Glossy Materials in Cycles: The Right Way
While I’m not sure there’s a ‘right’ or a ‘wrong’ way to set up your shaders, this quick tutorial shows how to achieve an effect that’s closer to PBR. I rather like the result.
Moby Motion writes:For all the years I’ve been using Blender, I only found out about the right way to make glossy shaders very recently.
I wanted to share the very simple trick I learnt, so no-one else has to endure horrible looking glossy materials for as long as I did!
to save you a click: It is just a diffuse mixed with a glossy with a fresnel as the fac. http://i0.wp.com/www.mobymotionblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/nodes-for-realistic-glossy-shaders.jpg
Thanks, I’ll use that time saved to enjoy a coffee!
I’m still undecided if the following “PBR” enhancement to the basic diffuse+glossy/fresnel configuration adds enough value to warrant the node complexity: http://www.blendernation.com/2015/08/20/an-in-depth-look-at-physically-based-rendering/
Just do you. For example, I would probably use Cynicat’s node setup to present complex object or characters to get the “wow” effect (to impress, if you dont know what It meant), but never a scene. Just to have more control over my own shaders.
Unuseful tutorial of the week
It is an Ok tutorial, but the fresnel input is not the best to achieve this solution. Better use Layer Weight node with Facing input.
You can benefit here by adding another layer. First mix the glossy and diffuse to control the overall level off glossiness. Typically, you want it to be a lot lower than .5 . Then create another diffuse shader and another mix shader and mix this diffuse with the output of the first mix shader, using the fresnel as the factor.