Home Technical Talk

A few questions about gloss maps, blend layer and the detail map

Where do I load the gloss map? Do I put it in the alpha channel of the normal map and save the cry tiff as NormalWithGlossInAlpha_highQ? Is there any difference if I put it in the alpha channel of the spec?

What about the gloss map for the blendlayer? There's no second gloss slot for that either, so just put it in the alpha of the normal map?

Do I only load the diffuse for my detail map? No spec, gloss or normal? Thank you.

Replies

  • JohnnyH
    Offline / Send Message
    JohnnyH interpolator
    Hey Man,

    1. As for as I know it doesn't make much difference, it makes some sense to place the gloss map in the alpha channel of the normal map because they both deal with the same sort of information (they both describe the micro surface of the object. For memory reasons its nice to put it along with either the diffuse or gloss to save the texture call. Maybe if for some reason you absolutely needed some other map in the Diffuse alpha slot, you would be forced to put it in with the normal alpha slot - Personally I always place it in the specular maps alpha.

    Remember that a 4-channel texture (RGB+A) can in some cases actually be more expensive than 2 3-channel textures :)

    You actually don't have a second gloss map, but you do have a specular mask, which you can put in the second diffuse map's alpha channel

    Hope this helps :)
  • Zezeri
    As of CRYENGINE 3.6 and the PBR system that comes with it, you have to put your Gloss Map in the Alpha of the Normal and then sav eit as the crytiff preset you've mentioned.

    That also answers your second question.

    The detail mapping in CRYENGINE utilises 2 channels of the texture for normals (x,y), 1 channel for diffuse and 1 for gloss.
Sign In or Register to comment.