Need new ideas/opinions - creating Lumicor resin panel material

[nickroz]

Product page: Lumicor Crystal

3D crystals with a smooth glossy finish. Image attached.


I've tried greyscale maps of this in just about every slot within 2sidedMtl, BlendMtl and OverrideMtl and I can't get the 3D specular reflections I need for an animation. Need some new ideas.

Maybe FastSSS2?

[skogskalle]

Have you tried modeling the crystals instead of using a map? Then you could have one simple glass-object with a scratchmap as the outer surface and then fill that with glossy crystalobjects. I havent done anything like this myself though, its just a thought.
k

[nickroz]

That'll be my last resort if it comes down to it. I guess I could vrayproxy the glazing to save on polys...

[joconnell]

You'll never get the complex internal reflections from a texture map tbh. I think Brett Simms might have done some kind of ruby surface recently with this? The actual inner geometry could be modelled and then poly reduced to lighten the load and also add some sharp angles - as Skogskalle mentioned a sharp scratch map could break up the detail further.

[simmsimaging]

I agree with skogskalle and John. If you really want it to look anything like that you will need to model it. John's idea about decimating the crystal meshes, then vrayproxy'ing it too. I think that would be the way I would go. I have tried more complex crystal-type surfaces with displacement too, but just didn't get a result I was happy with. It doesn't seem to be like organic stuff: you just can't get quite the right internal reflections and refractions without geometry.

/b