[Half Life]

The new Maxwell grass system (in the 2.7 update) is very cool, but the angle mapping option is a bit complex.

In order to simplify the task of making and compiling angle maps for the Maxwell grass system I made the following Substance which can do some unique things (and is completely free): https://dl.dropbox.com/u/41250852/Maxwe ... ping.sbsar

As you can see it is a very small file (under 3 kB) but it has a wide array of options that will allow you to do any of the following:

• Auto creation of Swirl Maps or Radial Maps (your choice)
• Input of custom greyscale maps for any of the RGB channels (to create your own angle patterns)
• Auto clump generation (this can be randomized by changing the seed value) -- which is the real point of this Substance
• Clump Threshold -- this is based off the green input channel (so you can have any custom shaped clumps you desire)
• Maximum and Minimum Clump Size (to control the randomization a bit)
• Number of Clumps
• Minimum Height Angle (90 degrees being straight up and 0 degrees being lying flat on the ground)
• Length map (derived from the Green channel)
• Clamping (threshold position, softness and inverting) of each RGB channel
• Preview of each RGB channel (to see exactly what is happening to each channel when clamping)
• Clamping operations for the matching density map (invert was not included because you can do this easily in Maxwell)
• Output resolutions up to 2048 x 2048 dynamically

The most powerful/unique aspect of this tool is the clumping aspect (which works in a similar fashion to the Image Hose tool in Corel Painter) -- this can be customized to create some really nice random effects that would be very difficult to get any other way. I would highly recommend creating a greyscale map to represent the height of a clump (think of it like a displacement map) and using it for the green channel input, which when combined with the clumping function can generate some nice effects. The default settings will give this result on a 1m x 1m plane (normalized UVs):



The only grass setting I changed here was to increase the density to 50,000... everything else is the work of the maps. I personally like to stack several grass modfiers on the same geometry with the same maps (using different seed values) and variations of the grass material (dried, green, etc.) to increase the naturalism.

You'll need to download the Free Substance Player app to render out these textures (assuming you are not using 3DS Max or Maya, which support Substances directly).

If you find this tool helpful, please add a +1 to the Maxwell Support for Substances feature request thread here.

You can get my "green grass" MXM material I used here: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/41250852/j_greengrass_base.zip



If you have any questions please PM me.

Best,
Jason.

[Half Life]

Here's a video about using this Substance with the Maxwell Grass system -- also, I've updated the Substance as well, so if you have an older version please re-download.

http://vimeo.com/45061420

Best,
Jason.

[sandykoufax]

Looks nice.
Thanks for the share.
I have to try it later.

[Nova66]

Hi Jason,

Thanks so much for sharing the grass clumping Substance. It's been a great incentive for getting into the Substance player which seems to have so much potential. I'm looking forward to exploring it further

Andrew.

[segnoprogetto]

Tanks Jason for the share !