Building Materials in Element 3D

There are a few different key options for creating great looking materials in Element 3D. You can adjust Diffuse, Specular, Reflection/Refraction, Illumination, Normal Bump, Occlusion, and Normal Bump, Environment. See Material Texture Slots for more specific descriptions of each material setting.

Beyond The Basics Video • Customizing UI • Adding textures • Basic texture mapping options WATCH NOW!

The main idea is that you can click on the the slots for those material settings and load your own texture maps into those slots. For example:

EXAMPLE Create a metallic looking texture

1. Click on the Diffuse slot where it says "none set" and a popup window comes up, click on the Load Texture slot. 2. This will let you navigate to where your textures are located, and click open to select that texture map. 3. You can import JPEG or PNG files. Go here for recommended asset storing. This will help files stay linked together when transferring files. 4. If you have a Specular version of the map you can do the same process for selecting that map and loading it into the specular slot. 5. Now you can adjust each channel with the options that correspond to the Texture Slot name further down the material options window. 6. You can also save your material settings by right clicking on the Main Material Name slot and selecting Save as Material Preset.