Jump to content
3DCoat Forums

Smart materials in PBR permenant?


dreamparacite
 Share

Go to solution Solved by ajz3d,

Recommended Posts

  • Member

Hello 3D Coat!

 

I've recently dove into PBR in general and I decided to go with 3D coat since I already own it and can directly upload to sketchfab. I've viewed some tutorials and I've decided to make my own smart materials to learn the workflow instead of using default ones. I've made some progress but one question I have is that there is the smart material preview window and while it is handy I like to use the paint bucket to fill an object so that it has whatever smart material I'm working on even outside the preview and I don't have to wait for it to render. However, it would appear that once you fill with the paint bucket it keeps the parameters of the smart material at the time and that even if you adjust them later it won't reflect the new ones. That's fine, as I suppose you just fill the area each time you want to update the material (and then use the preview window to view the material as you work on it). However, one thing I noticed is that normal maps seem to be "permanent".

 

Here's an example of what I mean, I'm working on a rusty metal texture, and there is an edge scattering texture and a normal map to give a scattering of rusty and some bump so that the rust isn't flat.

 

L2wxqY5.png

 

So there is the metal latch with the original texture, however if I paste a different smart material...

 

K0yKMVJ.png

 

The new material is applied but the rusty normal map remains! This is unlike any texturing program I've encountered as the texture seems to affect the object permanently, which definitely makes me hesitant to experiment and try new textures. Is this normal or is there a way to prevent this? I've seen the "fill with freeze" option in the paint bucket tool which has been suggested but I'm not sure what that does and all it seems to do is fill the area with a checkerboard texture. Ideally I'd like to be able to be able to work on smart materials within the preview window and fill each area when I'm happy with the results. Thank you for your time and please let me know if you know of a solution.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Contributor
  • Solution

They stack on each other.

Take advantage of paint layers. You can then easily ditch or hide them if you don't like the result. Also, use clip masks because with them you can mask one layer with another.

 

For example, if I were to texture the default robot with rusty metal that is covered in red paint, I'd create two paint layers: Metal and Paint. Fill the first one with e.g. metal_forged, and selected parts of the second one with paint_2. Then from Metal layer's blending menu, I'd choose Paint as Clip Mask Layer and enable Invert Clip Mask. This will make the red paint mask the rusted metal material that lies underneath.

Note: if you change any of the smart materials, you need to reapply it to the paint layer. I always clear the layer first, or use Refill Material from layer's RMB menu.

Edited by ajz3d
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Member

Thanks for the reply! That makes a lot of sense. I've been using layers for different parts on my object but didn't know that pasted materials stacked on the same layer. And since smart materials have layers of their own I guess the layers upon layers was a little confusing, still very new to this. Thank you for the quick and helpful reply, I'll try your tips!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Contributor

One more thing I'd like to add.

You might have noticed that you can only choose one layer as a mask of a given layer. So what to do if there are more layers that you want to mask the metal layer with? Well, you can do at least two things:

1. Create a "special" paint layer that will act as a mask for a given paint layer (in our case it will be a mask of the metal layer) and name it Metal Mask (for our example). Now, pick any colour and disable all channels but colour. Start RMB clicking all of the layers that you want to act as a mask for the Metal layer, and for each one of them select Freeze Painted Pixels. Then fill the Metal Mask layer with colour. Now, select the Metal layer and change the clip mask to Metal Mask layer (toggle Invert Clip Mask if necessary). Et voila.
2. Freeze painted pixels of layers you want to mask the Metal layer with, select the Metal layer, invert the freeze and erase everything that is unfrozen on the Metal layer (Freeze->Erase Unfrozen).

 

Of course now, if you'd want to reapply any of the overlying materials (after modifying them in the editor), you'd have to manually update the Metal Mask as well. Unless their painted pixels area would not change.

 

I call 3D-Coat's paint module a "Photoshop in 3D", so you shouldn't expect that once applied materials will update on the model if you change them in the editor. Once applied, you need to update them manually one way or another.

Edited by ajz3d
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 year later...
  • Member
On 8/4/2015 at 2:39 PM, ajz3d said:

One more thing I'd like to add.

You might have noticed that you can only choose one layer as a mask of a given layer. So what to do if there are more layers that you want to mask the metal layer with? Well, you can do at least two things:

1. Create a "special" paint layer that will act as a mask for a given paint layer (in our case it will be a mask of the metal layer) and name it Metal Mask (for our example). Now, pick any colour and disable all channels but colour. Start RMB clicking all of the layers that you want to act as a mask for the Metal layer, and for each one of them select Freeze Painted Pixels. Then fill the Metal Mask layer with colour. Now, select the Metal layer and change the clip mask to Metal Mask layer (toggle Invert Clip Mask if necessary). Et voila.
2. Freeze painted pixels of layers you want to mask the Metal layer with, select the Metal layer, invert the freeze and erase everything that is unfrozen on the Metal layer (Freeze->Erase Unfrozen).

 

Of course now, if you'd want to reapply any of the overlying materials (after modifying them in the editor), you'd have to manually update the Metal Mask as well. Unless their painted pixels area would not change.

 

I call 3D-Coat's paint module a "Photoshop in 3D", so you shouldn't expect that once applied materials will update on the model if you change them in the editor. Once applied, you need to update them manually one way or another.

I don't really understand how this works, probably because I'm stuck on the photoshop analogy. How would I paint a mask for one layer like in photoshop? I cannot find the mask icon.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...