In the January Video Toaster User (apparently, since I haven't seen a copy yet) one of my graphics appears in the Gallery section. It is a Seasons Greetings scene with Christmas bulbs and lights on...

A HARDWOOD FLOOR!

Here's how I did it.

I used the LIGHTWOOD bitmap that comes with the Video Toaster's version of Lightwave (I used 3.1... not sure if these textures are sold with 4.0). You can use any wood bitmap that you fancy.

- In Modeler I created a rectangle and called the surface HARDWOOD.

- In ToasterPaint (you can use any graphics program for this) I drew rectangles of various shades of gray that were parallel. These were to be used as a DIFFUSE map so various planks of the LIGHTWOOD surface would be darker, and lighter.

- In the same paint package, draw black lines separating the gray rectangles (outlining the rectangles) and fill everything with white. This is a second bitmap that will be used as a BUMP map, forming the grooves between the planks. (Not necessary if your floor is a parquet floor with smooth division between planks.)

- In Layout, load your object. Load the LIGHTWOOD image. Load the DIFFUSE MAP image (gray planks). Load the BUMP MAP image (grooves).

- Set your surface colour to Texture Map of the LIGHTWOOD image. - Set your diffuse to Texture Map of DIFFUSE MAP image. - Set your bump to Texture Map of BUMP MAP image.

- You can also use the LIGHTWOOD image as a SPECULAR map as well. That way, darker parts of the wood won't be as glossy, but the whole floor will be shiny. Unevenly. That's the beauty of it.

There is another way to do this, but it's more involved. It DOES give you better plank grooves, however, if grooves are what you want.

Take your floor polygon and create your planks in the modeler. Then bevel each plank to form the V grooves. Then you can use the same image maps to make the planks vary in diffuse levels, provided your modelled planks correspond to your drawn planks. You could surface each individual plank, too. This would give you more interactive cotrol in Layout of what each plank looks like.

Hope this was of SOME help. There are many different ways to achieve a particular thing in Lightwave. This was one way to make a Hardwood floor.