This will be my little hideout where I share crazy stuff and what not.
I will make a proper first post later.
During the Corona 1.5 Daily Build phase I was pushing/testing hard to get all the proper Blending Modes into CoronaMix.
There are three main reason for this. I will be posting two new mini guides on two of the reasons in the near future.
The third reason is procedural masking.
I’ve been talking to Ondra about procedural maps/masks for a couple of weeks now.
My idea is to turn Corona into a crazy ass procedural beast.
Last night I put together a proof of concept inside the material editor. It’s basically Quixels dDO inside max.
Right now I’m using baked maps for Curvature, AO, ObjectSpaceNormal and Gradient. Everything else is done inside the material editor.
I’ve posted Mantis requests for Curvature, ObjectSpaceNormal and Gradient maps. If we ever get these maps, we only have to swap them with the baked bitmaps, and there we go.
Crazy ass mask generator inside max!
Here are the input maps.
My proof of concept mask generator that behaves like Quixels dDO.
Out comes
oh God…
That’s crazy. Nice, but crazy :] Wonder how big penalty in render time you’d get from such material setup compare it to baked maps?
Doesn’t CoronaData map already has world object space normal map pass? Can’t test it at the moment.
Anyway, i love procedural stuff. Insta subscribe!
Lol on the simple blur, I was looking for that last week but could find no way to do it (wanted to blur some procedural output), so yes, that would be a useful thing!
I support this.
Consider that hero materials can be as complex as the one that dubcat posted, but for the rest of the materials I think just the curvature map can do wonders without too much penalization.
One of the first things I did was to test all the CoronaData maps, the position map is not the kind we want.
Round Edge Map is almost a Curvature map. I use it as a filler curvature map every now and then, but it also masks crevices white.
I have reported this is my Curvature thread on Mantis.
The biggest problem right now is that all the default 3dsmax maps are calculating shit in linear and we need sRGB.
I’m adjusting all these maps afterwards with an Output map as a little hack.
These functions need to be added to CoronaOutput in Photoshop form. (Reported on Mantis)
- Invert
- Gamma
- Legacy Brightness
- Legacy Contrast
We also need to split the Curvature map into 7 parts, to get full control, and then blend them back with Overlay.
To do this we need Highpass filter (There are functions out there for real time) and Gaussian Blur.
I did a 32 pass test.
Big ass procedural tree = 06:45 min
1 compiled bitmap = 01:40 min
I hope all this stuff can be bundled into one optimized map. I’ve already offered to make a reference sheet on how all this fits together.
If Team Corona want to tackle this map, just text me on Skype.
I made this mock up (v0.1) last night when I made the proof of concept.
It might look overwhelming, but when you load the map, all the boxes should be closed.
So if you want to work on Curvature, you open the curvature section etc.
I forgot to add master opacity for each map.
I used to think that procedural maps did not tile for some reason and instead went on in random generation forever. Kind of wish they behaved like that instead.
I have to say I’m glad some people here fall into the mad professor category - in a good way, of course - I’m awestruck, looking forward to where this could get one day.
Well if this is not something “in the works” now, it could be listed at least for now in “the most wanted features” poll…
Flexible procedural map even partialy substituting the likes of substance or quixel mask generators is a great added value.
How the shader graph would look like with this CoronaMaskBuilder compared to the image you posted at the beginning?
I’ve remade the FuzzyShading map from Unreal 4.
It’s using the default Unreal 4 settings, including falloffs.
There are 3 parameters you can adjust to taste. These are Core Darkness, Edge Brightness, Power.
You can either use it as in the example below, or you can make one material for the stone and one for the moss. And then blend them together with the fuzz mask.
Download link bellow.
I used one of the free Megascans assets to test the shader while I was building it.
I can’t wait to try this shader on fabrics!
Here are some test renders, in case you don’t know what all the fuzz is about. (I used the default settings).
Open the pictures in a new tab for maximum comparison satisfaction!
Normal Corona Shader
FuzzyShading Shader
Enjoy.
The graph and the mock up is the same 
It looked kinda similar, but the hotspots and falloffs didn’t quite match. If this is the correct map, it needs to be adjusted a little.
FuzzyShading2014.zip (212 KB)
I like how it kinda glows on grazing angles and in shaded areas, but transition from rock to moss doesn’t look that good.
Not sure about that, but could it be due to difference in how normals are calculated in various apps? Sadly there isn’t unified standart for normal shading.
I’ve ported Metallic Shading from Unreal 4.
The falloff has bright edges, dark middle and semi bright center.
In Unreal 4 you are only allowed to change the Base Color, but you can tweak the gamma inside the Pow maps for different looks.
Basic shader to show the effect
I’ve also updated the Fuz shader.
- Fixed some math in the Core Darkness section.
- I realized that pow is the same as inverse gamma, so now you can adjust Power the same way as in Unreal 4.
This has to do with Edge Brightness, I had it at 1 during testing.
MetallicShading.zip (209 KB)
Professor Dubcat,I love it! I have been looking for this to hook the curvature, positionmaps, etc. to some Substances I made.
Edit: Bug in my auto script, will post update when it’s sorted out.
I thought that after most recent changes in Corona material (PBR mode), its glosiness matches 1:1 with Vray GGX, isn’t? 
It should be closer, I noticed a bug in my vray script. The fstorm table is accurate. I’ll wait until the table is 100% complete before I post it again.
Here is a little “how to get that fStorm look in Corona” post.
I’ve attached a little Photoshop script that will turn your harsh Corona renders into soft fStorm renders.
This blur/sharpen effect really help sell that photorealism, when did you capture a picture with your camera and the noise was pixel perfect ? (I’m not talking about ISO 1million)
If you are using Arion to add chromatic aberration, you will already have a blur like this (- the sharpen), since this is a side effect of the R G B transform. But this Photoshop script is shifting R G B equally.
If you do an anti chromatic aberration operation in CameraRaw after Arion, you will see that your render still looks more Photorealistic after the anti chromatic aberration operation. This is because the blur that is the main ingredient.
This stuff should be included in Corona frame buffer. Go and +1 on mantis!
and this is how you can emulate fStorms “Angle Affect” option in Corona
In fStorm the “Angle Affect” parameter goes from 0-1. After some quick testing, this looks to be the same as IOR 1.5 - 3
I’ve made a little improvement to the effect. You can specify a value that gets multiplied with the base glossiness. This is nice for rough materials, where you don’t want the edges to be 255 glossiness.
So tweak IOR and the multiply value to taste.
This feature should be included in Corona if you ask me! I notice this effect each time I lay down, even on rough fabrics.
Next time you lie down in bed or drunk on the floor, try to look for this effect, and then go and +1 mantis!
I’ve also attached two LUTs that emulate the default 0.3 contrast in fStorm and a 0.15 contrast version. The contrast slider in fStorm don’t affect white, so it’s more of a black crusher. The effect can be really strong, so you might want to tone it down.
This is 0.15 contrast
-1 HC in fStorm that has kinda become the standard, is 50 hc in Corona!
fStorm is caped at around 0.40 Corona glossiness. Which is a bad thing, but now you know.
Another thing that Corona is still missing that both fStorm and Vray has, is focus pick in frame buffer. +1 mantis if you are missing this feature!
You won’t believe how amazing it is to build your scene. Walk around as a photographer, focus pick in frame buffer. CTRL + C, render afterwards. This is a MUST feature.
fStorm renders object with no material as default material, instead of random object color.
So there you go, if you follow these guidelines you will get that cRona look!
Don’t forget to Mantis, shit won’t happen if you don’t act! Spread the words to your friends.
fstorm 030 contrast.CUBE (864 KB)
fstorm 0.15 contrast.CUBE (864 KB)
fstormify.atn (330 Bytes)