When to use bump maps.
This was made with Maya and rendered with mental ray.
The stone walls have a heavy bump map. The material was made with a tileable stone texture and the bump map was made from the same seamless texture.
The bed was sculpted with the Maya sculpting tool found in Modeling under Surfaces. The bedspread material is made from a seamless cloth texture and the bump map for it was made from the same seamless texture.
The cement floor was made from a seamless cement texture and again, the same texture was used to make a bump map.
The sink/toilet combo and the metal bars were made with mental ray “paint” materials. Since they are smooth and shiny, they are not bump mapped.
This images can be clicked on to blow them up.
Here are two variations:
