Displacement maps visible in viewports?

[TomA]

Is it possible to view the effects of displacement maps in viewports in Max?

[Bruce Hart]

As you may be aware, displacement is produced by micro polygon subdivision at render time. If you were to use the displacement modifier with a mesh that has been subdivided by meshsmooth or quadify mesh for example - then you could see the displacement effects in the viewport. However you would probably need to view the effect in much lower detail than the rendertime subdivision.

[Stephen Thomas]

Yes, if you have a dense mesh and use the displacement modifier. No, if your displacement is done through material, or in vray. Like Bruce said, those are render-time calculations.

[TomA]

Thanks.

 

Copying the displacement map into the diffuse slot was enough for what I needed.

[danielchilds]

There is one way that i was experimenting with but it envolves creating a shader that alowes the max viewport to display the paralac effect. i was working on one for my second year uni character design project.

 

the only down side to this technique is that you need a set of textures for rendering and a set for viewport viewing.

 

im going to have a go at re creating it now for my own project, if it works then ill try find a way to upload the shader.