Color Map Section

Introduction

One of the central features of IFW2 Textures is the color and alpha maps. The color page allows the color map to be set up and controlled. A color map consists of eight colors and eight blend points. When the texture is rendered the texture function returns a value between 0 and 1 for any particular point. The variation of this value controls the look of the texture. The value is then mapped to a color based on color map. The easy way to understand how this works is to think of a simple color map going from Yellow at 0% to Red at 100%. If the texture function returned 0.0 then this would map directly to Yellow. Similarly if the texture function returned 1.0 this would map to Red. However, if the texture function returned 0.5 then this would map to a mix of 50% Yellow and 50% Red, i.e. Orange. Two simple color maps are shown below along with how the look mapped to fBm on a simple cube.

Simple Gradient 1

Here a simple gradient has been set up to go from Yellow at 0% of the texture function to Red at 100%.

Simple Gradient 2

Here a simple gradient has been set up to go from Yellow at 0% of the texture function to green at 50% and on to Red at 100%.

Enable Colors

Each color can be enabled or disabled. When the enable check box is checked then that color is used in the color map. If the color is disabled then it is effectively transparent allowing the underlying colors to shown through. This allows holes to be made in the actual color map without the need to use an alpha map. An example of how this works is shown below. Here, Color 2, Green, is disabled and the underlying color Light Grey shows through.

Simple Gradient 3

Here a simple gradient has been set up to go from Yellow at 0% of the texture function to green at 50% and on to Red at 100%. However, the green color, Color2 has been disabled so that the underlying color, grey in this case, shows through.