How should I add 'wear' to a complex road system.

[Roodogg]

Hi Guys - looked online for an answer but couldn't find...

 

I'm creating an entire housing development and I want to add a pale faded area where cars would drive over.

 

I'm thinking a composite material with a bitmap in a different map channel?

 

Before I proceed, just wanted to check this was the best way to go...

 

Cheers for your input.

[Corey Beaulieu]

definitely a good way to go. I'd render a top down view of the roadway isolated on a black background. Paint your markings and then yes, what you said about the composite material.

 

I've seen the distance texture used for this kind of thing as well, but I can't say the results were that much better. It also requires a lot more setup.

[dande]

Take a picture of a road surface with similar ware

[notamondayfan]

Even a new road will have marks, defects, etc. I would add them, but restrain on over doing it. Also I think adding things like leafs near a curb works well to break up the CAD feel of new roads.

[NigelStutt]

Could do the road as a lofted shape and use a linear pattern to create the road texture which would follow the loft. Roads usually have blacker lines where car tyres travel, and lighter area in centre and edge. Plus a loft could enable you to do the painted lines quite easily as well. Usually this is good if you are seeing the road from high up like in an aerial view.But for more complex roads I think only way is to unwrap and paint the texture, drains and lines onto it. A faster alternative would be to paint the road texture/lines/drains etc in after render with Photoshop if only a small part of the road is visible. But you would probably ned the lines rendered with the road (dont want to be painting those). So the approach probably depends ulimately how close you are going to get to the road and how prominent it is going to be in the image.

Edited October 13, 2014 by NigelStutt

[Nicolai Bongard]

I think this would work: 1. Make your road. 2. Make one dark and one light road material, combine in a vray blend. 3. In top view draw a spline in the center of the road. 4. Sweep a profile (box) along the line so that the width of the sweep equals whatever width there is between car wheels. 5. Apply edit poly to the sweep object, select two of the edges of the sweep, loop, and make a new shape. 6. Use extrude on the shape so that it goes through your road geometry. 7. Make sure the extruded shape is not renderable (not visible to camera, dont cast shadows etc..). 8. Set the blend between the asphalt materials to be a vray distance map and select the extruded geometry as the distance object.

Not sure if it works but it should.

[Nicolai Bongard]

Also, if the distance tex does not work as a seperator in the blend material, you could also cut up your road geometry by first making a cut along where the wheels are, then chamfer so that each wheel line is 3 lines (with the width of them the fade from light to dark), then use vertex paint and color everything black and then color the center lines of each wheel white, then use the vertex color in the blend between the two materials.

[blank...]

Roads usually have blacker lines where car tyres travel, and lighter area in centre and edge.

 

Actually, it's the other way around:

http://images.universityherald.com/data/images/full/5599/long-road.jpg

[numerobis]

i would say, this depends on the lighting...

I think it is related to the rubber from the tyres and the smoothness of the road which results in a higher reflection compared to the rest of the asphalt.

So the colour depends on the reflection (light background/ dark background) and can be controlled by the roughness/reflectiveness of the road material.

[dande]

If you are using 3DS Max design have a look at some of the materials in civil view.

[Roodogg]

Wow guys thanks for all of the great ideas. I'll report back when I've found the best /quickest way of doing it.

 

Thanks again.

[Tommy L]

Actually, it's the other way around:

http://images.universityherald.com/data/images/full/5599/long-road.jpg

 

Dario is correct. The tires sweep the debris from the road and smooth it out, they dont leave black behind unless there's a skid. The area the tire ruuns in shold have a higher reflection value and a lower reflection blurriness value. The place the tires dont run should have practically no relection at all, maybe a few oil spots.

The debris and oil drips accumulate in the middle, the edges get debris and mulch if there's trees and a kerb.

If you ride a motorcycle you learn quickly about colors on the road as they affect your traction...

 

Edit; its all different if you want to render wet conditions.