Material Properties For 2D and
3D Artists By Neil Blevins Created On: Feb 16th 2025 Software: None Whether a 2D artist using traditional or digital painting,
or a 3D artist using rendering algorithms, replicating materials comes
down to a deep knowledge of what specific materials look like, and why
they look that way.
So here’s a collection of information about real world materials, why
they look the way they do, and what attributes they have that you will
need to replicate, regardless of whether you’re using 2D or 3D tools.
Exercise
If you really want to drive the point home, here's a little exercise
you can try...
Get 3 pictures of different materials from the web.
Define each material using 5 different properties, for example,
wood might be mostly a diffuse brown color, a low roughness surface
shows sharp reflections, the ends of the wood are very rough and bumpy,
etc.
Make a quick page with pictures showing an example of each
material, and the list of properties (with arrows showing where in the
picture you see the property).
