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Paint my wood!

Ott
polycounter lvl 13
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Ott polycounter lvl 13
Ok, this question is in regards to a little more advanced texture painting techniques. Let's say you have some random pieces of wood, such as this:

randomwoodbw4.jpg

And your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to go back over this wood and make it look like it has a worn painted look to it.

Now, we are all familiar with the old "use old painted wood in the first place, jackass" technique, as well as using a basic color overlay in PS and then using some grungy brushes to scratch some of the color off, but that doesn't always do the trick.

Every time I do a base colors/layer styles/grungy brushes in PS I wind up with something that looks like I used a grungy brush in PS, and NOT like it was originally painted.

What sort of tricks do you guys do to paint your wood to give it that authentic paint look? I'm working on a ship that has a lot of worn down colors, but I want it to look like it was originally painted a specific way, but not so cheesy that it looks like I bucket painted the thing.

Any ideas on how you guys handle this sort of thing would be appreciated!

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  • poopinmymouth
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    poopinmymouth polycounter lvl 19
    Find a photo that looks exactly how you want, and then visually dissect it to figure out what you need to do to match the look.

    That's how I always approach this type of thing.

    poop.gif
  • Ott
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    Ott polycounter lvl 13
    Good advice Ben, but my question was more specific to the nature of photoshop and the actual software tricks used to do it. If the wood is already in place, what steps would you take to overlay paint on top of it so that it looks like it has been painted?
  • poopinmymouth
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    poopinmymouth polycounter lvl 19
    I'd take some images of painted surface and put them over the wood layer, probably 2 or more layers of different colored paint to really make it look worn and painted multiple times. First I'd marquee select each boards worth of wood and flip it so that the paint pattern doesn't continue from one board to the next. Then I'd shade the paint with a soft light or overlay layer to make it feel like it wraps around the wooden boards, then I'd paint in the masks of the paint layers using one of my paint chip brushes to hide the paint in chipped patterns. I'd also use a slight drop shadow on each paint layer to make it appear thick. I might add a slight bevel/emboss too in the lighting direction to make it feel even thicker. When I'm mostly done, I'd collapse it all and paint some opaque paint over top to reinforce all the procedural lighting and do any contrast adjustments.

    poop.gif
  • Sage
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    Sage polycounter lvl 19
    Have you tried using a combination of overlay, multiply, soft light and play with the opacity settings plus layer masks? Usually a combination of those makes it look more realistic and you may need to add an adjustment layer with a mask that lowers the saturation in case the overlay mode makes it look too cartoony.

    Can you show a sample of the results you usually get?

    Alex
  • Ott
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    Ott polycounter lvl 13
    hmm, I hadn't thought about using multiple layers of different colors. And the drop shadows is another good one. I've used the emboss before but didn't think about drop shadows.

    At any rate, i'll take those ideas to mind. Thanks for the tips!
  • Rick Stirling
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    Rick Stirling polycounter lvl 18
    It's often because simply erasing the paint leave holes that don't look 3d. You can try something as simple as stroking a selection created from the holes, making a white version and and a black version of this stroked layer, then earasing parts of those to fake paint depth.

    You could also overlay flaking paint textures.
  • Ott
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    Ott polycounter lvl 13
    Yeah, the carnival booth on my site was the last time I did wood painting. My ship is going to need some painting work on it to closer match a ship of the era and I'm just figuring out how I want to approach the next few color passes.

    Layer masks are another area of PS I don't know much about. Looks I got more research to do ;P

    Here's where my ship is at now, in case you are curious.

    colorpass1vh2.jpg

    I've got a few more weeks to go till I graduate, and I wouldn't mind having it done by then, but I'm not stressing. It will be done soon enough :P
  • Ott
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    Ott polycounter lvl 13
    That makes sense, about the holes. I think the biggest problem with most of my painting comes from this depth issue. Anytime I do overlays, normal maps, lighting...it all adds to the depth of the surface.

    Without it its really shitting my fakey paint look. Once I get some more color passes done on this guy and start doing the color details on the sides ill post it up and see what you guys think. Thanks for all the suggestions so far!
  • mvelasquez
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    Have you checked out this method?
    http://www.cgtextures.com/tutorials/blendif/tut_blendif.html
    Ive always completely over looked that part of the layer blending options..
  • Mark Dygert
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    I haven't read thru the thread yet so forgive me if this was mentioned already. I think your method is fine, you are just forgetting about brush strokes that often come through on old painted surfaces. In todays world of sprayers and rollers painted surfaces are much smoother so you might have trouble finding adequate ref.

    - Don't forget old objects often get coated with paint a few times. So layering paint and creating little areas where the lower levels of paint where chipped and painted over with the higher levels of paint.

    Suggestions to include brush strokes if you need em:
    - Set your color layer to a SLIGHT bevel/emboss, pick the erase tool and set it to use a hair brush, turn the opacity way down 10%-ish, and paint in some brush strokes.

    - On a new blank layer, paint a few shadowy strokes in a darker color using the hair brush. Duplicate that layer invert it, and nudge it up and over 2px.

    Most of what I suggested was just shadow work and can be painted into a normal map, or turned into a pattern and applied to just about any surface you need it.
  • Ryno
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    Ryno polycounter lvl 18
    Did a very quick example of how I often handle it. The psd is layered, with a description of what each one does. This took about 5 minutes, and it would certainly look better with a little more love.

    RynoWood.jpg

    PSD Here
  • Rick Stirling
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    Rick Stirling polycounter lvl 18
    [ QUOTE ]
    Have you checked out this method?
    http://www.cgtextures.com/tutorials/blendif/tut_blendif.html
    Ive always completely over looked that part of the layer blending options..

    [/ QUOTE ]


    Stonking tutorial.
  • Rhinokey
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    Rhinokey polycounter lvl 18
    Here’s a method I use for this kind of thing. Be aware this was just a 2 minute example done on my lunch break today; normally I would put a bit more time in it.
    Make an overlay layer above your wood base and pick a color then with you paint brush set to all layers and about an 80 tolerance click somewhere on the image this will flood fill you a layer using the tolerance of the wood to break up the pattern. Then I make a new layer lower the tolerance and paint again, (usually hide the previously painted so it won't use that for the tolerance) usually I set this one to normal and just lower the opacity a bit,

    Then I repeat the last step with a third layer. Sometimes I pick slightly different shades to fade the paint out.

    Sometimes the paint bucket will need a small blur because the edges seem pixeled.

    Extra stuff: sometimes I add a layer effects to do a 1 pixel drop shadow or a small inner glow to make the chips stand out,

    Also sometimes I add a layer mask and use the paint bucket to fill in some grey splotches to make the paint more faded.

    Its just personal preference and how you like it


    paintwood.jpg
  • MoP
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    MoP polycounter lvl 18
    Nice stuff guys, cool tips all round smile.gif
  • Panupat
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    Panupat polycounter lvl 15
    [ QUOTE ]
    Have you checked out this method?
    http://www.cgtextures.com/tutorials/blendif/tut_blendif.html
    Ive always completely over looked that part of the layer blending options..

    [/ QUOTE ] Never noticed that technique.. thanks for the link. ooo.gif
  • Joao Sapiro
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    Joao Sapiro sublime tool
    wow thank you !
  • Tumerboy
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    Tumerboy polycounter lvl 17
    rhinokey that's a great method. Thanks for sharing.
  • snap.crackle.pop
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    snap.crackle.pop polycounter lvl 18
    Please, don't let Johny know how to blend textures. Remove this link or your going to regret it crazy.gif
  • Jesse Moody
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    Jesse Moody polycounter lvl 17
    Yeah Rhino I have used that method many a times for painted concrete, wood, metal, etc. It was showed off by Stefan Morrel (sp?) in one of his tutorials over at cgtalk.
  • Rhinokey
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    Rhinokey polycounter lvl 18
    i may try combining Rynos method with mine sometime today,i like the thick paint look he has with still seeing the wood grain
  • Tumerboy
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    Tumerboy polycounter lvl 17
    agreed, the thick paint method could also come in handy
  • Mark Dygert
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    I guy I work with had another suggestion for painting brush strokes into painted wood, I haven't tried it out, but here is what he suggests.

    Thicken some paint by either leaving it out or use a thickening agent (yes real paint). Used a thick haired brush (not a hair brush). After it is plenty thick paint a stroke on a piece of paper, let it dry. Scan it in, make a few different tiles out of it and use it as an overlay.

    So many good methods in this thread =) Thanks a bunch guys!
  • Ryno
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    Ryno polycounter lvl 18
    Yeah Rhinokey, I think a melding of our two approaches would be ideal. I usually do use a bit of the approach that you are using, but was really lazy with this example.

    I find that making a copy of the original wood, doing an emboss filter on it, and setting it to overlay mode on the top of the stack helps with keeping the definition in the wood, and gives that paint seeping into the cracks look a bit.
  • EarthQuake
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    It would probablly be much better to do what ryno is doing with his emboss layer, just using a bump map. Thats basicly what he's doing anyway, pre-lighting bump detail.
  • Panupat
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    Panupat polycounter lvl 15
    That's an awesome paint over Rhinokey... following your technique I can't even make mine half that good frown.gif
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