The Case Study of Metal Gear Solid 4

[MGS.]

C10. Texture Setting for General Machines

The shader used for the battle helicopter had basic specular control and incidence parameters. You can see in the render screen the texture structure that was used.

From the right, the maps that were applied were defuse, normal, specular, specular gradation and incidence mask. Note that to lessen the image calculation load, the same UV value was shared between them all.

Defuse Map

Created based on the ambient occlusion obtained with Ultimapper and by adding condition information obtained with the render map. In addition to basic color tones, weathering and dirt is written onto the defuse map.

Normal Map

The normal map obtained with Ultimapper. Because this information is linked to the tangent colors of the model mesh, for the most part intermediate image editing is not performed for this mapping. In this image, you can check whether the bump map that was set in a high polygon model was also baked into the normal map.

Incidence Control Map

The incidence is masked and applied based on this map. For example, the inside of the air intake or cockpit parts are filled in with black and masked. Tinting is also possible to update the color and apply the incidence. In this example, an expression is used that reflects the blue of the sky.

Specular Map

Created while imagining how light reflects when it hits metal. The areas that shine brighter are made whiter. You can darken the areas that you do not want to shine. Writing fine scratches that are difficult to express in the normal map onto the specular map is effective because the fine scratches react only to the areas that are hit by light.

Specular Gradation Map

Gradation for specular control. Redness is added in consideration of the reflection on this black battle helicopter. By adding contrast to the gradations for reflections, a more complex expression is achieved.