Normal Mapping

Normal mapping is the process of using a texture to vary the surface normal of an object. It can be used to add details to a lower-poly mesh from a generated texture, or by using data baked from sculpting or displacement.

Usage

Normal maps are loaded via the image map node and by enabling the Normal map option. The node can then be connected to any material bump slot. The normal map bump height can be scaled with the Height setting. A height of 1.0 would be the default height of the texture.

Unlike regular bump maps the scale of a normal map is relative. For instance, 0.5 is half the bump of the texture. Thus you'll mostly want to to leave the height setting at 1.0 for normal maps. As with any image map, the object must have UV coordinates for using a normal map.

Using Baked Normal Maps

Extra care has to be taken when using baked normal maps. In order to prevent seams, enable the "Generate Tangents" option. Currently we can only ensure that normal maps baked with Blender or xNormal will be seamless, however it may work for other generators. Please note that this does not apply to non-baked normal maps.

Mixing With Other Textures

The normalmap texture acts a special float(grey-scale) texture, and can be mixed with other float textures using the math node to produce complex bump maps.