Very, very much no to this. A specular map defines how reflective a surface is. Its not something you can simply adjust from a diffuse map the majority of the time. A spec map should be worked on in conjunction with the diffuse and gloss maps, spec/gloss are not after thought maps that you can quickly derive from a diffuse…
I'm guessing that you are at a place where you are trying to fill in gaps to your understanding since you said you have seen tutorials but they "tend to be missing certain things". Simply put, most spec maps are made by taking the diffuse map in Photoshop and quickly editing it. Below is one of my own where I simply took…
Thanks EarthQuake, it's been a joy reading more in depth about PBR and the importance of reflection and layering. I'm beginning to wrap my head around this stuff now and I'll have a better idea of what I want rather than slapping on random values and maps too late in the pipeline to accurately represent the object I'm…
This will depend on exactly how your skin shader works and what the sub-dermis map defines exactly. But yeah, again probably not a map you should just wait until the end to make, as previewing your diffuse work without even a basic sub-dermis map will mean you'll end up adding stuff to the diffuse that should probably go…
What he says here half makes sense and half doesn't. "because its dark" - this bit makes no sense. Materials do no become less reflective when less light hits them, this is simply nonsense. If you multiply AO on your spec, this means that if you have a dynamic light pointed directly at that section, it will not reflect at…