It's been awhile since I've played around with it, but I'm pretty sure there is. At least, I know decals can support normal maps, so I feel like it should be possible. I know there's a checkbox in the material parameters that's off by default on masked materials that allows it to be affected by the dominant light.
So if I wanted something like a panel line to encompass the circumference of an object, I would just copy out the ring/loop I want the panel break on, and then map that geo onto my 'decal atlas' ? Like this works with more than just things on a flat plane, right?
@agitori If I remember right, Blend Layer shader feature just mixes another layer in the surface shader based on vertex colors. Suitable for stuff like dirt, or peeling paint on brick walls and so on. It seems to be used in Star Citizen, yea, but it doesn't have anything to do with deferred decals.
I don't think it's possible to support multi-material underlying surface if you go that route. You completely decouple decals from the underlying surface, can update them independently and so on. It can certainly work for small props warranting just one tiled material, though. I'm also not sure how big of a deal overdraw…
@JohnnynapalmscThe first UV channel will be your uniquely layed out UVs on your trim/decal sheet texture. Then you simply add uvw boxmapping on your second UV channel for your tiling texture. This will automatically blend in UE when you set up your shader using 2 channels.
Ah okay I understand now. So in this case the decals has been cut into the mesh right? So they are not floating close to the main surface. This can work though, and it would require a lot less complex material. Also then they not must have to use tileables, they can use own unique textures too.
So if I have an underlying normal map that I want to show through (like in my thing there's a bit of bump in the normal channel) or Albedo or whatever, I basically have to copy that setup (ie everything that comes before the three roughness slots) And plug those into respective channels in the decal material, right?
Hey guys, I have read through the thread and it's good to see that you have made progress with a decal technique which can be used in UE4. From what I've gathered you can now use the DBuffer material on a static mesh which will write only normal/roughness information into the render pass and gives realistic results. The…
@Johnnynapalmsc No problem, mate. Yes, that's the limitation with this method. It can get geo-heavy, especially if you are using edge trims. And obviously there's a bit of messing about with UVs. But you can still use floating geo and have it attached to the 'parent mesh'. That way you are sort of using a hybrid approach…
@chrisevansart Nothing should prevent it from working in Unity, as far as I see. Since deferred decal shaders don't differ much from normal ones beyond the way they write to defered RTs, you can pretty much copy the POM setup from something like the popular Uber shader and it will work.