stainless steel

[ilovedividends]

Hi all.

I am able to get certain camera angles looking nice with stainless steel, but then I go for another angle and the light just blows out the stainless like crazy or the stainless takes on a completely unsatisfying look vs the previous camera angle.  So I then change hues/sat/etc and or roughness, etc. 

I will say that I have been taking pictures around the house of some stainless and was amazed how bad/awkward it looked vs what I picture in my mind.  If the light is not just right stainless pictures look nothing like what I imagine in my mind.  Maybe this is a little marketing brainwash that I have from seeing beautiful pictures over the years.

I would like to fine tune my stainless over time and I am wondering if anyone has a stainless no brush or very light brush that is good with most angles for the most part? 

I actually started getting some better stainless after dabbling with the blue zinc a little and seeing that just a very tiny amount of blue helps a little.

Thanks.

[thomasteger]

Did you check the KeyShot cloud?

[richardfunnell]

If you want to get more control over your stainless (and other metal materials), working with the anisotropic material gives you much more control.
First, it allows you to define the highlight direction of the material via roughness values; second it also allows you to define reflectivity/specularity via color or texture.
This second item allows you keep your metal materials from blowing out.
I also give stainless some sort of color depending on the chromium or nickel content, 304 is warmer vs. 430 which is cooler.

Here's a quick example using a standard environment & simple part.

[ilovedividends]

thanks i am working on the anisotrpoic material right now.  I looked in the cloud and saw a couple stainless materials but those alone didn't get me to where I wanted to get yet.

thanks.

[ilovedividends]

Im getting better results now using anistropic.

I am playing with the X and Y roughness, and I can see a difference but I cannot wrap my mind around how they are different.  Is there a way you think of differentiating b/w X and Y?

[richardfunnell]

Anisotropic is a tough material to get perfect, it will take a little bit of fine tuning to get it right.

My trick for working with X/Y roughness is to get the value to be the same on both, then slightly adjust one to get the correct direction for the highlights.
It will work best when there is a big difference between X & Y, usually I end up with something like .1 x to .01 y. It does depend on the original orientation of your geometry though, so that's something to keep in mind.
That will basically drive the highlight direction, then I add color/specular textures to get the right appearance for the brushed material.

[Ed]

Richard - Do you have an example of your particular stainless steel material you can put on the Cloud?

Ed

[richardfunnell]

Yes indeed, just uploaded one called "Anisotropic Stainless Steel" You will probably have to tweak it for your geometry/environment, let me know if you have any questions. This one is pretty blue which can be adjusted in the color. Thanks!

[Ed]

Thanks for sharing your stainless steel Richard.  Here is a quick test on a ring.  I only adjusted the material color and the texture scale.

Ed Ferguson

[richardfunnell]

Wow Ed, that looks great!! Thank you for sharing 

[guest84672]

Impressive, Ed. Did you upload to the cloud?

[Ed]

Thomas - Richard Funnell uploaded his Anisotropic Stainless Steel already (see his posting below).

My ring uses his material.  All I did was adjust the color (I'm using less blue), and scale of the texture to match the scale of the ring.

Ed Ferguson

[guest84672]

ok - thanks for clarifying, Ed!

[Greg Polymerou]

I have uploaded in the Cloud a S/S material that works well with flat surfaces, at least for me. It has some bright to dark transition which fakes the effect of slightly deformed surface. Give it a try.

[Finema]

Thomas - Richard Funnell uploaded his Anisotropic Stainless Steel already (see his posting below).

My ring uses his material.  All I did was adjust the color (I'm using less blue), and scale of the texture to match the scale of the ring.

Ed Ferguson

Hello,

I don't find it on the cloud