Production

I always start with the height map and it’s also where I will spend most of my time. This is very important, attempting to jump into color and roughness maps too early while the height map isn’t completed is a recipe for disaster. If the height information isn’t correct, the normal and ambient occlusion will also look wrong and a whole bunch of issues will occur.

I analyze some reference images and try to identify all the different elements I will need to create. I then start building each element separately working my way from the biggest shapes to the smallest details in that order as much as possible. I try to make sure I account for all “level of details”: Large, medium and small shapes as well as surface detail. I won’t start working on other maps until I am satisfied with the height, normal and ambient occlusion.

One of the key challenges in this kind of material with a lot of different elements is figuring out how to blend all the different elements together. I had to think about the order in which the elements are gonna be blended one on top of the other. For example, in this material, it was interesting to blend in the rocks before the grass. This would give the grass some much-needed volume and would create an interesting effect as it overlayed on top of the rocks.