The roughness texture they used, was the red channel of the original wood texture, but I thought that with roughness, towards black is glossy, and towards white is rough/matte(within UE4). So how come in the texture, the grooves within the wood grain are darker than the surface
Maybe they just inverted that channel in their material.
I looked for it in the material but I couldn't find where the inverted. I would assume it would be somewhere in between the link from the red channel and the final input into the roughness, but I don't see.
I looked for it in the material but I couldn't find where the inverted. I would assume it would be somewhere in between the link from the red channel and the final input into the roughness, but I don't see.
Check the parameters for the material instance (RoughnessWoodHigh & RoughnessWoodLow), because if you enter a low number for the high value, and a high for the low, that essentially inverts it and by lerping together this way you have a bit more control.
Following on from my post earlier I've been playing around more to make sure everything is working as expected and had to make a few alterations to what I was storing in which map channel.
Thought I'd share my final setup for anyone else wanting to do PBR with SubSurface:
Hope it proves useful for someone else
(once again, excuse the crappy test maps)
You should to use fresnel to mask out subsurface and/or opacity channel.
SubSurface works really odd without addtional masking.
You should to use fresnel to mask out subsurface and/or opacity channel.
SubSurface works really odd without addtional masking.
Not sure what you mean by this, can you explain further? The documentation says that when the lighting model is set to subsurface the opacity slot behaves as the subsurface depth mask and it looked nice setup as above, though this is my first time using SSS in any engine so happy to be shown otherwise.
Something like that. You should take a look at Blueprint Office example. There is big tree. Look at it branches material, there is cleaver usage of fresnel.
Not really sure if it will help with skin rendering, but I think it is worth an experiment!
Did anyone else change the grid snapping from its default, to powers of 2? Also, by doing that, the units are still in centimeters right?
It is, but the new standard going forward is decimal. The power-of-two grid is really only there for backwards compatibility. It doesn't change the units the engine is using.
I don't know if you mean that but in the first picture you see the direct specular reflection that is much stronger than the indirect specular in the other pics when the pencil is not directly under the light.
Since the light than bounce off the metal part of the pencil have that intensity it produces a stronger reflection that you see on the table too.
Check the parameters for the material instance (RoughnessWoodHigh & RoughnessWoodLow), because if you enter a low number for the high value, and a high for the low, that essentially inverts it and by lerping together this way you have a bit more control.
You're absolutely right! Messing with those sliders allowed me to have a lot of control over the roughness. I don't quite understand the "wood_high" and "wood_low" terms though. Do they mean, high as in the surface, and low as in the crevices of the wood grain? idk. And what about normal map detail, was their any reason other than preference to not have detail normals, or a normal for the actual wood itself?
You're absolutely right! Messing with those sliders allowed me to have a lot of control over the roughness. I don't quite understand the "wood_high" and "wood_low" terms though. Do they mean, high as in the surface, and low as in the crevices of the wood grain? idk. And what about normal map detail, was their any reason other than preference to not have detail normals, or a normal for the actual wood itself?
With polished wood, or I should say, "finished" wood, the grain doesn't have so much effect on the normals.
Also they really aren't using the black and white values of that textures red channel for anything much but a mask and driving the real values by the scaler parameters mentioned earlier by someone else.
Doing it this way removes a lot of control and issue from the texture and can be tweaked with just a few numbers instead of tweaking the texture over and over.
Also gives the ability to make this wood more polished, smoother, rougher and so on.
Basically just gives the user more control over end result.
Does anyone know why I have to open certain materials before it will display correctly as a thumbnail? I'm currently having to open all my materials before I start working just to get a preview.
Content browser thumbnail when project first opens
Content browser thumbnail after opening and closing the material
Have the same thing happening on my pc. It also updates model preview if you place them in the scene. Not a biggie, but it can get annoying after a while.
Following on from my post earlier I've been playing around more to make sure everything is working as expected and had to make a few alterations to what I was storing in which map channel.
Thought I'd share my final setup for anyone else wanting to do PBR with SubSurface:
Hope it proves useful for someone else
(once again, excuse the crappy test maps)
Nice, its very useful... I hadn't gotten into sss for unreal this is gonna gimme a head start, question, why do we have to use opacity on sss material, usually don't in max.
You're absolutely right! Messing with those sliders allowed me to have a lot of control over the roughness. I don't quite understand the "wood_high" and "wood_low" terms though. Do they mean, high as in the surface, and low as in the crevices of the wood grain? idk. And what about normal map detail, was their any reason other than preference to not have detail normals, or a normal for the actual wood itself?
Well it is simply driven off of the alpha as used for the lerp, so I think high just means the brighter parts of the mask, and low means the darker part.
As for normal map detail, I don't think it is needed in this application, since the examples of wood aren't very worn, the roughness seems to do a good job of simulating the amount/type of finish on the wood.
Oh i see, so the opacity channel on sss takes a subsurface mask. But wat is that exactly? And how can I go about making 1?
Edit
Oh silly me, I think I got it,it's just a mask for where the subsurface scattering is visible and where it isn't right?feeling like I'm in total noob mode today, gonna try and see if I can get some good sss results tonight
Been trying to find resources on setting up world space UVs for materials. Anyone know of some good resources? Even UDK knowledge would be a good start
Been trying to find resources on setting up world space UVs for materials. Anyone know of some good resources? Even UDK knowledge would be a good start
Also seems that UE4 has a few material functions for UV world space as well.
Here's something I just put together for my environment. Middle two nodes project UV's based on the world position of each pixel, separated out by X and Y. I then lerp between them based on the normal direction of each vertex. I'm also adding masking out the +Z/-Z directions for my own purposes, but you could switch it around to project the Z axis texture instead. This isn't pefect, but it works well enough for projecting streaks of dirt/grime across my modular mountains with no seams
Is there an option like in CryEngine that allows me to set views in the editor. So say, whenever I'm done with a certain part of my scene, I can press 1 for example, and it'll pop the view back to where I set view "1" to be at?
Here's something I just put together for my environment. Middle two nodes project UV's based on the world position of each pixel, separated out by X and Y. I then lerp between them based on the normal direction of each vertex. I'm also adding masking out the +Z/-Z directions for my own purposes, but you could switch it around to project the Z axis texture instead. This isn't pefect, but it works well enough for projecting streaks of dirt/grime across my modular mountains with no seams
Oh nice. At the end where are you adding this all into?
So it looks like Lense Flare Editor is gone in UE4. Does anyone know if it's still possible to create lens flares like this in UE4? Per-pixel lens flare is nice and all, but it's very limiting I think (I find it's very useful for lens dirt effect not for anamorphic flares). I still would like to have more control over my flares and place them where I want it to be.
Hey BlvdNights, after digging through some of the Effects Cave content I noticed there's already a built-in material function for World Aligned Textures. Doh!
So it looks like Lense Flare Editor is gone in UE4. Does anyone know if it's still possible to create lens flares like this in UE4? Per-pixel lens flare is nice and all, but it's very limiting I think (I find it's very useful for lens dirt effect not for anamorphic flares). I still would like to have more control over my flares and place them where I want it to be.
During a live stream I think they mentioned that. If i remember correctly, they have plans to bring the lens-flare tool back. Leaving the possibility to chose between custom flare of dynamic ones.
During a live stream I think they mentioned that. If i remember correctly, they have plans to bring the lens-flare tool back. Leaving the possibility to chose between custom flare of dynamic ones.
Oh cool. That's a good news. I need to watch the stream now. Looks like I'm missing lots of interesting info. Thanks
Hey BlvdNights, after digging through some of the Effects Cave content I noticed there's already a built-in material function for World Aligned Textures. Doh!
Still trying to wrap my head around with these material functions and how to use them. Need to sit down and actually play around with them. Basically just "prefabs" of material nodes yes?
Yeah, there were material functions in UDK as well but it seems they're much more extensively used in UE4.
Going through the Effects Cave they're used all over the place. I don't know if there's a performance reason or if it's mostly to keep the nodes clean and reusable.
Material functions let you set up a sequence of nodes and treat it like an asset to reuse in other materials. In UE4 you can basically set up entire shaders as material functions and mask them as layers in another material.
Right, it's not about performance it's convenience, maintenance and sharing across team members and projects. Shaders are flattened before they are actually compiled - like C++ #include statements.
Functions also exist as their own .uassets - and when updated or changed, will propagate to all materials that use them. Both handy and dangerous, you could fix a problem or add a feature in one fell swoop, but you can also break everything that uses them if you're not careful
Functions aren't just material layers either, you can create a function out of a commonly used series of nodes to your benefit, or do complex math to values, etc. There are a lot of functions that ship with UE4, you can drag & drop them into your materials as you wish! Also, if you "Show Engine Content" in the Content Browser, you can view them and see how they have been built.
Hey guys, just wanted to let you know that the Substance plugin for UE4 that lets you tweak your substances at runtime in the Unreal Editor or directly in-game is available for free for all UE4 subscribers.
Replies
Maybe they just inverted that channel in their material.
Check the parameters for the material instance (RoughnessWoodHigh & RoughnessWoodLow), because if you enter a low number for the high value, and a high for the low, that essentially inverts it and by lerping together this way you have a bit more control.
SubSurface works really odd without addtional masking.
Not sure what you mean by this, can you explain further? The documentation says that when the lighting model is set to subsurface the opacity slot behaves as the subsurface depth mask and it looked nice setup as above, though this is my first time using SSS in any engine so happy to be shown otherwise.
Something like that. You should take a look at Blueprint Office example. There is big tree. Look at it branches material, there is cleaver usage of fresnel.
Not really sure if it will help with skin rendering, but I think it is worth an experiment!
I don't know if you mean that but in the first picture you see the direct specular reflection that is much stronger than the indirect specular in the other pics when the pencil is not directly under the light.
Since the light than bounce off the metal part of the pencil have that intensity it produces a stronger reflection that you see on the table too.
You're absolutely right! Messing with those sliders allowed me to have a lot of control over the roughness. I don't quite understand the "wood_high" and "wood_low" terms though. Do they mean, high as in the surface, and low as in the crevices of the wood grain? idk. And what about normal map detail, was their any reason other than preference to not have detail normals, or a normal for the actual wood itself?
With polished wood, or I should say, "finished" wood, the grain doesn't have so much effect on the normals.
Doing it this way removes a lot of control and issue from the texture and can be tweaked with just a few numbers instead of tweaking the texture over and over.
Also gives the ability to make this wood more polished, smoother, rougher and so on.
Basically just gives the user more control over end result.
Content browser thumbnail when project first opens
Content browser thumbnail after opening and closing the material
http://www.twitch.tv/unrealengine
Nice, its very useful... I hadn't gotten into sss for unreal this is gonna gimme a head start, question, why do we have to use opacity on sss material, usually don't in max.
Well it is simply driven off of the alpha as used for the lerp, so I think high just means the brighter parts of the mask, and low means the darker part.
As for normal map detail, I don't think it is needed in this application, since the examples of wood aren't very worn, the roughness seems to do a good job of simulating the amount/type of finish on the wood.
Edit
Oh silly me, I think I got it,it's just a mask for where the subsurface scattering is visible and where it isn't right?feeling like I'm in total noob mode today, gonna try and see if I can get some good sss results tonight
[ame="
I think you are looking for MacroUV's
Also seems that UE4 has a few material functions for UV world space as well.
oh sorry, was so into particles, Macrouv's is for particles only. I think that tutorial should help you out anyhow.
Here's something I just put together for my environment. Middle two nodes project UV's based on the world position of each pixel, separated out by X and Y. I then lerp between them based on the normal direction of each vertex. I'm also adding masking out the +Z/-Z directions for my own purposes, but you could switch it around to project the Z axis texture instead. This isn't pefect, but it works well enough for projecting streaks of dirt/grime across my modular mountains with no seams
Oh nice. At the end where are you adding this all into?
I'm just using it as a mask to blend in to my base color and roughness. It works well for grunge, maybe water streaks or water running down the sides.
Effects Cave Showcase
https://www.unrealengine.com/blog/new-release-effects-cave-showcase
https://docs.unrealengine.com/latest/INT/Resources/Showcases/Effects/index.html
[SystemSettings]
r.TextureStreaming=0
into your project's DefaultEngine.ini, that should do it.
Thanks, I'll try that.
During a live stream I think they mentioned that. If i remember correctly, they have plans to bring the lens-flare tool back. Leaving the possibility to chose between custom flare of dynamic ones.
Oh cool. That's a good news. I need to watch the stream now. Looks like I'm missing lots of interesting info. Thanks
Does this work yet? Or does anyone know the ETA.
https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2014/03/12/mozilla-and-epic-preview-unreal-engine-4-running-in-firefox/
Still trying to wrap my head around with these material functions and how to use them. Need to sit down and actually play around with them. Basically just "prefabs" of material nodes yes?
Going through the Effects Cave they're used all over the place. I don't know if there's a performance reason or if it's mostly to keep the nodes clean and reusable.
Material functions let you set up a sequence of nodes and treat it like an asset to reuse in other materials. In UE4 you can basically set up entire shaders as material functions and mask them as layers in another material.
Functions aren't just material layers either, you can create a function out of a commonly used series of nodes to your benefit, or do complex math to values, etc. There are a lot of functions that ship with UE4, you can drag & drop them into your materials as you wish! Also, if you "Show Engine Content" in the Content Browser, you can view them and see how they have been built.
In stock we got preintegrated skin shader , or sssss
neither of those have really "expected" behaviors, it's quite strange. I'll try to document as i go.
More details and download on this page
getting a 404 on the github link from your site though