vertex color

[SgWRX]

from one of my WIP posts, i was trying to work with vertex color to help make a decent parking lot. the thought was to put a vertex color map on a plane and then use vertex paint modifier to paint in the darker areas of asphalt where rubber from the tires would discolor. the same could be true of a road surface.

 

so here's what i've found so far, that you have to put the vertex color map in the diffuse slot and that won't allow the use of any other color maps for example like a blend or smoke map to vary the color of the parking lot overall and then be able to tweak with a vertex color.

 

here's what i've got so far. notice that this is exactly the opposite of the pattern i want. the darker areas should be lighter and the lighter areas should be darker because that's where the tires would go.

 

my thought is - do i have to paint the whole plane dark except and then paint in the lighter areas? seems like an extra step to have to paint the whole thing dark as opposed to using a diffuse color map like noise or something.

 

EDIT: oh, i forgot to mention the apparent texture/color is a noise bump map in the bump slot of the standard max material.

[SgWRX]

ha! found it. http://tutorial.jcwcn.com/3D-Graphics/3DS%20MAX/Materials/2008-07-12/9569.html

 

they use a couple of mix maps to have both a vertex color map and a diffuse color map (in this case a wood bitmap).

 

other neat tips on there too.

[SgWRX]

ok, here we go. the speckle bump map notwithstanding, if you look over towards the parking lines i was able to use vertex color to paint on darker variation where the rubber would wear from the tires. this is just my initial test. some thoughts:

 

1. i had to sub-divide my parking lot quite a bit in the area in wanted to use vertex paint. this was so that i could get smoother results, higher density of verticies gives smoother color transition results. you can see where the sub-divisions end, the lightest gray color areas on the right. what i did was select all the verticies that were sub-divided in the vertex paint modifier to confine the painting to those areas only.

 

2. my thoughts behind this rather than a bitmap are that it's completely customizable per scene. give the appearance of tire tracks where they should be and according to parking lines.

 

3. i like this rather than post-processing because in post, you have weird angles and perspective to deal with, and this is baked right into the image so that last minute camera changes (and of course animation) are not going to require re-doing the post work.

 

so... hm.