[WIP] Fish restaurant tiles, my first material in substance designer

Baya

Hello,

This is my very first attempt at creating my own material from scratch and my very first post on polycount. I wanted to try to create a lot of different shapes so that I would become more familiar with all the nodes in SD. This is a work in progress and I'm looking for feedback before I start adding dirt and procedural damage. The idea is to create a small fish restaurant scene with this material included.

My dream is to become a material artist in the games industry so any tips on getting there are more than welcome

My rendering skills are currently zero to none so apologies for these renders

Ashervisalis

Looks cool! I'd increase the normal intensity a bit.

9Solid

Hi Baya! I agree with Ashervisalis that the normal intensity needs to be kicked up. Another thing that stands out to me is that the tiles themselves seem very uniform in placement. They're perfectly aligned as well as the same height. This screams cg. You want the tiles to have a veeeery slight random rotation, since they were placed by hand. Also, it's a good idea generally to multiply a gradient map on top of the tiles themselves and randomize the rotation with that in order to give the tiles slightly varying heights. The tiles are also too sharp, and could benefit from being a little more rounded out. 

This guy has a good example of tiles

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2mcQmYQOqbk

On top of that the plaster itself looks too uniform. It's hard to decipher what the material is supposed to be. It needs roughness variation. because in the renders right now it looks like a white block. It's a good start, keep at it, and use references!

Carabiner

+1 to @Ashervisalis and @9Solid 's comment! Just wanted to duck in and say that this is a really cool idea, I haven't seen many people do this sort of painted restaurant tile before. It's instantly recognizable, like I can completely picture the type of restaurant it'd be in. Cool idea!

Baya

Thank you all for your feedback and the video! I did have the height difference but it's definitely not strong enough. I'll tweek it and add the rest of your feedback