Germany, Berlin
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Chromium / Stainless / Metal in General
What is a good practice to make metal surfaces, in particular chromium / stainless steel, polished as well as rough?
Can it be achieved with colour and shininess only? If so - which values yield realistic results? Or should I better use textures? If so - are there suitable ones around?
The shelving system I'm modelling consists mostly of chrome-plated parts. I'm pretty inexperienced when it comes to surfaces. Also, my color vision is too limited to make a reliable judgment. OTOH, this is perhaps a simple case for the experienced. I've searched around, but haven't found much information about metal in SH3D.
TIA
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Cheers - Joe //
Netherlands
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Re: Chromium / Stainless / Metal in General
Export your object. Edit the obj file and add the prefix "sweethome3d_window_mirror_" to every g line you want to appear as chrome. Usually you can see the material in the following line that starts with "usemtl". That makes finding the correct g lines to change easier. You can change the color to make it look like silver, bronze, etc. Example: "g shelf_1_1" > "g sweethome3d_window_mirror_shelf_1_1"
Import your object and when you render a photo the parts with the prefix will look like chrome (not in the 2D or 3D panes).
Germany, Berlin
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Re: Chromium / Stainless / Metal in General
No results, yet. The magic prefix to the *obj group names gives me solid, perfectly smooth mirrors, regardless of any texture. For the wire parts, that is fine.
But I am still looking for a way to make perforated/rough surfaces look more or less metallic. Is there any source of information about group name prefixes in SH3D?
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Cheers - Joe //
Russia
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Re: Chromium / Stainless / Metal in General
hi. It is very difficult to deal with rough textures of metal and varnish. All mirror prefixes (there are three of them) in SH3D give the same polished result. I will try to post my experiment today. For other metal grinding options in SH3D, you can only use different JPG images. It all depends on how these textures are distributed in the model on the surface. Sometimes everything works out, sometimes the textures are made in pieces with turns, then everything is bad. I would also like to know the method of a polished rough surface. But I don't know yet.
Here is an imitation of unpolished steel using an image in texture
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Re: Chromium / Stainless / Metal in General
Is the oven's surface identic to the lower picture or have you still applied some other *.mtl parameters?
I'm really more and more inclined to use pictures instead of trying to model the physical properties. Also, my personal use case is more about configuration and spatial arrangement than aesthetics.
I will try a diffusely transmitting pane with a shiny mirror very closely behind it. This might approximate isotopically rough metal. But it still does not solve the alpha texturing question for the perforation.
However, I'd like to achieve a wider usefulness, as the shelving system is popular, and perhaps others could use a parts library as well.
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Cheers - Joe //
Russia
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Re: Chromium / Stainless / Metal in General
I'm very interested in what you're doing. I ask you to show your results, it's important. I cannot yet boast of achievements in the matte gloss of metal, the MTL file does not seem to be involved in the intricacies of reflections in any way. At least in SH3D. I will be glad to make a mistake... I think you can experiment in the render settings, but then the image processing time immediately increases catastrophically and it makes no sense to study this further. A good texture (a picture of metal) simulates all reflexes much more effectively.
Germany, Berlin
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Re: Chromium / Stainless / Metal in General
I have made first insecure steps in blender - just enough to get an idea of its power.
It occurred to me, you could create the material you want there. Then, under illumination similar to that of the target scene, render a face and take that as texture.
The big drawback is: any greater change of camera position or illumination demands a new render. But at least, you can control it, and re-use the texture setup.
Blender's features go beyond the *mtl format definition, so sophisticated texturing will not be portable. And it is a beast that wants to be tamed. Not much simpler than chess.
Your pure-SH3D results are already impressive, even though SH3D is said to have only a very basic material and texture model. Not sure if the painstaking work with blender would pay off in your case. ----------------------------------------
BTW, after asking
Is there any source of information about group name prefixes in SH3D?
Netherlands
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Re: Chromium / Stainless / Metal in General
A really great way would be to create an actual rough surface. Not a texture that simulates it but an object with 'real' bumps in the surface. Using Sweet Home 3D I can only think about using the terrain generator but that will be an unreasonable job in both time and efficiency.
I know it can be done in Blender. It requires a displacement map you use with a displacement modifier. You need to subdivide the surface to split it into many smaller faces that allow creating the relief and if you can't find a fitting displacement map you will have to create that too. Unneccessary to mention that this will result in a huge object in size because of the many faces needed. But, the result can be a very close representation of the real shelf. With the shelf having a real roughness there's no need for a texture thus the mirror effect with a color works. The real advantage is that light from different angles really works on the surface like it would on the real shelf. That's something that GaudiGalopin too would like very much! Prepare for very long rendering times though...
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