However, as Jesse put it, it’s a volumetric object he’s lighting using generated background texture coordinates to fake a normal map, so he’s not really sure if there’s a right way to do it. Still, it’s a useful tip worth exploring.
Jesse Miettinen, a legendary Blender artist and master of proceduralism. Check out some of his recent projects, like this liquid made without fluid simulation and an adaptive subdivision setup, discovered “accidentally”:
