image textures

The following formats can be used as textures:

• BMP (uncompressed)
• EXR
• JPG
• PNG
• HDR (Analyze 7.5)
• RAW (consisting of a very simple header (in ascii), then the image data)
• ASC (Ascii)
• INR (Inrimage)
• PPM/PGM (Portable Pixmap)
• PAN (Pandore-5)
• DLM (Matlab ASCII)

Tif images may work on some platforms.

image texture parameters

• gamma
• gain
• filter

the effect of the gain setting when using an image for the diffuse channel

the effect of the gain setting when using an image as a bumpmap

he effect of the gamma setting when using an image for the diffuse channel

the effect of the gamma setting when using an image as a bumpmap

the effect of various filters when using an image for the diffuse channel

the effect of various filters when using an image as a bumpmap

 

procedural textures

Procedural textures are textures that are defined mathematically, which means that the texture value (or colour) at any given point is calculated by the program instead of being defined by an existing bitmap image. By combining various textures, very complex materials can be created. At the same time, using procedural textures can be very time effective as mapping is not required.

The downside of having LuxRender calculate the texture's values is that your 3d application may not be able to show previews for all textures. As many of LuxRender's procedural texture types have been taken from Blender, this program is very suitable for working with Luxrender's procedural materials. However, all textures can be assigned using any exporter.

Many of the procedural textures are fully three dimensional, which means that regardless of the shape of an object, they will always fit perfectly at edges.

Procedural textures are not filtered or anti-aliased. This is hardly ever a problem as the user can keep the specified frequencies within acceptable limits.

blender blend texture

This is one of the most important procedural textures. You can use blend textures to blend other textures together (with Stencil) or to create special effects (especially with the Map Input: Nor trick). If you use a colour band to create a custom blending, you may have to use No RGB, if the Map To value needs an intensity input.
parameters

• lin: a linear progression
• quad: a quadratic progression
• ease: a flowing, non-linear progression
• diag: a diagonal progression
• sphere: a progression with the shape of a three-dimensional ball
• halo: a quadratic progression with the shape of a three-dimensional ball
• flip XY: the direction of the progression is flipped a quarter turn

blender clouds

use

Clouds, Fire and Smoke. Also well suited to be used as bump map, giving an overall irregularity to the material.

parameters

default: standard noise, providing an intensity only
color: noise providing an RGB value
soft noise/hard noise: changes the contrast and sharpness
noisesize: the dimension of the noise table
noisedepth: the depth of the cloud calculation - a higher number results in a long calculation time, but also in finer details

blender distorted noise

use

Often used for: grunge, very complex and versatile materials.

parameters

distortion noise: the texture to use to distort another
noise basis: the texture to be distorted
noise size: the size of the noise generated
distortion amount: the amount to which distortion noise affects noise basis

blender magic

use

This texture could be used for "Thin Film Interference" if you use it on a specular material channel using a relatively high Turbulence.

parameters

depth: the depth of the calculation - a higher number results in a long calculation time, but also in finer details
turbulence: the strength of the pattern

blender marble

use

Often used for marble, fire, noise with a structure.

parameters

soft/sharp/sharper: three pre-sets, varying from soft to more clearly defined marble soft noise/hard noise: alternative methods for the noise function

noisesize: the dimensions of the noise table

noisedepth: the depth of the marble calculation - a higher value results in finer details, but longer calculation time

turbulence: the turbulence of the sine bands.

blender musgrave texture

use

Often used for organic materials, although the texture is so flexible you can do almost anything with it.

parameters

This procedural texture has five noise types on which the resulting pattern can be based, which are:

fBm
Hetero Terrain
Hybrid Multifractal
Ridged Multifractal
Multifractal

These noise types determine the manner in which the program layers successive copies of the same pattern on top of each other at varying contrasts and scales.

In addition to the five noise types, musgrave has a noise basis setting which determines the algorithm that generates the noise itself. These are the same noise basis options found in the other procedural textures.

The main noise types have four characteristics They are:

    * H (Fractal Dimension) - Range 0 to 2)

Fractal dimension controls the contrast of a layer relative to the previous layer in the texture. The higher the fractal dimension, the higher the contrast between the layers, and thus the more detail will show in the texture.

    * Lacu (Lacuniarity) - Range 0 to 6)

Lacuniarity controls the scaling of each layer of the musgrave texture, meaning that each additional layer will have a scale that is the inverse of the value which shows on the button. i.e. Lacu = 2 -> Scale = 1/2 original

    * Octs (Octave) - Range 0 to 8)

Octave controls the number of times the original noise pattern is overlayed on itself and scaled/contrasted with the fractal dimension and lacuniarity settings.

The Hybrid Multifractal, Ridged Multifractal, and Hetero Terrain types have additional settings:

    * ofst (Fractal Offset)

All three types have a Fractal Offset button labeled Ofst. This serves as a "sea level" adjustment and indicates the base height of the resulting bump map. Bump values below this threshold will be returned as zero.

    * gain

Hybrid Multifractal and Ridged Multifractal both have a gain setting which determines the range of values created by the function. The higher the number, the greater the range. This is a fast way to bring out additional details in a texture where extremes are normally clipped off.

blender noise

use

This texture can be used for white noise in an animation. It is not well suited for other uses. For material roughness, use the clouds texture instead. parameters

This texture does not have configurable parameters.

blender stucci

use

Stone, asphalt, oranges and also as a bump map to create grainy surfaces.

parameters

plastic: the standard stucci texture
wall in, wall out: a typical wall stucco effect with holes or bumps
soft noise/hard noise: alternative noise types
noisesize: the dimension of the noise table
turbulence: the depth of the stucci calculations

blender voronoi

use

This can be used to create very convincing metals (especially the hammered effects) and organic shaders (e.g. scales, veins in skin).

parameters

This texture has seven Distance Metric options. These determine the algorithm to find the distance between cells of the texture. The options are:

Minkovsky
Minkovsky 4
Minkovsky 1/2

The Minkovsky setting has a user definable value which determines the exponent (e) of the distance function (x^e + y^e + z^e)^(1/e). A value of one produces the Manhattan distance metric, a value less then one produces stars and higher values produce square cells. So all distance settings are basically the same - variations of Minkowsky.

Different shaped cells in the texture can also be obtained by using the other four settings:

Chebychev: irregularly-sized square cells
Manhattan: randomly-positioned diamond shaped cells
Actual Distance/Distance Squared: irregularly-shaped rounded cells

Four Worley constants are used to calculate the distances between each cell in the texture, based on the distance metric. Adjusting these values can have some interesting effects on the end result. Check the Samples Gallery for some examples of these settings and what textures they produce.

Four different noise basis types can be used as methods to calculate colour and intensity of the texture output. This gives the Voronoi textures created with the Worley Sliders a completely different appearance. The noise basis settings are equivalent to the noise basis setting found on the other textures.

blender wood

use

This texture is particularly suited for wood materials.

parameters

bands: the standard wood texture
rings: this suggests wood rings
bandnoise: gives the standard wood texture a certain degree of turbulence
ringnoise: gives the rings type a certain degree of turbulence
soft noise/hard noise: two noise methods
noisesize: the dimension of the noise table
turbulence: the turbulence of the bandnoise and ringnoise types

bilerp

bilerp texture using uv and spherical mapping

The bilerp texture takes four colours as input and interpolates the colours in between. It can use uv, planar, cylindrical and spherical mapping.

checkerboard

2d and 3d checkerboard texture

This texture generates a two- or three-dimensional checkerboard pattern.

parameters

2d/3d: switches between the two- and threedimensional patterns
closedform/supersample: anti aliasing algorithms for the 2d pattern
uv: base the pattern on the object's uv texture mapping
cylindrical: use a cylindrical projection (2d pattern)
spherical: use a spherical projection (2d pattern)
planar: use a planar projection (2d pattern)
Ud/Vd: offset values for the planar projection

dots

This texture creates a grid of dots, each of which has a 50% chance of being displayed.

parameters

uv: base the pattern on the object's uv texture mapping
cylindrical: use a cylindrical projection
spherical: use a spherical projection
planar: use a planar projection
ud/vd: offset values for the planar projection

FBm

The FBm (fractal Brownian motion) texture generates fractal noise, which is very suitable for use as a bump map.

parameters

roughness: the noise roughness - low values generate smooth shapes, higher values add detail
octaves: the range of noise frequencies - higher values create more detailed patterns

harlequin

This texture assigns a colour to each face, which can be useful for checking mesh subdivisions.

marble

The marble texture generates a marble pattern by distorting a layer pattern.

parameters

octaves: the range of noise frequencies
roughness: the amount of noise
noisescale: the scale of the noise
variation: additional variation in the pattern by offsetting through the marble layers

mix

mix texture, mixing a checkerboard with a solid red colour

The mix texture mixes textures by taking the average of their colour values. The proportion between the two source textures can be defined by the user.

scale

scale texture, scaling a checkerboard with a solid red colour

The scale texture mixes textures by multiplying their colour values, where black is zero and white is one.

uv

uv texture

The uv procedural texture is intended to clearly display uv mapping. A red gradient is used for the u direction, while a green gradient indicates the v direction.

windy

The windy (or windy waves) texture is intended as a bump map or displacement map for waves. It is based on the FBm material and does not have any adjustable parameters.

wrinkled

The wrinkled texture generates turbulence noise, which is very suitable for use as a bump map.

parameters

roughness: the noise roughness - low values generate smooth shapes, higher values add detail
octaves: the range of noise frequencies - higher values create more detailed patterns

procedural textures: noise types

Each noise-based Blender texture (with the exception of Voronoi and simple noise) has a noise basis setting that defines which algorithm is used to generate the texture. The Noise Basis settings makes the procedural textures (and especially Musgrave) extremely flexible.

The noise basis governs the structural appearance of the texture.

Noise Types/Bases

Blender Original

Original Perlin

Improved Perlin

Voronoi F1

Voronoi F2

Voronoi F3

Voronoi F4

Voronoi F2/F1

Voronoi Crackle

Cellnoise