888 Detail Tileable Normal Maps by KoromoWorks

Koromo

I´ve spent several months working on this so I will say that this was my quarantine project instead of some 3d work.
For years I´ve seen a lot of people selling and or using 4k or even 8k textures, more related to workflows that involve the final rendering in Vray, Arnold, Octane... 

Maybe I´m the only one who still no uses super high res scanned textures and assets in 2020.

But what about game models that are going to be rendered in real time? Using those high resolution textures for detailing my assets wasn´t ideal for me, so for the final details, I was always looking for detail normals in Google. 

And that´s when all of this began, so I decided to do my own huge library and because I was a masochist(or probably dumb), the number that I wanted to achieve was 888.

Why 888? 8 is my favorite number, but that was a low number to do a texture pack. So, then I wanted to have 88...but there are packs from others that contain hundreds, that´s not going to work...So in the end I finished with that, 888 textures in total(889 if I consider the last Skin texture added).

So the journey ended expending a lot more time than I initially expected, but finally, I released the 888 Detail Tileable Normal Maps 1.0!!



The textures are organized into 7 types: Skin, Cloth, Stone, Wood, Metal, Hair, and Stains. So a mix of organic and inorganic surfaces.

And yes, this is a "low res pack" because all of them are 512x512. For my personal needs and tests, this is enough for close-ups thanks to the tiling.

So the question is... Why This? Normal maps at only 512x512? Are you kidding me?

History

Let´s get back to the old days, specifically, 2006 with the release of Gears of War 1.
I remember when while playing that game and zooming into the ground, pillars, and props... Wow! A lot of micro details from these surfaces. My astonishment when I was a teenager playing this game and later Crysis 1 related to textures is a memory that I still have today.
So yeah, that was my first experience seeing detail normal maps used extensively in unreal engine 3.

What is a Detail Normal Map?
The definition as simple as possible: A tileable normal map focused mostly on tertiary details, micro details.
The difference between a normal map and a detail normal(or tileable normal) is that most of the time the normal map will be the baked one from the high poly, with the position and details that match those of your UV mapping.

When we sculpt with several million polygons and then bake down the maps to a lower resolution, sometimes the details are not what we expected. So, instead of increasing the baking resolution a lot, using a tileable normal map specific for those micro details; in my opinion, it´s a smarter and more optimized way of dealing with this. You can mix them with the original bake normal or use them separately in a game engine, it´s your choice.

Since the pack is very large I have divided it into 30 different packages for any budget and needs.

There is 20% OFF in every pack using this code: 888textures20off

Here is everything:
https://gumroad.com/koromoworks

And here a free sample of 20 Detail Tileable Normal Maps:
https://gumroad.com/l/dcuhg

Right here another freebie, this time a pdf with all 888 renders:
https://gumroad.com/l/OoZFN

Koromo

Recently I´ve used them as gloss, specular, roughtness and metalness maps too in Marmoset Toolbag despite being limited in texture options and absence of nodes. 

The results are not so bad for my taste, here is a demo of how easy is in Marmoset Toolbag 3:




And that´s how I made this promotional GIF:



In this case, the pack consists of 100 Skin Detail Tileable Normal Maps.
It´s in sale 30% Off. If anyone is interested:
https://gumroad.com/l/CzYXz/100skin30off

Koromo

How to avoid excessive repetition and tiling?

Use several maps!
In Substance Painter, I use 3-4 of every type to make surface details instead of using only 1 and see the repetitive tiling all over the model

It´s difficult to record and explain this on a GIF in Substance Painter, but I will try:




WORKFLOW mixing detail normals in Substance Painter:

1. Add Fill Layer, enable Color, Rough, Normal.
2. Plug the tileable normal maps in those slots. In this case, I use 3 different wood grains.
3. Choose a Tiling to affect all of them.
4. Filter - HSL Perceptive - Saturation to 0 in Color and Rough. (This transforms to grayscale the normal map while maintaining the original tiling)
5. Base Color Levels, Roughness Levels. Adjust them to your liking
6. Profit! You will have surface details in form of Normal Maps, Roughness(or Metallic if you want), and Base color/albedo! And all of this under 3 minutes!