Jan 23, 20242 min read

How Materials are perfected by imperfection maps

Recently one of the users asked me about the way to use (Surface) imperfection maps which I thought was a good question, so I decided to post some instance short tutorials with a written explanation for you all.

Before we begin, because Imperfection maps come in many categories and varieties that have separate details, we'll be simplifying them into brief and comprehensive information.

They are collection of textures that help artists and users take the raw and superficial material in the shading and texturing processes and make it far more beautiful and realistic.

In order to achieve this believable result, we should always work out to please viewers' senses and feelings because realism is about to maintain the same feeling as if you're looking at the world and not computer graphics. When the viewer says about a realistic wood material or metal with excitement, it means that the creator of that material was capable to first understand the niceties of that material, and then to make it work skillfully to culminate those traits into viewer's eyes.

To do so, we should take use of some textures which are in fact these imperfection maps that we can perform very affectively in Diffuse or color sections and also the in defining the reflective or glossiness behaviour of the material.

Once I heard an artist say, sometimes what we do with texturing is not aimed to arouse anything, it's to maintain nothing! No one will notice things that look real and normal along the way, but the moment the same things start to appear off with imperfections or reflective traits, it will become apparent.

Let me exemplify this matter of imperfection's presence with some before and afters. You will see how shallow and raw these materials are without the imperfection maps, and how realistic they will become when imperfections are added to them.