   Technique(s) which actually create depth
  Hi guys, I previously posted about building the world view of my cartoon game. I want to add depth onto the globe, something to make mountains and other things appear to come off the map. I'm doing so with a data file containing the heights of these depths which can be laid over no problem.The obvious first idea was bump mapping which I agree with. However I realized I don't want just the shading to change because I would like to actually create depth which will affect the silhouette of the sphere (i.e. actually have the depth be there rather just faked via shading).This will be a dedicated section so performance isn't a problem, and I can use glsl, but I just can't think of what the name of the techniques are that actually create depth. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.   
  displacement mappingparallax mapping (and there are variations on this one)   ;  Try POM/relief/CSM with border clamping, it is able to both modify silhouette and depth values (you don't need to do self-shadowing, if you modify depth in pixel shader you can let standard shadow mapping do the job).   ;Quote:Original post by V-mandisplacement mappingparallax mapping (and there are variations on this one)Awesome, those were exactly what I was looking for. Does parallax mapping actually affect depth though, steep parallax mapping looks great, but still seems that it only creates the illusion of depth from the literature I'm looking through.  No need to convince me though, just letting me know how certain you are would be helpful. Thanks :);  no.standard parallax mapping just displaces the texcoords which is pretty good for most cases and only costs 2 extra instructions.2. One variation I've seen does some kind of search to be more accurate but requires SM 3.0 hw.Another variation does what 2. does but also writes to the depth buffer. I doubt anyone uses this one in a game since it costs a lot of cycles.   ;  It's possible to modify parallax mapping such that it affects the silhouette; I've successfully implemented this in HLSL, and there's no reason it couldn't be done in OpenGL. The math is tricky, though. Why not just make real, vertex-based bumps on your sphere?   ;Quote:Original post by SneftelWhy not just make real, vertex-based bumps on your sphere?That's the conclusion I'm reaching. Very thankful for your guys input, shading is something I have a long way to go on. So when you say vertex-based bumps, you literally mean me reading in my displacement file in and displacing the vertices myself by looking up values in the data?;Quote:Original post by rcookSo when you say vertex-based bumps, you literally mean me reading in my displacement file in and displacing the vertices myself by looking up values in the data?Sure, that's a reasonable way to accomplish it.   