Landscaping

[CiroC]

Whoaa..Thanks for sharing the shader tree. It really helps me with the procedural map. That thing with the glossiness looks interesting. The problem I am finding is the wide variety of Galvanized Steel materials available. In this case I am looking for a less reflective material.

Correct me if I am wrong, but I thing this material is close to the "reality" in this case.

Thanks for mentioning the script. I will have a go with the shader tree you shared.

[maru]

Correct me if I am wrong, but I thing this material is close to the "reality" in this case.

To me it looks completely different. Most visible aspect of this material in real life is that the "cells" or "flakes" of it reflect light at different angles. I wouldn't experiment with glossiness or anisotropy but with bump map. A greyscale bumpmap would require gradient cells so I would probably try with a normal map. But it's just an idea. :)

[maru]

But maybe I'm wrong... I even wrote something different in another topic. :)
Here is what I got after making a normal map in photoshop (couldn't control cellular map's intensity per cell). Not very good... Maybe it needs tweaking, maybe it's not a good approach.

[romullus]

I'd like to politely disagree, maru :] Don't think that bump map has much to do with this and even if it does, it's rather complicated to recreate it procedurally properly. One would need many little gradients for that. That probably means bercon maps should be involved - less compatibility, more instability. I like to keep things simple :]

Here, i tweaked my material a bit - tried to match more closely to provided reference picture. Should i have more time, i could match it more closely, i think.

[romullus]

Could you show your material settings, maru? I find your results pretty interesting. Maybe i'm wrong after all.

[maru]

One would need many little gradients for that.

Yup, that's why I used a normal map. :)
And here is a test with glossiness without normal/bump map. It looks slightly better...

[CiroC]

You are right. I have been looking to this render all day, so I needed a fresh pair of eyes. It came to my mind that a car paint shader might to the trick, unfortunately for now we don't have anything like that in Corona. :\

But your results are impressive. I am going to try the same approach.

[maru]

Could you show your material settings, maru? I find your results pretty interesting. Maybe i'm wrong after all.

Not much to show, really. The normal map is most important. I think it would be possible to recreate procedurally but I don't know how to control intensity of individual cells in cellular map. It either creates all cells facing the same "angle" or gradients that don't work well in normal maps. Maybe it would be possible to use cellular map as greyscale bump map...

[romullus]

I noticed that your normal testure isn't normalized. You should always do that. Don't you want to see if it makes any difference?

[romullus]

Inspired by maru, i decided to construct procedural normal map right inside max. While there's still a lot to try to improve, the results are quite interesting.

p.s. Cyrus3v, tell me if you feel that we highjacked your thread, i'll move our discussion to separate topic, because i feel a need to contribute to this interesting topic even more :]

[CiroC]

romullus, please carry one. I am pleased to be part of this conversation because I am also interested in creating a material like this. I am glad if I can help with anything. :D

I run out of time today, but tomorrow morning I want to apply what maru and you shared here. I like your material, but I still think that a texture can give that extra detail for a close up. Are you using maru's texture?


PS - I think I should rename this thread to cyrus's wips :)

[Ondra]

mods can split the topic in two actually...

[CiroC]

mods can split the topic in two actually...

I don't mind to keep this topic here, but if you feel that forum could benefit from a separate topic...

[romullus]

Ok, enough research for today. I much improved procedural normal map. Now, if i only could find a way to offset multiple maps at once, i should finish this material.

[maru]

Romullus, your material looks really nice! What settings did you use for your cellular maps?

I noticed that your normal testure isn't normalized. You should always do that. Don't you want to see if it makes any difference?

What does it mean to normalize a normal map? I don't know much about normal maps.