Cone Step Mapping (Released)

[franck22000]

Here is a new shader for LE it's called cone step mapping ( CSM ) and it will give you a great relief effect for your materials

 

- CSM is very fast, it's faster and much more efficient than parralax occlusion mapping.

- CSM need a cone step map that you can generate ( it take the heightmap and generate cone step map from it ).

- CSM will be very good for those who want to make static scenes without gameplay.

- If you want to add this in your game, remember that decals will not apply correctly on the surface of your objects with this shader applied it can look bad, you will need to lower the depth to make it not too strange.

- CSM rendering is better if you use the FXAA 3.11 anti-aliasing shader.

 

 

SHADER UNIFORMS

 

conestep_depth : You can change this value to ajust the depth of the effect, be gentle with that otherwise you will get too much artifacts.

 

 

DOWNLOAD (version 1.0)

 

 

 

STANDARD INSTALLATION

 

1- Download the file in this post.

 

2- Put the 2 Shaders Presets files in the "Mesh" folder of your shaders.pak

 

3- Put this code in the Mesh.frag shader just before the Main() function:

 

#ifdef LW_CONESTEP
uniform sampler2D LW_CONESTEP;
varying vec3 eyevec;

uniform float conestep_depth = 0.08;

void conestep_10step (sampler2D csmMap, inout vec3 dp, in vec3 ds)
{

   float iz = max(abs(ds.x),abs(ds.y));
   float w = 1.2;
   vec4 t;

   // 10 Steps
   t=texture2D(csmMap,dp.xy);
   dp += ds * w * (t.r - dp.z) / (iz/(t.g*t.g) + 1.0);

   t=texture2D(csmMap,dp.xy);
   dp += ds * w * (t.r - dp.z) / (iz/(t.g*t.g) + 1.0);
   t=texture2D(csmMap,dp.xy);
   dp += ds * w * (t.r - dp.z) / (iz/(t.g*t.g) + 1.0);
   t=texture2D(csmMap,dp.xy);
   dp += ds * w * (t.r - dp.z) / (iz/(t.g*t.g) + 1.0);
   t=texture2D(csmMap,dp.xy);
   dp += ds * w * (t.r - dp.z) / (iz/(t.g*t.g) + 1.0);

   t=texture2D(csmMap,dp.xy);
   dp += ds * w * (t.r - dp.z) / (iz/(t.g*t.g) + 1.0);
   t=texture2D(csmMap,dp.xy);
   dp += ds * w * (t.r - dp.z) / (iz/(t.g*t.g) + 1.0);
   t=texture2D(csmMap,dp.xy);
   dp += ds * w * (t.r - dp.z) / (iz/(t.g*t.g) + 1.0);
   t=texture2D(csmMap,dp.xy);
   dp += ds * w * (t.r - dp.z) / (iz/(t.g*t.g) + 1.0);
   t=texture2D(csmMap,dp.xy);
   dp += ds * w * (t.r - dp.z) / (iz/(t.g*t.g) + 1.0);

   return;
}



void conestep_exp(sampler2D csmMap, inout vec3 dp, vec3 ds, float dist_factor)
{
	float iz = max(abs(ds.x), abs(ds.y));
	vec4  t = texture2D(csmMap,dp.xy);
	float ht, old_ht;
	float CR = 0.0;

	while (t.r > dp.z)
	{
		CR = t.g * t.g;

		dp += ds * (dist_factor + (t.r - dp.z) * CR) / (iz + CR);

		t = texture2DLod(csmMap, dp.xy, 0.0);
	}

	ht = (t.r - dp.z);
	dist_factor /= (iz + CR);
	dp -= ds * dist_factor;

	t = texture2D(csmMap,dp.xy);
	old_ht = t.r - dp.z;

	dp += ds * dist_factor * (1.0 - clamp (ht / (ht - old_ht), 0.0, 1.0));

	t = texture2D(csmMap, dp.xy);
	dp += ds * (t.r - dp.z) / (iz/(t.g*t.g) + 1.0);

	return;
}
#endif

 

4- Put this code in the Mesh.frag shader inside the Main() function just after the #ifdef LW_PARALLAXMAP section:

 

#ifdef LW_CONESTEP
	float a = -conestep_depth / eyevec.z;
	vec3 s = vec3((eyevec * a).xy, 1);

	float df = 0.1 * sqrt(length(fwidth(texcoord.xy)));

	vec3 uv = vec3(texcoord.xy, 0);

	// HIGH QUALITY
	conestep_exp(LW_CONESTEP, uv, s, df);

	// LOW QUALITY
	//conestep_10step(LW_CONESTEP, uv, s);

	texcoord = uv.xy;
#endif

 

5- It's done ! you can use the test material provided in the zip file downloaded on a 3D object to test the effect

 

 

Here is 2 new screenshots to show you the effect at various angles:

 

 

 

 

[Roland]

What can I say ..... big applause :D

[Flexman]

He's an evil genius.

 

I hadn't heard of Cone Step Mapping but it sounds cool and looks great.

[franck22000]

Shader released have fun, hope i forgot nothing

[Flexman]

Merci. It will take me a while to look at this and check it out but I think this might work well for the rocky/gravel boundary around areas of airstrips. Certainly can't wait to try it on the interior of our Chinook helicopter which has lots of quilted padding, that should suit this shader quite well.

[wayneg]

can it do grass too ?

[franck22000]

I dont think grass will be good but you can try

[Flexman]

What makes good source files for HeightProc.exe? I takes a straight heightmap. What settings did you use for the test scene above?

[Naughty Alien]

..ill give it a go..eventually Ill try to play and do some texture painting over this...it may look fun..nice anyway

[franck22000]

im used to generate the cone map from the heigthmap then tweak the cone map manualy like adding a little of gaussian blur to remove artifacts and minor modifications...

[Flexman]

im used to generate the cone map from the heigthmap then tweak the cone map manualy like adding a little of gaussian blur to remove artifacts and minor modifications...

 

Sorry to be a pain, but what is the process of generating the heightmap from the diffuse?

 

Is it a greyscale? 0 to 255? Could you provide the original heightmap you used as a reference? I'm trying to create my own and getting odd results.

[macklebee]

you could use njob to make the heightmap from the diffuse... as for the final _step DDS file, I am still attempting to reproduce the same results that franck has... without much luck...

[franck22000]

You need to generate a heighmap ( grayscale image ) then with this just drag the heightmap on the tool provided to make a stepmap

But you will not have good result if you are not editing the heigthmap yourself, you need to work on the heigth map manually to have a good depth effect without too much artifacts.

[Roland]

Regarding generation of height maps, could it be something like I'm doing in this video

http://vimeo.com/26964731

[wailingmonkey]

nice work, franck22000!

[Josh]

Thanks for releasing this!