UDK Parallax Floor Tile Material

m1neh

Hey Polycounters!

So I've been messing around with some parallax materials via sculpting and baking maps down. Thought I whack up my progress and see what y'all think about it.

This material is supposed to be some stone tiles in a bed of sand, not really meant for indoors, but the contrast in lighting there shows it a bit better.

Editor Screenie:



Maps:









Getting quite a weird ridge appearing where the geometry is displacing in the bump offset, is that due to too much height contrast in the heightmap? If so is there a way easily fix whilst retaining the height?

Crit away...

Shogun3d

I would definitely say its the contrast, you need more gradation. Possible a slight gradient (or variable) to break up the inner black areas of the crevices.

m1neh

Okay, so I've made the height map less dark in the grouting, and this is the result.



New Height Map:



I'm still having this weird issue when I zoom in in the mat editor, I have also decreased the height ratio from 0.05 to 0.015 to stop it being ridiculously exaggerated.

passerby

you need a better material for between the tiles, also try playing with the specular exponet too.

m1neh

Mkay, have put on a more noisy sand grouting, not sure as to whether or not it is better really - any suggestions on how I could make the grouting better?

Also put on a specular power of 70, just looked right!

m1neh

Image with better representation of the environment it will be a part of...

Shogun3d

Much better, but what you're doing is filling in the grout with a "flat" value in the height map. You need to break this up for a more natural parallax feel. It's more subtle and easier to pick up.

Use the grout mask you are using for the heightmap, and paint in some subtle variations in height and blend into the tiles.

Some of the tiles themselves can use some variation in heightself as well, so don't be afraid to experiment by creating a couple shades and multiplying over a few of those blocks.

m1neh

Kaburan - cheers for the advice, have put in heightmap variation both in grouting and in some of the tiles



quite pleased with the outcome now - more crits?

cptSwing

I'm not sure of the scale, but it seems that the grouti is too wide? And I think you could really add a little more height variation, some cracks, maybe rotate some of them a little bit? Nice looking

m1neh

cptSwing wrote: »

I'm not sure of the scale, but it seems that the grouti is too wide? And I think you could really add a little more height variation, some cracks, maybe rotate some of them a little bit? Nice looking

Reducing the grouting to be pretty much non existent, and have added height variation in the new bakes. Am gonna create textures and will post updates!

Not sure I'd be able to do the rotations for the bakes, as Max would crash to death if I tiled that many tiles, several million polys (overkill I know..). Might be able to within PS though - we shall see!

m1neh

Okay so here is my latest iteration, despite much more height variation, it's not quite sticking out as much as I'd like!



More Crits?

aivanov

"Sticking out" might also depend on your lighting, considering you have a strong light just filling the entire room, there's little in the way of contrast to help highlight height-difference (though it also may be just the map, like you think.)

What does your normal map look like at this point? And have you looked at this (referring to what he does to the normals), by any chance?

m1neh

When I reduced the light brightness and viewed it from a different angle, the height variation was quite a bit better! aivanov - that technique does look useful though, and will certainly refer to it for future textures

Screenie:



Maps:

Quickel

Yeah the lighting is killing this scene with the strong yellow ambient. It might look nice if some of your tile corners have sunken into the sand a little or are covered a little more with sand.

m1neh

Added a more neutral wall mat (not by me) to try to dispel that lighting from the walls + ceiling. Think it looks a bit more natural now?



Material is most likely going to be put into a vertex painting shader, so don't want to integrate such features.

biofrost

Still a bit yellow but looking better. Good job with the tiles so far, the height map seems to be doing a good job.

m1neh

Thanks biofrost! Here's my second attempt, going for a slightly more interesting pattern this time. Got crits? Too red?

Here are the goods!

Outside:



Maps:

m1neh

Decided it was way too red >.< have toned it down and liking the results!

Selaznog

Looks awesome

Macattackk

IMO i think youre pushing the bricks up and down too much in your height map. a brick floor this precisely laid out wouldnt have bricks that stick out more or less than the other bricks so much, people would trip on it and would be weird etc. i mean if you are just doing this as an exercise and just wanna test it out with extreme height variation then thats fine. i just think on a logical basis its a little much

m1neh

Cheers Macattackk, will attempt to tone that down - what do we think about the latest one?

cptSwing

I like it

Though they feel a little large compared to the scale of the door/window to the right?