Splodgy Wood Normal Maps

BLOODCURVE

I don't seem to be able to recreate a good normal mapped wood texture, metals and such I seem to be fine with, but every time I try wood, the surface just keeps ending up looking like porridge, any tips and advice on getting a good looking 'realistic' wood texture ( diffuse, spec, normal ), visual examples with a little descriptive text would be very much appreciated.

Thanks.

ZacD

it really depends on the type of wood, smooth wood floors or rough old 2 by 4's, or like tree bark? just post some pictures of the look your trying to get.

fearian

and the results your getting now!

also, are you sculpting or using normal map filters/crazybump. Wood is something I can definitely see myself using crazybump for.

BLOODCURVE

I'm trying to create a similar look to these : -









I've used Nvidia's photoshop plugin and pixplant, pixplant creates a much nicer normal map than the Nvidia version, but I create these based on a greyscaled ( and tweaked ) version of my diffuse, and I just seem to end up with too much detail ( porridgey look ) - where the pixels have been pushed too far, cutting back, I lose the detail. Can't seem to find a happy medium. Would still love to see others peoples versions ( and any other surface types would be great, rubber, etc ).

Here's a quick test I made with a handpainted texture




Ideally, I'd love to pull off a surface similar to this : -



Thanks

BLOODCURVE

It seems like I should be using a seperate specular that is not connected with the underlying diffuse texture ( so that the diffuse takes care of the colour per se, and the specular map, created with different surface detail, takes care of the varnish type specular needed ).

Hmm... maybe I'll try that... and create a light overlay of the diffuse, so that it has 'some' specular correlation.... ?

bbob

Remember that most wood like that has been sanded and varnished, so all of the real minor ridges in the fibers are washed out in the reflection. Also notice how the darker rings of the ore has sucked more of the varnish, leaving it slightly more diffuse there?

So a lot of the real detail lies in the specular map, whereas the normal should only really be blothchy the way paint is, and go into the major cracks..

You don't really need two speculars for wood, not even for architechtural viz..

BLOODCURVE

Ah, so you would put the detail into the specular only, yup, that sounds like good advice, off to do some testing...

BLOODCURVE

Excellent, I can already start to see the look I'm wanting, after some quick tests, obviously I need to practice a bit more, and set my maps up correctly on the actual model I'm working on !

Thanks again.

bbob

No problem ^_^

Minos

I think the problem is that the texture you are generating your normal map from has too much high-frequency detail. The ideal is to have separate normal maps for small and large details, just like crazybump works, and then combine them as you see fit.

Another good idea is to have some gradients between the indented areas, to create more depth variation (as in the example you posted). To do that you will need to adjust your height map manually before converting it to normal map. You can achieve great results using smart blur, surface blur, gradients, inner shadow etc... I made a quick tutorial, hope it helps:

EarthQuake

Minotouar, you mean High freq, not low!

Minos

EarthQuake wrote: »

Minotouar, you mean High freq, not low!

woops, fixed

r_fletch_r

Nice guide!

SHEPEIRO

smart and surface blur are brilliant for creating heightmaps and brushes for zbrush for alot of things when theres too much high frequency in the Photosource... i especially like it for conrete cracks and the like

teaandcigarettes

Damn, I've never even thought of using surface blur for that. Thanks for the tips minotaur