RO Substance Tests
greentooth
UPDATE : Nodes have been added to Gumroad
I added a folder structure this time with a project configuration hope it works out. I only did this for the guys asking for this. Honestly I am rather shamed by these nodes while some are okish most are pretty bad. But that is ok. If you all find use for them good for you
Note: Cavity Chips works using the peaks and or valleys. One of those old things I should have made proper. If time permits ill try to do some actual clean up on these, but honestly I would just name them different anyways.
https://gumroad.com/products/vlGVR/edit#share
Substance nodes
-RO AO-
This is a new AO node that mimicks the ouputs of AO maps in X-normal from a flat texture standpoint. This is an expensive node
and highly editable for different results. The base settings should be alright for most textures.
-RO Overlay Grayscale-
This the same just optimized for gray scale use. I like having a grayscale version of every tool since it makes it easier to make graphs it
also makes sense to clean my workflow as I go. I created this based on the allegorithmic version for my personal use.
I tested it and it is slightly less expensive than version inside substance.
-RO Cavity Better-
I called it Cavity since more people understand that term than curvature, but it is a curvature map maker. Using a tangent space normal
map it outputs a cavity with several options and outputs such as peaks and valleys. The current Curvature map in substance designer
creates a lot of micro noise which is horrible for composting onto of color or base textures with. I created this version to reduce the
noise and get a cleaner output than the ordinal version. This node is more expensive than the substance native curvature node, but It is
still pretty optimized and has more options.
-RO Dirt Position-
This node creates dirt based on the worldspace/position of the asset. Very helpful for dust, sun bleaching, and many others.
-Ro Dirt Position Streaks-
This node creates streaks/leaks like water stains or grunge based on the worldspace/position. works well for rain or grunge dirt marks.
-RO Dirt Cavity grease-
This node creates grease with cavity included you can get different grunge like results with the properties.
-RO Cavity Chips-
This node creates paint like chips for areas with cavity. Use Cavity Peaks or Valleys if you use cavity raw it will not work.
-RO Dirt Cavity Streaks-
This node creates streaks based where the cavity starts this works well for detailed leaks based on cavity peeks or valleys.
-RO Position
-this node is a helper node for using on tile able textures to have the function of direction based streaks or grunge. If your making a unique asset use the baked out position if your using a tile able texture you can use a black and white gradient or this position node to plug in into position.
I did tweak some of the nodes like Cavity and AO slightly so if you were using the old ones please know that it may change your output look and tweak accordingly.
RO Cavity
This cavity node has three outputs
Cavity = everything blended together
Peaks = the top usually white point of the cavity
valleys= the dark points of the cavity
It comes with several slider groups
Noise Reduction
blur out the noise or bringing it in. sometimes you want a bit of noise in your cavity but now you can choose for a clean or noisy feel. Also comes with opacity slider for further tweaking.
Peaks
position and contrast together work like a ramp to thin out the line or deepen it.
It has an opacity slider also.
Valleys
position and contrast together work like a ramp to thin out the line or deepen it.
It has an opacity slider also.
Normal influence opacity
This is not really part of a true cavity but you can decide to use it. it is basically the blue channel of the normal multiplied onto of everything to give it more form.
Another tool added into the download is
Overlay Grayscale
Substance designer already has a overlay but it uses rgb. I made this version out of the substance designer one and optimized it without breaking the actual function of it, it is slightly cheaper and the end all it does is keep my graphs clean with less rgb to grayscale conversions etc. The function is the same just used for grayscale images. So since the cavity graph uses it needs to be included.
The installation is pretty easy just unzip the files onto the Substance Designer\resources\packages to view and use these nodes. This is the first time I am trying it on other machines so I am curious if it will work as I think it should
I have the steam version which makes the directory different for everyone...I guess we will see if it works out.
These are not my texture these are from the awesome and talented artist at GameTextures.com ill use them for testing reasons to make these nodes and some of my own textures also.
Replies
Substance Tools
Tiny Update
I decided to remake the curvature map inside substance designer. The substance designer curvature node map filter comes with a noise issue that was just not great for composting on top of base colors. Especially on clean meshes like the robot low poly I was having aliasing issues on the gradients of the normals where it would create micro facets so I made this node to clean that up.
This cavity node has three outputs
Cavity = everything blended together
Peaks = the top usually white point of the cavity
valleys= the dark points of the cavity
It comes with several slider groups
Noise Reduction
blur out the noise or bringing it in. sometimes you want a bit of noise in your cavity but now you can choose for a clean or noisy feel. Also comes with opacity slider for further tweaking.
Peaks
position and contrast together work like a ramp to thin out the line or deepen it.
It has an opacity slider also.
Valleys
position and contrast together work like a ramp to thin out the line or deepen it.
It has an opacity slider also.
Normal influence opacity
This is not really part of a true cavity but you can decide to use it. it is basically the blue channel of the normal multiplied onto of everything to give it more form.
Another tool added into the download is
Overlay Grayscale
Substance designer already has a overlay but it uses rgb. I made this version out of the substance designer one and optimized it without breaking the actual function of it, it is slightly cheaper and the end all it does is keep my graphs clean with less rgb to grayscale conversions etc. The function is the same just used for grayscale images. So since the cavity graph uses it needs to be included.
The sample normal map samples below are from GameTextures.com free textures. I will keep on using those as samples from time to time
The installation is pretty easy just unzip the files onto the c: / and make sure to link it to the root substance_tools directory in substance designer to view these graphs and use them. This is the first time I am trying it on other machines so i am curious if it will work as I think it should
I guess we will see if it works out.
again I want to repeat these are not my texture these are from the awesome and talented artist at GameTextures.com
Like I said this is going to be sort of slow going. Mostly just putting things together, It is actually kind of cool since I am forced to recreate things again and I am quickly finding more efficient ways of doing stuff.
Thanks for the comments so far.
The robot is all uved and normal mapped ill package that guy in soon.
NOTE: If you downloaded the previous files please delete those and add these to the correct directory thanks
Download
Substance Tools
Updated where the files go in. Now all files go in into the basic substance directory unzip contents into Substance Designer\resources\packages and all should work well.
and files are named RO_etc also for ease of finding in substance
-RO AO
-RO Cavity
-RO Overlay Grayscale
The download comes with the previous Cavity, and Overlay but now I added an AO node.
This AO node was made specifically for tileable texture use I do not expect this to be used on unique baked models. I looks close to a x-normal ao bake on flat AOs on a settings which I use for my flat AO bakes.
this node comes with many properties to change the look. In general the prebaked in properties should be good for most tileable AO maps and you can tweak the properties to get a better look by individually tweaking stuff in or out.
Note: it is easy to messup the AO map with the properties so be careful. Also the height map that gets inputted makes a difference. at times the height maps might have too much darkened areas It might be suggested to tweak the dark spots into a dark gray before inputting in.
The sample normal map samples and heights used below are from GameTextures.com free textures. I will keep on using those as samples from time to time
The middle texture dirt looking one is mine
luthyn: I have not looked into that myself but I know of someone who has. I have used FX for some bits but I am still kind of new to those myself. I know the bare basics of them. I will look into more for sure.
Small fix. AO and Cavity were not showing in the library the only way to find it was searching it. It was just bad tagging on my part and Filters actually being Filter.
Seen the files have been downloaded several times let me know what you all think.
I am taking inspiration from stuff I see artist do to add grim dirt but making it fully procedural. Again some base textures like normal and height are from gametextures.com I am using them as a testing base for these filters.
Yep I will release these as soon as I get a few more done. So far I only have a
-worldspace/position dirt with position controls
-Cavity Dirt streaks with position controls - The ones on the screenshots
The other ones should be far easier to make so not too long for the wait.
Really awesome work so far!
Still tweaking making sure these make sense and are functional in many different usages.
https://vimeo.com/85016170
[vv]85016170[/vv]
Download
Substance nodes
-RO AO-
This is a new AO node that mimicks the ouputs of AO maps in X-normal from a flat texture standpoint. This is an expensive node
and highly editable for different results. The base settings should be alright for most textures.
-RO Overlay Grayscale-
This the same just optimized for gray scale use. I like having a grayscale version of every tool since it makes it easier to make graphs it
also makes sense to clean my workflow as I go. I created this based on the allegorithmic version for my personal use.
I tested it and it is slightly less expensive than version inside substance.
-RO Cavity Better-
I called it Cavity since more people understand that term than curvature, but it is a curvature map maker. Using a tangent space normal
map it outputs a cavity with several options and outputs such as peaks and valleys. The current Curvature map in substance designer
creates a lot of micro noise which is horrible for composting onto of color or base textures with. I created this version to reduce the
noise and get a cleaner output than the ordinal version. This node is more expensive than the substance native curvature node, but It is
still pretty optimized and has more options.
-RO Dirt Position-
This node creates dirt based on the worldspace/position of the asset. Very helpful for dust, sun bleaching, and many others.
-Ro Dirt Position Streaks-
This node creates streaks/leaks like water stains or grunge based on the worldspace/position. works well for rain or grunge dirt marks.
-RO Dirt Cavity grease-
This node creates grease with cavity included you can get different grunge like results with the properties.
-RO Cavity Chips-
This node creates paint like chips for areas with cavity.
-RO Dirt Cavity Streaks-
This node creates streaks based where the cavity starts this works well for detailed leaks based on cavity peeks or valleys.
-RO Position
-this node is a helper node for using on tile able textures to have the function of direction based streaks or grunge. If your making a unique asset use the baked out position if your using a tile able texture you can use a black and white gradient or this position node to plug in into position.
This video below shows the masks in action. This nodes work with tile able textures and unique bakes.
I did tweak some of the nodes like Cavity and AO slightly so if you were using the old ones please know that it may change your output look and tweak accordingly.
Enjoy
https://vimeo.com/85016170
[vv]85016170[/vv]
Next plans Ill actually make a project to show these all off and record the steps as I go I will most likely make some kind of techdoor or something that would take too long to hand create dirt and wear by hand so some kind of complex hardsurface sample mostly environment style.
edit: seems to work now!
Awesome tools. I've just imported to SD 4.1.1 and it works perfectly.
Cheers.
I plan to make a cleaner version later on but not sure when Ill have time to work on it.
cool inspiration
Minor update been super busy at work finished up the Uncharted trailer 4 was part of the team on the trailer as a texture artist.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y1Rx-Bbht5E
I have some new ideas for these nodes
these nodes need to be cleaned up anyways. Trying to make it more modular with specific fx that can be chained together as opposed to one node that does one full effect.
Oh and to avoid the question... I did use substance on this trailer, but I can not say how much or what
From the traile it looks outstanding!
1. Nodes that generate information maps e.g. curvature, ao, position
2. Nodes that generate noise - e.g. cavity chips, grease, streak
Nodes that generation information maps you use instead of baking out maps. I personally will run it through say "RO AO" then save that file out. I use that file any time I need a general AO. I do this instead of baking out an ao map using xnormal.
Nodes that generate noise I use for adding detail to my materials. SD has a node called material color blend. You plug in a material then add a noise mask. You can then choose what color you want to place where the mask is applied for each channel.
I have some links on my sig to tutorials on basic texturing with SD.
Until this is resolved I would have to reinstall these and each time the program upgrades and that needs path alias etc.
Thanks for sharing all the same.
You can create an alias, save it in a project and preserve any relative path to the sbs if the folder containing the resources is at the same level as the project file.
I do this with some custom filters between my home computer and my computer at work with a folder and a project located in my dropbox. We will have some documentation about that very soon.
thanks!
I've added it to the user paths and everything.
Only way around it is to manually go in a find the .sbs it wants for all the missing files.
When I drop one of RO's nodes into my graphs, an Update Report pops up listing the node, change from diffuse to base color, 1.1015151 engine v4, blend node modified:2, and 1.1015933 remove unused package dependencies. No idea what it means at the moment but looking into it. Thought a post here might speed things up.
If you get a chance, can you resave in 6? As per as said its wanting to relink everytime to outside standard filters from inside the RO folder. Which of course you can't save since the RO files are locked. I tried copy/pasting your nodes into a replica graph, but it also looks like you have custom input parameters which wont save out all the information.
Yep ill check these out soon and see what I can do to them. When I do ill put the on Gumroad free of course. let you all know. In till than sorry just not been keeping up with these and some ways I almost wanted these to die slowly so i could come back and fix them proper.
I may update them instead because these are kind of old.