I continue my Blender Tutorial series this time by talking a great deal about Materials. I also cover lighting, textures, show how to simulate glass, how to get lights to track objects, provide many examples and much more.
Following the video below I have a full transcript of every command I used. The Blender files I used are available here for download Sphere File and Glass File.
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Cheat Sheet
Blender Tutorial 4 Materials, Lighting, Textures with Many Examples II. Materials A. Material settings define how simulated light and surfaces can simulate the look of metal, glass, cloth, skin, plastic, etc. 1. In Properties (n) Under Shading Select GLSL 2. Select Texture Mode under Method to Shade 3D Objects in bottom tool bar next to Object Mode drop down B. When light hits an object 1. It diffuses or reflects off a surface in many directions to different degrees depending upon how rough the surface is 2. If that object is smooth, the object reflects white light (all wavelengths) at a consistent angle (Specular Lighting) 3. The object reflects back its color as well as surrounding objects depending on the objects reflectivity 4. And, the object is transparent, both the objects color as well as colors from the objects background C. We change a lighting, textures, camera angles, shadows, translucency settings and more to simulate different materials D. You set materials in the Properties Window -> Material (4th from the right) -> New E. Set the color with Diffuse Color 1. Intensity : Amount of light to reflect to the camera 2. Ramp : Used to set a range of colors and how they will vary from outer edge of the object to the center of the highlight 3. Diffuse Shaders a. Lambert : Default that allows you to define how much light is reflected b. Oren-Nayar : Provides a Roughness / Diffusion Amount option c. Toon : Simulates cartoon cel shading with settings for Size of lit area and the softness of that boundary d. Minnaert : Darkens parts of an object to simulate materails e. Fresnel : Change the Fresnel Effect to define ambient light, translucency, sensitivity to light and shadow F. Ramps 1. You can define a color gradient across a material, rather then just going from light to dark 2. Color Ramp Widget : Used to define how colors change from the out edge to the inner highlight a. + / - / <-> : Add, Delete, or Flip colors b. Straight Colors (RGB) or HSV with more saturation c. Interpolation Options i. Constant ii. B-Spline : (Basis Spline) iii. Linear iv. Cardinal v. Ease vi. All of the above use different functions to create smooth transitions between color stops d. Position : Slide to change positioning between color stops e. Change Color and Alpha of selected color stop f. Input : Defines how the color ramp is mapped to the object g. Blend : Ways of blending the diffuse color with the color ramp 3. Testing Ramp a. Create sphere at Top Ortho (7 5) b. Add Middle Color Stop c. Change colors and alpha for each color stop d. Change Input, Blend and Objects X Position to see differences G. Specular represents the objects highlight 1. Increasing the hardness makes the light source glow smaller 2. Shaders a. Cook-Torrance : Plastic b. Phong : Skin / Organic Surfaces c. Blinn : Simulates how light bends when reflecting based on Index of Refraction setting d. Toon : Cartoon cels e. Ward Isotropic : Metal / Plastic H. Shading 1. Emit : Amount of light to emit 2. Ambient : Defines how available scene lighting effects the object 3. Translucency : Amount of lighting behind the object that shows through 4. Shadeless : Makes light and shadow have no effect 5. Tangent Shading : Intensifies highlights 6. Cubic Interpolation : Smooth transitions between light and shadow I. Transparency 1. Check it and adjust Alpha below 1 to make transparent 2. Fresnel : Defines how transparent an object is 3. Specular : How quickly light is absorbed by glass giving thickness 4. Blend : Blending between transparent and non-transparent surfaces 5. Mask : Mixes colors from the background with the object in front 6. Z Transparent : Also mixes object color with background colors to create transparent look 7. Raytrace : Simulates light rays passing through a transparent object a. Index of Refraction (IOR) : How much a the background is distorted when passing through an object b. Filter : The higher this is the more of the objects base color will show c. Falloff : Gives the feeling of thickness d. Limit : Determines at what thickness an object losses transparency e. Depth : Sets the max number of transparent surfaces a ray can pass through f. Gloss i. Amount : Lower then 0 creates blur ii. Threshold : Limits an objects shapes influence on the gloss iii. Samples : Defines complexity when determining blurriness J. Mirror 1. Check and increase Reflectivity to make object reflect light as a mirror K. Make Glass Glass 1. Make light Hemi 2. Object Mode -> Contraints -> Track To -> Target BezierCurve -> To -Z -> Up Y 3. Add Plane -> LX 0, LY -8, LZ 8 -> RX 90 -> SX 8, SY 8, SZ 1 -> DX 16, DY 16 4. Add Plane -> LX -8, LY 0, LZ 8 -> RX 90, RY 0, RZ 90 -> SX 8, SY 8, SZ 1 -> DX 16, DY 16 5. Add Materials to both Planes 6. Add Material to glass a. Specular 300 b. Transparency -> Raytrace -> Alpha .1, Fresnel 5, IOR 1.25, Depth 10 c. Tangent Shading on and off?