Normal mapping

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Normal mapping steps.
Normal mapping animated

Normal mapping (also known as Dot3 bump mapping ) is a term from 3D computer graphics and is used to achieve greater detail in shades without increasing the number of polygons .

With normal mapping, the information relevant for the lighting on the alignment of the normals is transferred from a high to a low resolution 3D model. The surface detail is thus optically retained. The low detail is only visible in the silhouette, which still corresponds to that of the low-resolution model. This technology is often used in real-time 3D graphics (e.g. in computer games ). This technique has been made easier, especially for several light sources, by the introduction of pixel shaders (since DirectX 9.0 or OpenGL 1.5 or as OpenGL extensions).

disadvantage

Normal mapping is strongly dependent on the angle. The steeper you look at a surface, the less the normal map looks. No effect is visible at a viewing angle of 0 degrees.

See also

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