Texture Objects

We want to put an image on an object, rather than just have a solid color.

Texture Types

There are several types of textures.

Diffuse/Albedo map - Color for object. The is the basics of what you need. Although the image can look “flat.” Think bricks. Shouldn’t look flat, but will be with just a diffuse map.
Bump maps - Create illusion of depth via grayscale data. Shade of gray is height. These are grayscale images.
Normal maps - Better than bump maps, uses RGB for more info. This can give us x, y, and z. Allows for angle and more realistic looks. These maps tend to look blue.
Displacement/Height map - This map is used to actually changes surface they are on.
Specular/Metallic - Maps out what part of the image is shiny.

Here are some samples from Texturise, their “Tilable Wood Planks Texture”.

Here they are, in action on Blender.

Where can you get textures?

Create a new project.
Add a 10x10 plane.
Create a folder called “Textures”
Toss the images there.
Create a material in that folder.
Toss onto the plane.
Put images into texture
- Toss ‘texture’ to Albedo.
- Toss ‘specular’ to ‘metalic’. Change to ‘Albedo Alpha’ and turn smoothness down to about 0.1. You can use this for occlusion instead.
- Toss ‘normal’ to ‘normal map’
- Toss ‘displacement’ to ‘Height map’