Bending the Height to our will?

This may just be another weird 'dilla' idea, but I was wondering what would be possible if we could freely tilt and rotate the height-vector that defines the surface height axis in surface-type filters.

Currently, this height-vector is always perpendicular to the image plane, but if one had the ability to freely rotate and tilt it (and also set its 'length'), isometric representations of height would be possible in addition to the traditional top-down view, opening up a wide field of possibilities for new surface effects. We would no longer have to fake isometric effects with 2D-methods, like in the filter examples below...


Maze 2D


Pixel Scape™


Spelunker's Scribble

This could be an additional 'Isometric Surface' filter type or just a checkbox enabling 'isometrics' on our beloved standard surface filter.

One could also imagine this kind of functionality in the form of a dedicated isometric 'Extrude' component. It would have a Source input, which would be extruded along a freely rotatable vector according to the Height map input and the parameters set for Angle and Extrude (which controls the extrusion 'length' or 'percentage').

wouldn't that effect the seamless tiling

+1

I often wish I could 'tilt' the plane of the bumpmap offset from something other than perpendicular to the image plane. Would be even better if it could seamlessly tile.

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StevieJ wrote: I know Vlad doesn't want to get into 3D with all the other apps out there.....but I still think he should get into it for the total package...

I don't think that is going to happen, ever. Not even if FF was acquired by Autodesk...

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Crapadilla wrote: One could also imagine this kind of functionality in the form of a dedicated isometric 'Extrude' component.

Here's an example of why an Extrude component would be useful: The 2D method currently used to 'fake' isometric extrusion shows edge artifacts!

In effect, the method works by stacking copies of the source layer on top of eachother (6 copies in the example below). With more copies the edge 'jaggies' become smaller, but you can't get rid of them entirely, and each new layer introduced to reduce the artifacts increases the rendering time.

It almost seems like motion blur and then a threshold might allow simpler stuff like the blue maze to be accomplished with smooth edges. Just an idea.

jffe

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ThreeDee wrote: Can you post a copy of (or link to) that last filter?

I gave the link above... it's the Maze2D filter.

Been thinking about the motion blur method too, but I don't like using blurs unless absolutely necessary.

***cough***

I'm liking this "Custom Height Enhancement" idea more and more every day!!!

i'm glad you reminded me of this thread, dilla. i was thinking about this and coupling what you're after here with un-tieing the height from the result component, wouldnt it be possible to do some, or even all, of what you have in mind by simply making a height component all by itself? i mean, add an offset to that and wouldnt that give you the isometric aspect?

but i think for more depth you're going to have to go 16 bit. with height currently tied to gray scale you either have to add a multiplier, which is probably possible, or you increase your byte size and thus your height scale.

ok, i think i follow what you want with the isometric extrusions. and you're right, the height map would have little to nothing to do with it.

hmmm, i've probably got something misunderstood here about the height map, then. but, double precision simply means two word storage in digital, where one of the words is the floating point representation. so, you can still only have values of gray at a minimum of 0.00, black and a max of 255.00, as far as i understand it. yes, you can have a ton of intermediates, but still only a max of 255 and a min of 0. so, unless you remove the decimal point parsing, it's always goign to be min 0, max 255 for your height vales.

then again, if you're parsing the two word value as if each increment in the decimal place were a whole number relative to height, then yes, you'd have a ton of potential depth. but, my experiecne so far in FF says they're not doing it that way. then again, i've been known to be a complete idiot where some of this is concerned. but, since you werent thinking of the same thing with your isometric view as i was, it's kinda moot anyways, since you're not dealing with the height mapping.

+3

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A better idea would be to slap a real, general 3D renderer on top of FF

That's something I'd sure love to see.
I use FF alongside 3d programs and often times wish they were both in one package. Even if there was a way to access FF from 3d progs as a plug-in or something it would be cool.