[x3d-public] CommonSurfaceShader in view3dscene and Castle Game Engine implemented:)

[Michalis Kamburelis]

Hi,

I'm proud to announce an initial implementation of CommonSurfaceShader
in Castle Game Engine and view3dscene! CommonSurfaceShader acts as a
powerful "material on steroids" X3D node, in particular with support
for normal maps (bump mapping).

1. The documentation is on
https://castle-engine.sourceforge.io/x3d_implementation_texturing_extensions.php#section_ext_common_surface_shader

2. The demos are in
https://github.com/castle-engine/demo-models/tree/master/bump_mapping/common_surface_shader

3. To try this *now*, you can use view3dscene from our "nightly
builds": https://michalis.ii.uni.wroc.pl/castle-engine-snapshots/ .
You can download the official view3dscene from
http://castle-engine.sourceforge.net/view3dscene.php , unpack it, then
replace the exe file inside with the exe from
https://michalis.ii.uni.wroc.pl/castle-engine-snapshots/ .

This is happening thanks to the support on Patren (
https://www.patreon.com/castleengine ). Robert Daniel Murphy sponsored
improving the Blender exporter to be able to export normalmaps (and
specular maps and similar) from Blender to Castle Game Engine easily.
I took the idea a little further, and implemented it by adding the
CommonSurfaceShader node to the engine, and then the Blender exporter
will export an X3D file with the CommonSurfaceShader.

This way the Blender exporter will be improved for everyone, e.g.
Instant Reality / X3DOM users will also benefit by having an exporter
that can write CommonSurfaceShader.

More work is yet ahead (the Blender exporter, and the specular maps
are not done yet). But the CommonSurfaceShader, with many basic
fields, and normal maps, is supported now!

The CommonSurfaceShader works both for interactive rendering, and for
our toy raytracer. It is also understood when editing materials in
view3dscene (Edit->Edit Material->... menu items).

P.S. If you like view3dscene, or you'd like to request more
view3dscene features like that, please support me on Patreon
https://www.patreon.com/castleengine !:)

Best regards,
Michalis