[DanM]

Hi all.
I am trying to paint texture maps with Photoshop to be aplied with Maya. I'm having dificulty capturing the warps and distortions in the glass ( on highrise building ) that cause distortions in the specular and reflection components. Would anyone have any suggestions for this.
Any help would be apreciated.
Thanks,
Dan

[Frost]

The distortions are cause by the glass planes which are not perfectly planar (usually caused by temperature differences between inside/outside, possibly air pressure, etc.). I would suggest and env-map (reflection map) over curved surfaces instead of straight polygon planes.

Generally, *if* I understand this correctly, if it's hot inside and cold outside, the windows will be convex (bulging outwards), and vice versa. (it may be the total opposite... but thinking about it, warm air's molecules move faster and should therefore take up more space, thus having more pressure and density from the inside... eh... dunno.)

[This message has been edited by Frost (edited March 28, 2001).]

[DanM]

The distortion is caused by air pressure differance,the frames exert alot of force on glass to keep it attached to the building, and the imperfections in the glass caused by the production process of floating molten glass on a layer of molten zink.
I'm using an enviroment map but still need to add distortions to the bump to alter the normals of the surface so as the camera moves by the glass, the dump distorts the env map. Ive tried using an airbrush in photoshop to create the gradients mimicing the glass distortions but they still look too painted.
Thanks,
Dan



[This message has been edited by DanM (edited March 28, 2001).]

[Frost]

...they only bulge at the center... the frame stays intact... like a rectagular couch pillow with sown seems. I don't know what else to say, except these should be rather subtle... a slight change in normals has a lot of effect on reflections...

I don't know Maya much, so I can't help beyond that. sorry. Perhaps a displacement map will do what you want? Is this for real-time?

[Duckman2]

I think Frost has the right idea, go with the displacement map you can do alot of subtle differentiations.