The Bi-Weekly Substance Challenge (Challenge 3 & 4)
interpolator
Hello everyone, welcome to the Bi-Weekly Substance Challenge.
Like the previous challenge that was ran by Tejay, this is going to be running everyone 2 weeks to give people a little longer to work on the materials.
How it works
- Every 2 weeks a new reference will be shared to be recreated, you are also encouraged to find your own reference, as long as it still fits the topic for that bi-weekly substance, for example if we share a mud reference, you can gather you own mud reference.
- You can be creative with the reference and make it look either realistic, stylized or hand-painted, it is up to you.
Guidelines
- Try and give constructive criticism, giving and receiving this should help each of us artist grow.
- This is a Substance Challenge, so stick with that software.
- You can post Wip's and finished materials here.
- Don't share work you've done in the pass, if you done a material before, try it again don't try pass old work off as something you did for this.
- Final material renders to be rendered in a real-time engine (Marmoset, UE4, Unity, Cryengine, Stingray, IRay is also accepted).
- This is a learning experience for all, don't be afraid to ask questions.
- Learn all that you can and do share what you also learn.
- Please be respectful to each and everyone.
Discord
We have a channel in the Allegorithmic Discord group where you can share WIP's and final images as well as discuss the challenge, Click here to go to it.
If you have any other questions in relations to any of the Allegorithmic's software, use the appropriate channels for those questions.
Resources
- Allegorithmic Youtube Playlists
- Substance Academy
- Rogelio Olguin Substance Designer Gnomon Tutorial
- Joshua Lynch Substance Designer Tutorials
Previous Challenges
Challenge 3 - Rock on! (Rock) || Time Limit 2nd Mar - 16th Mar.
Click the pictures for bigger resolutions.
Challenge 4 - Sewer Drain || Time Limit 17th Mar - 31st Mar.
Click pictures for bigger resolutions.
Replies
EDIT: Tonight's wip, gave the Cartesian-to-polar node a go!
First pass on blocking in height and some color, a bit more refining and then on to the details
One thing that you guys might find useful is this node I made: https://share.allegorithmic.com/libraries/2408
It allows you to do all sorts of custom coordinates and it doesn't create the seams the polar coordinate node sometimes does.
He is my participation to this challenge! Hope you like it
@ibanwar good start! I think that the text would look better on a flat background, rather than on top of a pattern. Also that inner square pattern is non-symmetrical, I would fill that gap with something or continue the pattern all the way around. Hope that helps!
Here's an update on my progress. Using Marmoset for the first time to render, so I'm happy for any feedback.
@Hirudo89 That looking really good. Glad to see you got some bevel on the edges so the stretching when the height is up isn't too obvious.
@Adelphia Very interesting dude, Did you do that middle pattern in SD because if you did call me impressed. If not do remember this challenge is to be full on Substance, not imported bitmaps.
@Merlynn : Looks nice! The intense edge-damage makes the lid look a bit stylized - I don't know if it's intentional. If it's not, lowering the intensity would solve that pretty good, I think.
@ansh0488 : Looking good, though I feel like you have a lot of flat surfaces - some scratches or a bit of damage would be nice!
@Adelphia : Everything is substance? Even the bird-thing???
@Hirudo89 : Looking really nice! Maybe the height-map is a bit intense though? I feel like it can rip tires and shoes. I also feel like more dirt would have been collected in those crevasses.
@Bruno Afonseca : Really sweet rocks!
here it is, think i did a good job cleaning it up, it was a riot. this is the pattern before it gets slop blurred etc. if anyone wants me to zoom in on any part just let me know
Hey guys, first post to the challenge. I've been following along using this as a fun way to learn substance. It's been great seeing everyone's work and the community around here.
Any criticism would be great!
@15wgray Good stuff, maybe you could try adding a bit more of a height effect as it's looking a little flat right now?
@Adelphia Jesus, that pattern. Well done.
@Hirudo89 Great work! I love the amount of depth there is to it.
@Grindy Looking like a good start, keep it up.
@Bruno Afonseca Awesome rocks!
@lukors Cool stuff, maybe you could make the little squares a bit sharper? Maybe it's just me but they look a little bit like blocks of chocolate rather than metal.
@Merlynn Nice, I like the sharp little cuts and dents you've got everywhere. In your second pic the lighting makes the central section look a bit like tiles though.
@Daniel_Swing Looking good so far, pretty realistic! Maybe a bit on the light colored side?
@ibanwar Cool, I would say to go and take a look at some reference pics and choose a pattern, try to recreate that. I'd also try and add more depth and color contrast, and make the text a bit smaller and less stretched out.
@Sean VanGorder Impressive, nice material definition, depth and lighting.
@alexholmesl93 Good progress! The dirt looks a bit too strong for me but other than that really cool.
Here's an update on mine, nearly there
Spent a lot of time on the drain itself to clean up the graph because it became really messy. Added stuff like dirt buildup and rust. Not completely happy yet with the colors and roughness on some of the dirt in the hexes though. Going to work on that next before adding more stuff.
I know how to improve my albedo and add variation in the roughness/metallics but I'm tempted to go and try and clean my graph, doing this might result in a late submission though.
Sorry for the rant, thought it would be interesting for newbies to see that even people who have been using this software for several months can mess up their substances.
My graph
I have found myself over the course of these challenges spending the first few days or even first week experimenting and doodling as I find out where I want to go with the substance, and then rebuild the thing from scratch in a different, more logical order. Basically ripping my experimental work apart and piecing it back together in a way that makes sense.
Every time I've done it, it was definitely for the best as I ended up with a few less nodes to manage, much easier to read connections, and ultimately a better overall quality.
@ansh0488 looks very nice
@15wgray I think you could add more roughness variation and it might help to make the white marks fully metallic, if it is supposed to be bare metal?
@capone my graph is super messy too
Here's my go at the challenge. It was a nice experience playing with the text node for the first time.
@Freezy Demon Also quite cool! I like your use of text and an elaborate pattern. I do feel there is a bit too much contrast between the stone and metal colors, but maybe that was also in your reference or you were going for that?
And here's mine, calling it done because I reached a place where I'm happy with it and I don't have too much time in the next few days before deadline. I may have also gone a bit off topic by doing the concrete but it was just too darn fun.
Have a look on Artstation for more: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/V0wlZ
Having so much fun with these Sewer covers, thought I would have another go with this new reference image I came across. Probably won't finish this by the end of the challenge though.
Can I ask a question? If you look under the lettering at the bottom there is some weird noise banding going on. I've tried blurring potential culprit nodes and can't kill it. I recall a past tutorial where they mention this but I can't for the life of me remember where it was but it had something to do with adjusting the mip mapping setting on 2D Transforms? I tried some different settings but nothing fixed it. Anyone have any suggestions on how to clean this artifacts up? Here is another focused example of it;
Sorry for lack of feedback, was hoping to also join this but I've been busy with some freelance stuff. The next challenge will be up this weekend. (Most likely Saturday morning GMT).
here is my contribution. I just wanted to reproduce the "pattern" so I don't think I will push this further.
Only normal/heigth map.
Here is my take in the sewer, learned a lot. Cant wait for the next one.
GOOD JAB ALL! Eager to start on the next challenge.
A lot of really good work on this challenge, Sewer was really inspiring !