Specular Mapping
BlitzMax Forums/MiniB3D Module/Specular Mapping
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| Hello, I am a long time Blitz user who's been away for a while, in fact, i've been distracted by the day job which I spend mostly doing php and javascript. Over the last few years i've done very little 3D work and just used MiniB3D for the odd quick thing here and there where i've had the chance. I'm returning to BlitzMax now to write a game. My artist has come up with a style that's quite unique and to implement it i'm going to need 3 texture layers: Diffuse; Bump; and Specular. I've never played with bump and specular mapping before. I've done some reading up and it seems that bump mapping is just a secondary texture layer with a multiply filter which is easy enough, but i'm more confused by specular mapping. From what I can see the standard version of MiniB3D does not support specular mapping, do I need the extended version? The wiki says development of it has stopped - and I understand that fps drops somewhat using it. Is there a different PC/Mac 3D engine that I should consider, prefferably a free one as i'm a bit tight for cash this year ? I would be grateful to hear the thoughts of those who've been using Blitz in the interim years, as i'm quite a way behind on what's what with my favorite coding language. Thanks. |
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| Yeah, if you don't know OpenGL to implement the changes you want, you're in a hard spot. I'd suggest taking a look at Ninfa3D, it's very interesting and seems to have Bump and Specular shaders ready for use: http://www.mysticrealitystudio.comuv.com/index.php?p=3_2 |
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| Thanks, I was looking at Ninfa before I posted this but I was worried that I wouldn't be able to get support on it if I needed it because it comes across as very niche. At the moment i've just setup the extended MiniB3D - I had to make some changed because MouseXSpeed and MouseYSpeed where redeclared which suprised me, as these are part of the Max core modules. I simply renamed them in all the module sources and it seems to work fine, although a few of the samples wont load the demonstration .b3d files which is worrying (LoadAnimMesh). I've asked my artist to send me a test object so hopefully i'll get that during the week and see if it's going to work, i'm working blind at the moment as the media has only just been started this weekend and I havn't been sent any yet. http://twitpic.com/zfmpt I'll definitely check out ninfa if the extended MiniB3D causes more issues when I get the first object to experiment with. I liked that MiniB3D had a physics engine built in as it meens I can do a bit more then I first intended. I've never used a physics engine before, but i'm keen to try it out with atmospheric details such as debris. :) And my familiarity with the standard MiniB3d and Blitz3D makes it my preffered choice IF it proves up to the task. Thanks for the advise. |
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