Bump and Displacement
For adding surface detail to your models, LuxCoreRender supports bump maps and normal maps.
When using these features, it is important to remember the units that LuxCoreRender uses. 1 unit in LuxCoreRender equals one meter. So if you want a fairly small bump, use amounts like 0.01 or even 0.001 to start out. And this of course depends on the brightness of the image map you use for bump.
Bump and displacement maps use just the brightness of a texture, not the color value. It's recommended to use a grey-scale texture so you can see the actual difference in height across the texture. You can use a colored texture too but LuxCoreRender will convert it to a grey-scale texture anyway and it can be difficult to see the difference in height in a colored texture. A colored texture with a wild pattern can look completely flat(no bump) when converted to grey-scale.
Bump Maps
Bump mapping is the process of locally redefining surface shading based on a texture, without changing the actual geometry. This way, one can create a lot of surface detail without using unnecessarily complex models.
Bump mapping is essentially "free" from a memory and performance standpoint, but since it does not actually affect the surface geometry, it's only suited to fine details. Otherwise it can look obviously smooth and fake when viewed at an angle.
When using a bump map with a positive bump strength, the average color of the surface represents the base surface; any lighter shade will be considered a protrusion and any darker shade represents an indentation.
Normal Maps
Normal maps are a more advanced version of bump maps that can push the fake surface in any direction instead of simply up and down like a bump map can. Normal maps in LuxCoreRender are used by attaching a special "normal map" texture to the bump mapping channel. When using a baked normal map (such as from a hi-res sculpted mesh) you should enable the "generate tangents" option for that mesh.
Currently, LuxCoreRender only supports tangent space normal maps.
For more information, see Normal Mapping
Displacement
Not yet supported by LuxCoreRender.