Create polygons from bump map?

[Anonymous]

So i've got a model that has a wonderful bump map, but i'm looking to 3d print it.I can use the turbosmooth tool to create a ton of extra polygons, is there some way I can use the bump map to transform those extra devisions into actual geometry?

[ekahennequet]

The most straighforward way to physically displace your mesh is to use Displace modifier. How your texture appears and displaces will depend on your UV map and the Displacement settings. You will want to play around with both. For this example, I used a simple Box map type for UVW and not use Displace modifier's default UV map types. Turbosmooth subdivision was set to 6 Iterations.