map.

Material projection on the other hand would be a great new feature for adding decals to surfaces much like what can be done in Unreal Engine.

2020-02-04, 10:13:08
Reply #13

romullus

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I fully agree with Kyle - material/map projection feature would be much more usefull. Paralax might look impressive in demos, but somehow i think you won't find it very usefull in real world scenes, maybe except for animations, where Corona displacement still has much room to improve.
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2020-02-07, 23:00:01
Reply #14

marchik

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I fully agree with Kyle - material/map projection feature would be much more usefull. Paralax might look impressive in demos, but somehow i think you won't find it very usefull in real world scenes, maybe except for animations, where Corona displacement still has much room to improve.
I find these functions pretty closely related to each other. Consider, for example, asphalt, on top of which we want to place a decal with a pothole. The lower coordinate of the pothole is below the level of asphalt, which means that when using displacement, you will have to use a mixture of two height maps in one and apply this material to one mesh. In fact, the absence of parallax mapping negates the flexibility of decals in this case.

2020-02-10, 14:26:14
Reply #15

PastaJackal

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I fully agree with Kyle - material/map projection feature would be much more usefull. Paralax might look impressive in demos, but somehow i think you won't find it very usefull in real world scenes, maybe except for animations, where Corona displacement still has much room to improve.
I find these functions pretty closely related to each other. Consider, for example, asphalt, on top of which we want to place a decal with a pothole. The lower coordinate of the pothole is below the level of asphalt, which means that when using displacement, you will have to use a mixture of two height maps in one and apply this material to one mesh. In fact, the absence of parallax mapping negates the flexibility of decals in this case.

Agreed completely with this statement. Tho also right that projection mapping would be a more frequently utilised tool

2020-02-10, 15:37:00
Reply #16

romullus

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I fully agree with Kyle - material/map projection feature would be much more usefull. Paralax might look impressive in demos, but somehow i think you won't find it very usefull in real world scenes, maybe except for animations, where Corona displacement still has much room to improve.
I find these functions pretty closely related to each other. Consider, for example, asphalt, on top of which we want to place a decal with a pothole. The lower coordinate of the pothole is below the level of asphalt, which means that when using displacement, you will have to use a mixture of two height maps in one and apply this material to one mesh. In fact, the absence of parallax mapping negates the flexibility of decals in this case.

I think it's a matter of fact how well decals would be implemented. If displacement in decal's material would override base material's displacement, then there should be no problem, however if the same limitations would apply like currently it is in layered material, then decals would be quite limited to use.
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2020-02-11, 16:07:26
Reply #17

Jpjapers

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Seems to work pretty well for Andrey...
100% material projection and parallax mapping. Flat geometry.

2020-02-11, 16:13:30
Reply #18

romullus

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Why all the examples are on flat geometry? I want to see paralax mapping on highly curved geometry, maybe there's severe shadow terminator artifacts lurking around?
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2020-02-11, 16:19:13
Reply #19

Jpjapers

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Why all the examples are on flat geometry? I want to see paralax mapping on highly curved geometry, maybe there's severe shadow terminator artifacts lurking around?

Ill do some digging and report back.

2020-02-12, 01:50:22
Reply #20

PastaJackal

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As Andrey post a bit about it on the facebook page, I'll add links below to more examples of parallax.

It becomes obvious that parallax isn't going to achieve great results on rounded surfaces or where you see an edge. That's why games tend to model out the bricks at the end of a brick wall or terminate the wall with a column detail etc.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/FStormGroup/permalink/2222775061352233/



2020-02-12, 10:04:09
Reply #21

Jpjapers

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Why all the examples are on flat geometry? I want to see paralax mapping on highly curved geometry, maybe there's severe shadow terminator artifacts lurking around?

Hot off the press

2020-02-12, 10:06:13
Reply #22

romullus

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Looks good, thank you!
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2020-02-12, 15:58:55
Reply #23

dfcorona

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Why all the examples are on flat geometry? I want to see paralax mapping on highly curved geometry, maybe there's severe shadow terminator artifacts lurking around?

Hot off the press
that looks awesome

2020-02-12, 20:26:36
Reply #24

Jpjapers

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Microdetail example

2020-02-12, 21:59:48
Reply #25

romullus

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What it has to do with parallax mapping request?
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2020-02-12, 22:57:56
Reply #26

Jpjapers

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What it has to do with parallax mapping request?

That's microdetail done with parallax mapping. Someone in another thread asked about it so I posted it here too.

2020-02-13, 00:28:01
Reply #27

romullus

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That's interesting. I don't think paralax is needed in this case, but if it works... :]
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2020-04-21, 12:55:40
Reply #28

marchik

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2020-04-24, 09:44:46
Reply #29

Bjoershol

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Looks very interesting to me! Seems like a more streamlined way of working with composite materials - like in this tutorial: https://bertrand-benoit.com/blog/nakagin-photoreal-road-tutorial/

I imagine a good implementation of decal/material projection in Corona would be a really fast way of adding unique detail to base materials.

Not sure how parallax mapping factors into this, but I imagine it would be faster than using displacement - especially when developing the look of your scene and you want to move the camera around. Displacement really only works on the polygons that are visible to the camera when you first activate VFB, doesn't it?

2020-04-24, 19:03:47
Reply #30

MattiasD

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Decals (geometric and projected) and POM are the reason why I`m looking at Unreal or Fstorm. We used them extensively when working on Homefront: The revloltion (made with cryengine).

They are a quick way to add damage, dirt, markings, puddles, posters, edgwear, cracks, flat elements, ..
They are highly reusable.
They fit in your ideology of "Ease Of Use" (https://corona-renderer.com/features/ease-of-use)
And i`m tired of trying to achieve similar results with distance maps or ambient occlusion :)

And all though the displacement in POM is not real it does a really good job most of the time.

BIG +1 if this could be implemented.

2020-04-24, 19:18:06
Reply #31

marchik

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Looks very interesting to me! Seems like a more streamlined way of working with composite materials - like in this tutorial: https://bertrand-benoit.com/blog/nakagin-photoreal-road-tutorial/

I imagine a good implementation of decal/material projection in Corona would be a really fast way of adding unique detail to base materials.

Not sure how parallax mapping factors into this, but I imagine it would be faster than using displacement - especially when developing the look of your scene and you want to move the camera around. Displacement really only works on the polygons that are visible to the camera when you first activate VFB, doesn't it?
parallax bump is essential for using decals with negative surface level such as cracks just because u need to avoid intersections with the base geometry)

2022-02-07, 17:10:35
Reply #32

Naxos

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Yep, works.

Hello,
I've tried the max file, as soon as i'm putting a bitmap in the OSL file name, it hangs (not crashed, but 99% cpu, even after 15mn), just trying to render the normalMap node.

I first thought it was because of my disp map set to 16bits, but it does the same with a simple 8 bits jpg.

Any idea ?

2022-06-01, 23:30:57
Reply #33

burnin

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+1
must upgrade Decals with this

2022-07-29, 09:42:29
Reply #34

NazarVitkovskyi

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Hello, could you please explain why using displacement or normal map is not enough? Why parallax mapping would be better in this case?

2022-07-29, 12:28:49
Reply #35

burnin

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There are daily cases where everything else fails and only high budget geometry offers a way.
Most prominent example in use for archviz is to look through windows, into a room or a tunnel, hole, a portal of any sort. It's so often used that's become banal and surpasses use of clouds. Cuz when one is occupied, there's rarely time to invent and after, old habits die hard.
It would also makes it easier/cheaper & faster to animate far-away/mid to low LOD objects (use billboards instead of 3D), even representing surfaces under water/in volumetric objects... to ease and speed up actions which are repeated most often is where most benefit  is coming from.

Imagine rooms scattered over houses, blocks & skyscrapers, then buildings & skyscrapers scattered in back... or it could even be starting w/ grass, bushes, trees, animals, ppl... whatever entourage comes to mind. IIRC, ages ago there was a 3DS Max plugin which also provided whole library sets supporting such workflow.
Somebody surely remembers...?
« Last Edit: 2022-07-29, 12:33:27 by burnin »

2022-08-03, 14:08:41
Reply #36

maru

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We are still not convinced parallax mapping would be very beneficial. It looks like there aren't many common uses cases for this. Sure, it would be nice to create a skyscraper with rooms you can peek into and they are actually flat textures, but I don't think it would be commonly used. There are also some workarounds to this, like using OSL.

We would still prefer to improve our displacement if needed, than to develop a new feature like this.

Of course, if someone can share a good example of how parallax mapping (or decals with parallax) would be useful, please do.
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2022-08-03, 14:12:12
Reply #37

Juraj

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Parallax alone is quite useless, and the use-case of projected rooms is easily done by great OSL commercial plugin.

But Parallax Occlusion mapping can great alternative to normal mapping before stepping to Displacement, but that depends purely on render-cost and I have only seen it implemented in F-Storm, and I have no idea what performance penalty it brings.
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