Procedural Textured Succulent
Responsible for texturing, lighting, and all models except the cactus.
Arnold renderer sampling 6/4/3/1/4/1 - average rt 22 minutes per frame
Material Exploration - Fall 2021 Process blog
Reference images:
WIP renders:
Modeling Shot:
The cactus model was a modified asset. I used bend deformers on the pot geometry to achieve a shape closer to the reference.
Succulent Pot Material: Procedural aiStandardSurface
Full shader graph for the ceramic pot texture. In the reference the ceramic glazes had four different colors. In my research, the ceramicist described the glaze process starting with the base dark brown then dipped in white. In the final layer the plate was rotated before being dipped in blue, achieving a light blue and a green-tan. Due to the glazes being layered in the real life piece, I chose to link all four colors in blend nodes for the pot.
Upper right on main graph: In the main portion of the shader, I divided the four color sections by using two main diagonal ramps. I ended up connecting displacement to the white section as the reference glaze only had texture in that area.
Result blending the two diagonal ramp masks:
- These sections get subdivided in the following steps.
- Blue only used to visually differentiate.
Upper left on main graph: this section forms the dark brown and green ramp on the bottom of the pot. I chained blend color nodes for each color group so I could merge different colored noise patterns. They are then reusing ramp masks from the main section to only affect the bottom.
Bottom on main graph: this section forms the white and blue ramp on the top of the pot. This is built the same as above, but with variation on how many colors are layered. The ramp that defines the white section is multiplied from the displacement mask.
Succulent Leaf Material: Procedural aiStandardSurface
The succulent flesh was built using linear color ramps. The inverse ramps are used in subsurface and in sheen. I used a combination of noise in roughness and in sheen to mimic the disturbed powder coating on the reference.
Rock Material: Procedural aiStandardSurface
The rocks were created with a radial color ramp and an aiCurvature for color variation.
Lighting:
3 Point Lighting: 4 light samples in all lights, Fill light with HDRI, 2 area lights
https://polyhaven.com/a/photo_studio_loft_hall Piste Ninenzaka Sannenzaka
Overall Troubleshooting:
The main problem I had was building the divided ramps in the ceramic pot shader. It took the most experimenting to find out how the masks should be multiplied or made into an inverse copy. Additionally, in the different sections of glaze colors each had a unique noise/fractal pattern of color variation. This is what caused the chain of blend nodes, but it ended in the result I was going for.