I think the metal on the stock is still missing the mark. If you're going for tarnished silver, there's no reason to have that rough, bump normal map detail there.
Tarnished silver looks more like this:
The broad forms are still very smooth. Again your normal map detail there suggests cast iron or something very rusty.
s I'm trying to make it follow the rules of PBR, which should allow my model to look consistent with any lighting setup. Where as my other version would likely need tweaking for different lighting models
this is true and something i didn't really think of. PBR seems to be a little tricky and i am not too hot on Marmoset 2. Was just going strictly from the screen shots.
the bowl on the right would suggest to me that as the metal becomes more tarnished, you need to switch to a more diffuse value with lower reflectivity. which makes sense from a physical point of view because when a metal becomes tarnished or rusted, it's usually become oxidised and is therefor a salt and not a pure metal.
Hey EarthQuake, thanks for the feedback. I didn't want to go as far with the tarnish as your ref example as the rifle should look aged but not neglected. I was using this for ref:
but you are right I probably do need to scale back the bump.
Yeah I would pull back on the bumpy normal map stuff, or remove it entirely, and pull back on the cloudy black stuff too (you notice in your ref, that only in the rescessed areas/pits do you see that blackening) if that is your ref. Don't be afraid to have very simple texture content, what matters is how it looks on the model, not how interesting it is in the 2d maps.
If you're going for a hammered metal look, you should probably redo the pattern on the normals to reflect larger scale hammer marks.
Oh and in general, I think you should put less detail into the spec, and more into the gloss.
this is true and something i didn't really think of. PBR seems to be a little tricky and i am not too hot on Marmoset 2. Was just going strictly from the screen shots.
Hey walklikethis, not so hot with T2 either, but I'm hoping at the end of this I'll understand more, also happy to share anything useful I learn
So I've done a little more tweaking. Reduced the small noisy bump, but added a larger subtle hammered effect. (maybe too subtle?) I decided to scale back on the dark tarnish abit more, at least until I'm happy I've nailed the aged silver look. I'll grime it all up at the end.
Rendered a couple of shots using different sky lights to see if it's working as it should. Let me know what you think
Oh and in general, I think you should put less detail into the spec, and more into the gloss.
Hey EarthQuake, thanks for your feedback. I'm a little unsure what you mean by this though.
So far I've been using the spec to definne the reflectance of each type of material and their respective parts. So for example on the cross I have pure silver, but also tarnish. As tarnish is a considered a semi conductor I guessed it would require a lower reflectance value.
I'm currently using my gloss to define the surface detail, which atm is quite clean until I'm happy I have the base material down. Then I'll be going to town with the scratches and grime etc.
As I understand it, higher roughness will automatically reduce how bright the reflection is due to conservation of energy. The more spread out a reflection is, the dimmer it will be in any given area, so you don't really need to reduce the reflectance.
I think the point is the change in the reflectance isn't as strong as you are making it in you maps. It would be more Albedo and gloss change ( mostly gloss). Also you want alot more gloss details that don't match up with the reflectance or albedo.
I think the metal area is looking a lot better now. The wood area could use some love I think tho. Right now the wood is reading as very soft and wet. I think its coming out too saturated and dark in general. Some more edge highlighting in the gloss might help as well, although I'm just learning the pbr system now myself so its just a guess.
Hey EarthQuake, thanks for your feedback. I'm a little unsure what you mean by this though.
So far I've been using the spec to definne the reflectance of each type of material and their respective parts. So for example on the cross I have pure silver, but also tarnish. As tarnish is a considered a semi conductor I guessed it would require a lower reflectance value.
I'm currently using my gloss to define the surface detail, which atm is quite clean until I'm happy I have the base material down. Then I'll be going to town with the scratches and grime etc.
Is that the right approach?
Metal is looking way better now I think, and I don't think the normal detail is too subtle. Subtly is often good with overlaid normal detail, its easy to add way too much.
I think your logic here is generally sound. To explain myself a bit more:
Try to think of the specular map as setting the base reflectivity values in a broad sense, and then try to think of the gloss map as where you add all the little scratches, rough spots and other unique little details.
From the looks of your maps your specular and gloss maps seem to have generally the same pattern, but just slightly different brightness values. Maybe this is because I'm looking at sized down maps, but I would expect to see more of a difference between these too. Detail in the gloss that is completely different to the detail in the spec usually provides a very nice result.
To expand on what EQ is saying, maybe this will help you with your approach.
Specular = reflectivity. the reflectivity of a surface only changes if it's covered in another substance. for example: silver + mud = two reflective values.
Gloss = roughness. this is what changes the spread of the reflection.
so, if your surface is entirely silver, then the entire surface will have the same reflective value. however it will have different roughness values across its surface. there will be areas where it is completely smooth and therefor it reflects 100% of the light that hits it at a perfect response angle, but there will also be areas where the surface has microscopic (hence microsurface) details which will cause the light to bounce in random directions.
the reason why rough areas look less reflective, is because less of the reflected light is reaching your eye. the same amount of light is still being reflected by the surface, it's just being reflected in so many directions that not all of it reaches you.
Thanks almighty_gir, what your saying certainly makes sense, I plan on adding alot more detail to my gloss, so hopefully next time I post it will look better! (here's hoping anyway )
Hey Robeomega, I think that was actually another tarnish, but if it is dirt then your right it should certainly be brown
I wonder if someone can help me out with obtaining this type of mottled colour effect:
Should I be putting my colour info into the spec? If so would the brightness values be roughly the same, with just changes to hue and saturation? (Bearing in mind I'm using PBR).
Yes. The color shift you see in the untarnished areas should be controlled in the spec/ reflectance map. I would just do a hue shift and not change the value, as you said.
Yes. The color shift you see in the untarnished areas should be controlled in the spec/ reflectance map. I would just do a hue shift and not change the value, as you said.
Still tinkering with this. Layering up the tarnish on the body, trying to get a pitted cast iron look going, but it still needs work. Not much change to my gloss maps yet, just working mainly on albedo and reflectance.
This is starting to come along really nicely man =]
Thanks almighty_gir. It's taken me a while to get my head around the spec/reflectance workflow. But I think I'm getting the hang of it. Now I want to get this finished and start something new
I didn't mean because reflectance is kicking your ass or anything, at all. What i mean is that you can learn from the metalness workflow, how to approach your reflectance workflow better =]
I didn't mean because reflectance is kicking your ass or anything, at all. What i mean is that you can learn from the metalness workflow, how to approach your reflectance workflow better =]
hah thanks almighty_gir, I know you weren't insinuating that, but to be honest it really did kick my ass for a while there
I'm sure at some point I'll give the meatalness method a go so I at least know which one to use for what circumstances. (Or at least imagine I do) :poly105:
Few more tweaks, might have overdone the rust. Trying to think of interesting stuff to put into my gloss besides scratches and handprints lol. Any suggestions would be welcome
Few more tweaks, might have overdone the rust. Trying to think of interesting stuff to put into my gloss besides scratches and handprints lol. Any suggestions would be welcome
Yeah I think the rust overlay is too much right now, but not really that its "too much" but more so that it is everywhere, uniformly. Right now most of your metalic materials read as uniformly noisey/cloudy patterns, without much interesting, specific detail to break them up.
When you get past the base material phase I think its good to start thinking about adding some character to the texture. What I like to do is sort of think logically about how and why the wear would appear. Say one section gets a lot of use because you use it to adjust the scope, the edges there will be really worn. Add some patches of specific rust to an area where water/moisture would pool. Add some nice big scrapes to show where the item was dropped at some point. The important thing is really adding specific details that tell a story, more so than concentrating on the material qualities of the entire model.
Hey thanks for the feedback EarthQuake. I had gone a bit mad adding rust everywhere :poly105:. I just liked the look of it, but as you rightly pointed out there's nothing else to break it up!
I think I've been too focused on getting the material definition that I want, and as a result it's lost it's personality.
So I had another crack at it over the weekend, and whilst it's still wip, I think it's getting closer. But I'll let you guys be the judge of that, and C&C would be ace!
This is looking really nice, the scorching on the metal is a nice touch and the leather is looking really good.
I can't say for sure but it looks like maybe you have too much information in the albedo channel for the metal that forms the main body of the gun?
Hey thanks Pegbird. The main body has been the hardest to define, and is still quite a way off what im after. It's quite likely I've got too much info in the wrong maps (still not 100% sure what I'm doing). I can post my maps for critique soon.
I'd kill the background image, or at least change to something "steampunky". Your model stands well enough on its own, and the image actually detracts from your work, Something like this would be better:
Overall, though, I think you'd be better served with a simpler background. A nice dark, shiny wood (as though it's resting on a table) with an appropriately colored environment cube might be best - enough to give the impression of an actual scene without distracting the eye from the intended subject.
Hey thanks DWalker, that's a great interior, and it's so inviting, I could see myself sitting in that chair with my smoking jacket and slippers on (is it CG?)
Atm I'm using the museum skybox/HDRI background image in Toolbag2 just for quickness. Once I've nailed the look I'm going for I'll look at the lighting and backgrounds for my final renders.
Finally got some time on this. In all honesty It's been a real mission using this reflectance map workflow, and I'm still not confident I've got it nailed yet. But I like where it's at and Imo it's much better than it started out, so I'm going to call it a day and move onto something new. Yay! Thanks for all the feedback guys, it certainly helped.
Huge improvement on the original. Turned out great!
Can't quite tell, but I think your normals might be facing the wrong direction. Try flipping the y in marmoset, or setting it to max tangents on the object.
It looks great, good job! One thing is bothering me though; the fading on the wood is way too uniform and should be more subtle IMO. Also the background has really similar colors to the gun, it kind of works in this case but it might be a good idea to try 1 shot on a blue-grayish background.
Thanks for the compliments guys, hoping my next PBR project will be easier
stevston89- I used xnormals for the normal map, and have set that in T2. where are you seeing an issue?
Xazas - Glad it's been useful. I will point out that this is my first PBR object using the reflectance workflow, so there's a good chance the values aren't 100% correct, so use it at your peril
komaokc - If I'm honest I really like how the wood turned out, but I guess that a matter of personal preference. Perhaps it's looking uniform because I've mirrored the stock? As for the background I went for a blurred version of the Image based lighting background in T2. I can see your point though, and I might try a different background at some time.
Jesse Moody - Textures are 2048. Everything should be of a similar texel density, although I found I had some spare UV space so I scaled up some of the smaller elements to give them more definition.
I was spefically noticing weirdness around the screws. The light seems to hitting them at various different angles. That's why I said I wasn't quite sure.
Stevston89 - Now I'm with you. The screws were from a single floater and as billymcguffin rightly pointed out they were copy pasted, and rotated in PS. I know some of their normals aren't right I just hoped no one would notice, well spotted though you've both got a killer eye for details
Replies
In the meantime I'm going to start on the copper.
Tarnished silver looks more like this:
The broad forms are still very smooth. Again your normal map detail there suggests cast iron or something very rusty.
this is true and something i didn't really think of. PBR seems to be a little tricky and i am not too hot on Marmoset 2. Was just going strictly from the screen shots.
but you are right I probably do need to scale back the bump.
If you're going for a hammered metal look, you should probably redo the pattern on the normals to reflect larger scale hammer marks.
Oh and in general, I think you should put less detail into the spec, and more into the gloss.
Hey walklikethis, not so hot with T2 either, but I'm hoping at the end of this I'll understand more, also happy to share anything useful I learn
So I've done a little more tweaking. Reduced the small noisy bump, but added a larger subtle hammered effect. (maybe too subtle?) I decided to scale back on the dark tarnish abit more, at least until I'm happy I've nailed the aged silver look. I'll grime it all up at the end.
Rendered a couple of shots using different sky lights to see if it's working as it should. Let me know what you think
Hey EarthQuake, thanks for your feedback. I'm a little unsure what you mean by this though.
So far I've been using the spec to definne the reflectance of each type of material and their respective parts. So for example on the cross I have pure silver, but also tarnish. As tarnish is a considered a semi conductor I guessed it would require a lower reflectance value.
I'm currently using my gloss to define the surface detail, which atm is quite clean until I'm happy I have the base material down. Then I'll be going to town with the scratches and grime etc.
Is that the right approach?
Metal is looking way better now I think, and I don't think the normal detail is too subtle. Subtly is often good with overlaid normal detail, its easy to add way too much.
I think your logic here is generally sound. To explain myself a bit more:
Try to think of the specular map as setting the base reflectivity values in a broad sense, and then try to think of the gloss map as where you add all the little scratches, rough spots and other unique little details.
From the looks of your maps your specular and gloss maps seem to have generally the same pattern, but just slightly different brightness values. Maybe this is because I'm looking at sized down maps, but I would expect to see more of a difference between these too. Detail in the gloss that is completely different to the detail in the spec usually provides a very nice result.
Specular = reflectivity. the reflectivity of a surface only changes if it's covered in another substance. for example: silver + mud = two reflective values.
Gloss = roughness. this is what changes the spread of the reflection.
so, if your surface is entirely silver, then the entire surface will have the same reflective value. however it will have different roughness values across its surface. there will be areas where it is completely smooth and therefor it reflects 100% of the light that hits it at a perfect response angle, but there will also be areas where the surface has microscopic (hence microsurface) details which will cause the light to bounce in random directions.
the reason why rough areas look less reflective, is because less of the reflected light is reaching your eye. the same amount of light is still being reflected by the surface, it's just being reflected in so many directions that not all of it reaches you.
Please let me know what your thoughts are
Thanks stevston89, your right the copper looks to yellow. I think I've been staring at it for too long I missed that :poly142:
Hi Robeomega, are you referring to the dirt on the model or my dirt ref?
Hey Robeomega, I think that was actually another tarnish, but if it is dirt then your right it should certainly be brown
I wonder if someone can help me out with obtaining this type of mottled colour effect:
Should I be putting my colour info into the spec? If so would the brightness values be roughly the same, with just changes to hue and saturation? (Bearing in mind I'm using PBR).
Ok I'll give that a go, thanks stevston89
Any feedback is more than welcome.
Thanks almighty_gir. It's taken me a while to get my head around the spec/reflectance workflow. But I think I'm getting the hang of it. Now I want to get this finished and start something new
It certainly seems a simpler method, but then I like a challenge
I'm glad it's been useful Kip McSkipster, the help I've had from the community has been great, and really appreciated.
hah thanks almighty_gir, I know you weren't insinuating that, but to be honest it really did kick my ass for a while there
I'm sure at some point I'll give the meatalness method a go so I at least know which one to use for what circumstances. (Or at least imagine I do) :poly105:
Few more tweaks, might have overdone the rust. Trying to think of interesting stuff to put into my gloss besides scratches and handprints lol. Any suggestions would be welcome
Yeah I think the rust overlay is too much right now, but not really that its "too much" but more so that it is everywhere, uniformly. Right now most of your metalic materials read as uniformly noisey/cloudy patterns, without much interesting, specific detail to break them up.
When you get past the base material phase I think its good to start thinking about adding some character to the texture. What I like to do is sort of think logically about how and why the wear would appear. Say one section gets a lot of use because you use it to adjust the scope, the edges there will be really worn. Add some patches of specific rust to an area where water/moisture would pool. Add some nice big scrapes to show where the item was dropped at some point. The important thing is really adding specific details that tell a story, more so than concentrating on the material qualities of the entire model.
I think I've been too focused on getting the material definition that I want, and as a result it's lost it's personality.
So I had another crack at it over the weekend, and whilst it's still wip, I think it's getting closer. But I'll let you guys be the judge of that, and C&C would be ace!
I can't say for sure but it looks like maybe you have too much information in the albedo channel for the metal that forms the main body of the gun?
Hey thanks Pegbird. The main body has been the hardest to define, and is still quite a way off what im after. It's quite likely I've got too much info in the wrong maps (still not 100% sure what I'm doing). I can post my maps for critique soon.
Overall, though, I think you'd be better served with a simpler background. A nice dark, shiny wood (as though it's resting on a table) with an appropriately colored environment cube might be best - enough to give the impression of an actual scene without distracting the eye from the intended subject.
Atm I'm using the museum skybox/HDRI background image in Toolbag2 just for quickness. Once I've nailed the look I'm going for I'll look at the lighting and backgrounds for my final renders.
Here's some of the final renders:
And the maps incase it's useful to anyone:
Can't quite tell, but I think your normals might be facing the wrong direction. Try flipping the y in marmoset, or setting it to max tangents on the object.
Some things look out of proportion texel density wise. Would you mind applying a checkerboard to it so we can see.
It has def come a long ways since the start. Hopefully you are learning some things along the way for future projects.
stevston89 - I used xnormals for the normal map, and have set that in T2. where are you seeing an issue?
Xazas - Glad it's been useful. I will point out that this is my first PBR object using the reflectance workflow, so there's a good chance the values aren't 100% correct, so use it at your peril
komaokc - If I'm honest I really like how the wood turned out, but I guess that a matter of personal preference. Perhaps it's looking uniform because I've mirrored the stock? As for the background I went for a blurred version of the Image based lighting background in T2. I can see your point though, and I might try a different background at some time.
Pegbird - Thanks
Jesse Moody - Textures are 2048. Everything should be of a similar texel density, although I found I had some spare UV space so I scaled up some of the smaller elements to give them more definition.
Here's the checkerboard though: