In this workshop we learned how to create custom ID maps by using Maya, Photoshop and Substance Painter. First off we opened Maya and went to the UV editor to take a UV snapshot.
We then put the snapshot into Photoshop and used the reference image and went into the effects settings and changed the stroke so the lines were bolder. Then, with the pen tool, we selected the basic pattern on the front of the shield before setting a solid bright colour on top. We then filled the background with another different bright colour before using the magic wand tool to select the background then holding shift selecting the front of the shield and the straps using the lasso tool before inverting the selection and laying down the same solid colour as the pattern on the front, going back into the stroke settings and changing the stroke colour to the same as the background and to the desired thickness. We then exported this as a PNG.
Next we went into Substance Painter using our model we downloaded.
We went into the texture set settings and went to bake mesh maps and added the PNG we just exported into the ID maps. After it exported we checked to see that it exported correctly by toggling through the maps with ‘b’. We then went to layers and added a fill layer, changing the colour, roughness and metalness so it looked like gold. We added a new fill layer and added a black mask to create a grunge layer to make the gold appear duller.
Next we went to import some alphas to put patterns on our shield. We went into our shelf and clicked the import icon and added the TIFF files we had downloaded and changed the type to alpha and the suffix to OrnamentalAlphas. We then added a new layer and deselected everything apart from height so when we painted the alphas it would change the height and nothing else. When we took a look at the files earlier, we noticed that all of them are very gradient-ed and not one solid colour. This is because if we were to use solid colour it would make the result look a lot more blocky rather than flowing. We took our alphas on the painting channel and started to lay our patters down, toggling the mirror button in the top bar to create a symmetrical pattern. Then, because the patterns we painted weren’t the right colour, we added a new layer and put a colour layer on with the colour from the gold layer and changed the levels to the desired place.
Hot Key for Exporting Textures – Ctrl+Shift+E
We then used these settings to export the normal map. Making sure to not save it to the network otherwise it wouldn’t work properly.
We added another fill layer and a black mask, putting the ID map into the grayscale
These are the maps that we needed to bake after we had made our normal map. We selected World space Normal, Ambient Occlusion, Curvature and Position. The maps on the right are what should come up afterwards.
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