In article <3aad1701@news.povray.org>, Geoff Wedig 
<wed### [at] darwinepbicwruedu> wrote:

> I didn't think it would. I only added it because it kept saying "Normal 
> type not defined"

Because you were specifying a float value when it expected a normal 
pattern or normal identifier.


> I know.  I was trying to take a pigment I made with a proximity and 
> use it in the normal instead.  I knew I'd have to jiggle the 
> variables, but since it didn't work at all...

Well, of course it didn't...you have to do more than "jiggle the 
variables", you have to use a completely different type. Don't expect to 
be able to use an object as a color, either.


> In fact, this is the problem.  When I changed to a slope map, it worked. 
> didn't do what I wanted,

I would be surprised if it did...you are still using the wrong type. The 
slope_map takes a 2D vector...when you specify a float, the same value 
is used for both components when it is automatically promoted to a 2D 
vector, for example, 0.5 is promoted to < 0.5, 0.5>...which is pretty 
much useless in slope_maps. The first component is "height", and the 
second is "slope". POV uses a spline based on this information to figure 
out the slope of the pattern at in-between values, and get an equivalent 
to a "color_map" for normals. A normal_map behaves more like a 
pigment_map than a color_map, it interpolates between complete normals, 
each with it's own pattern and other normal stuff.
If you stated what your goal is, you might better help...however, I 
suggest you look through the manual, which clearly explains the syntax 
of normals, normal_maps, and slope_maps...especially look at section 
2.7.2, which is a tutorial about normals, and section 4.7.2, which is a 
complete syntax reference for normals.


> but it didn't crash. ;)

Wait, it crashed before? That's not good, it means there is a bug 
somewhere...it should just stop parsing and produce an error message.

-- 
Christopher James Huff
Personal: chr### [at] maccom, http://homepage.mac.com/chrishuff/
TAG: chr### [at] tagpovrayorg, http://tag.povray.org/

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