I’ve notice several tutorials online on how to use refraction, but the tutorial is always done with vray and/or using other objects created, which is something I don’t have and am not willing to do.
What I want to do is use refraction on one object that is interactive with a bitmapped environment with mental ray. I know it could be done in scanline. Can it be done in mental ray?
Sure thing, and you do it basically the same exact way. Shove your bitmap either in the environment, or in the diffuse slot of a material applied to a sphere (with interverted normals) inside which is your refractive object (the benefits of this latter method is better control over the actual display of the bitmap, depending on how you fiddle with it.)
Then, on the refractive object, apply an Arch and Design material and you’ll find a Refraction section. You’ll find a lot of the same parameters in there as you will in a standard material with a Raytrace map in the refract slot. There are also some presets there, if you want a bit of a headstart.
Edit: this might be in the wrong forum. Perhaps ask a mod to move it up a forum into the 3dsmax general forum – you may get more answers!