LuxBlend tutorial: Displacement Map

From LuxRender Wiki

Objective

Learn how to apply and render a displacement map.

Preparation

Create a directory Displacement Tutorial, which will be our working directory.

Download an appropriate material you can use as a diffuse (color) and displacement map. In this example I will download the "Stonesurface" material from the Indigo material database. Of course you can use any other diffuse and displacement map you find on the internet or create by yourself.

Download the pigm file from the Indigo material database. A pigm file is like a ZIP archive. Extract the two textures PACKED_0_STONESURFACE.jpg and PACKED_1_STONESURFACE_D.jpg from the pigm archive to the Displacement Tutorial directory.

Start Blender.

Setup Scene in Blender

Blender starts with the default scene which we need to alter. Select the cube and delete it.

Default scene in Blender

The scene is now empty. Add a plane to it. Press the <S> key to scale it, enter <3> to scale it 3 times the original size and apply it by pressing <Return>.

1. Delete cube;2. Add plane; 3. Resize plane

Press <F5> and add the "Material" to the plane.

Add a material to the plane

Press <F9> and add a Subsurf modifier to the plane and increase both levels to 5. The fields with the green dot     have to be changed.

Add a Subsurf modifier to the plane

Split the screen. If you do not know how to do this then check this Blender documentation page.

UV Mapping in Blender

Move the mouse over the left area in Blender and press <SHIFT> + <F10> to switch to the UV/Image Editor. Now move the mouse to the right area. Keep the plane selected and press <Tab> to switch from Object Mode to Edit Mode. Press <U> and select Unwrap. The shape of the frame now appears in the left area, the UV/Image Editor.

Keep all vertices selected and press <U> to unwrap

LuxRender Export

Open the LuxRender exporter in Blender.

Switch to the Material tab in the exporter. The fields with the green dot     have to be changed.

Blender Luxrender Exporter settings for Material and Output

Render

This is the output of LuxRender.

Result