VDrift Graphical Upgrades

[NaN]

should i bother the cpu to get them normalized

A lot of lighting models are using dot/cross products with the surface normal so normalizing it is a good idea. The speed shouldn't be an issue. We are not going to generate wheels per frame.

any way to alter a shader to have it draw vertex normals extending like little hairs off the vertex

Write your mesh into a file(you can use std::cerr) in obj file format and check it in blender. It's really simple.

obj file format (from wikipedia):

Code:

# this is a comment
# List of Vertices, with (x,y,z) coordinates.
v 0.123 0.234 0.345
v ...
...

#Texture coordinates, in (u,v) coordinates.
vt 0.500 -1.352
vt ...
...

#Normals in (x,y,z) form; normals might not be unit.
vn 0.707 0.000 0.707
vn ...
..

#Each face is given by a set of three indices each to the vertex/texture/normal
#coordinate array that precedes this.
#Hence f 1/1/1 2/2/2 3/3/3 is a triangle having texture coordinates and
#normals for those 3 vertices,
#and having for the vertex 1 (1/1/1) the vertex 1 from the "v" list, texture coordinate 1 from
#the "vt" list, and the normal 1 from the "vn" list; then for the 2nd vertex:
#the vertex 2 from the "v" list, texture coordinate 2 from
#the "vt" list, and the normal 2 from the "vn" list; for the 3rd vertex:
#vertex 3 from the "v" list, texture coordinate 3 from
#the "vt" list, and the normal 3 from the "vn" list
#NOTE: The list of vertices, etc. is one-based-indexing (meaning the first vertex in the file is v1).

f v1/vt1/vn1 v2/vt2/vn2 v3/vt3/vn3
f ...