Material Customization¶

Materials can be customized via their node group in the Shader Editor window.

material node group

Use Default Values¶

This slider is very useful to see how the original material looks. By using default values one can better judge what is being worked with when it comes to textures.

use default values slider

Tip

You can plug in anything with values from 0 to 1 and it will control Use Default Values. If you want just parts of the object to look as the original material for example, you can use textures or vertex colors to do that locally.

Base Color¶

The easiest way to change the color of the diffuse texture is by adjusting Base Color. RGB values of Base Color are used to multiply the material's diffuse texture. If Diffuse Texture Strength is set to 0, pure Base Color is used instead. To avoid multiplying two colorful RGB values you can set Diffuse Texture Saturation to 0. Then you do not have to worry about texture colors interfering with your chosen color.

base color light base color dark

Tip

Try to plug a texture into the base color's socket.

Normal Map¶

You can achieve smoother or more grain surface by adjusting Normal Map Strength.

normal slider low normal slider high

Tip

You can flip the green channel of the normal map to invert it.

Roughness¶

Roughness is basically how uneven the surface is. Unlike with normal map, it does not change the reflection vector. Higher roughness values produce more blurred reflections.

roughness slider low roughness slider high

Tip

With Node Wrangler addon enabled, select the material node with Ctrl+Shift+Left Button then click Left Button again to cycle through the outputs. This is useful to see the real values that are not affected by lighting.

Variations¶

The unified node group makes it easy to create and manage different variations of a single material. Saving vRAM and time. Common usecases are different color variations, surface lacquered or rough, UV or object mapping, dirty/worn version of the material, ...

material variations rendered

It is a good habit to also change the viewport color as each material variation looks different.

material variations viewport

Creating variations

To create a new material variation click on New Material button next to the material. This adds ".001" at the end which you should rename to more describe what this variation stands for.

creating material variant