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Skin pores and tertiary details in normal map for overlay?

Hi. I've been thinking about this one and wondered if anyone has done any such thing.
Basically I want to bake down the finer details of a body scan to a normal map. Then this normal map can be layered over the normal map I'm creating for my character that only has primary details in it, the big shapes like muscles and larger wrinkles. That way I can use different sets of skin details normal maps for my characters and don't have to project and bake it down every time. Just adding it on top in the shader.

Anyone done that? And what would the process be to get good, crisp quality without it being too weak?

Thanks.

Replies

  • Klunk
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    Klunk ngon master
    what your looking for is called a detail map..... some interesting stuff on blending in the detail map here
    other considerations  are to use a second mapping channel for the detail map (otherwise it could be baked into the base map ;) ) , you can modulate the effect either with an  alpha on the base or vertex color/alpha... though for something like skin pores You only real going to see them in extreme close up! You also have to consider is it even necessary any more when you can throw a 4k texture at it :/ 
    here's their method implemented with a base "sphere" with a detail leather texture with it's tiling being changed from 0.5 to 2 and back....

    pretty old stuff now though some may have more "modern" approaches :) 

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