I need help making my spec maps more believable. When I connect a spec map to my meshes, they are all very shiny even though I didn't blow out the whites in the original maps. Everything looks like metal. Do I need to work with the spec power node as well? I went ahead and used a multiply and constant3vector expression per my teacher to gray out the spec which toned the shininess down, but the objects just don't read well. Any tips on spec mapping and the nodes needed to achieve good results would be very welcome to this UDK noob.
Thanks in advance
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Spec Power can greatly improve the look of your materials. Even putting a constant value into SpecPower can make a big difference. Low values around 5-8 for rough surfaces like wood or concrete, higher values for smoother surfaces like glass or metal.
Putting your specular map through a power node effectively increases contrast, which can help pull out details as well.
Spec Power is what defines a material at the end of the day, so make sure you create a proper mask for it (which need to be straight up B&W values without any real details in them).
It's possible to go very in-depth with shaders but the absolute most basic setup I ever use is to put a bitmap combined with a multiply node and a constant value. It gives you more control and you can do more with it.
I usually set my diffuse power to anywhere between 1.25 and 1.5 and then plug that in to specular and as mentioned earlier, higher values create a tighter specular highlight. I've never been able to get a spec mask and math to work to my favor either so I always just use a value of about 25-35 for wood and stone, and lower values for glossy leaves, glass and bare metals. Sixteen is about the default value if no value is plugged in to specular power iirc.
If you don't mind a jab at your normal map, it looks like your polygon generated "corrective" normal map is overpowering your texture detail. Did you try removing the blue channel from your wood normal layer in layer properties? Also try using a smaller sample/filter size for fine details I usually go with 3x3 for detail normals and 5x5 or higher for the broad features.
2. grab a constant and connect it to specular power, just like jordanW said, you need to lower it from the default. i recommend a value of 10.
3. your AO bake are pure black, with no tint of colour. rarely is shadows ever truely black. unless this box is going to be in a dark basement with only one light source it most likely will have a tint in the shadows. if you still have the photoshop file, give your AO layer a blue tint.
4. You have smoothing groups on your model, it's making it look extra weird. remember that if faces on your model doesn't have an assigned smoothing group that UDK automatically puts them in smoothing group 0.
non conductive surfaces like wood shouldnt have a coloured spec. colouring the spec will make it look metalic. Jordan nailed it, low spec, masked with fresnel.