Making / Finding Realistic Textures

[Ryan Dognaux]

Okay, every year there are the animations that look so real that you can barely tell that they're animations at all, and there are ones that look incredibly cartoony. My question is, what textures/plugins are applied to get at ultra-realistic effect??

And there's nothing wrong w/ cartoony animations, for the record

[Suneet]

Hehe, well you can't get more real then an actual picture as the texture... but is that cheating?

Picture as texture, example (Old thing made for a lab ~ 8 months ago)

[Ryan Dognaux]

Very true, but I'm talking about the realism as seen in that scene right there... everything looks very crisp and real. What are some good was to achieve that look??

[gsensel]

In 2002 my old team (team 45 the Technokats) won the AutoDesk Technical Excellence Award for Animation. We won for our realism. In this we used many of the textures that are found within 3D studio Max. The key to making a texture look real is modifying it with plugins (built in ones not add ons) that are with in the program(s). For the animation you can look at www.technokats.org or if it is not there the Webmaster will be willing to send it to you.

[Jeremy_Mc]

Uhmm...honestly you can add to the realism of a texture by just using effective lighting.

You don't need fancy plugins or some incredible image program...just ingenuity, 3dsMAX, and creativity.

[Matt Hallock]

Make your own textures, you're not supposed to be using other peoples stuff anyhow. Besides, would you really want to settle for a texture that was made for someone elses project?

[ebmonon36]

I make my own textures. When taking a picture for a texture, make sure you are perpendicualar to the object if it has a lot of lines on it (bricks, tile etc.). Also make sure the lighting is consistent because if you have to tile it, it will look wierd. Try avoiding distinctive features in the texture like knots in wood for the same reason. I have not done too many textures with photoshop or anything like that.
Eric

[Matt Hallock]

However, if you take pictures of things, the you can't create really good bump maps with them. It's quicker but has its drawback.

[kcy88]

First off, you need to understand the components that make a texture "realistic". You need to have a good understanding of specular, bump, diffusion, the difference between refraction and reflections, transparent and translucent.
here's a link that explains all that.
http://leigh.cgcommunity.com/tutorialspart1.htm
enjoy.

[Salik Syed]

def... go to the website above...it has good stuff..
also it is not much to do w/ actual texture more w/ lighting and also the properties of the texture

[Ryan Dognaux]

Thanks guys you've been a great help, if you have any more tips we'd appreciate it. Definately gonna focus more on texturing and lighting this year, which is why I created this thread... I wasn't implying that I wanted a website with 1000's or textures or something.. and Max comes with textures, so wouldn't that be considered as using someone else's textures??..

Anyways, thanks to you guys who helped

[Matt Hallock]

Those textures come with 3DSMAX however, it's what you can do with 3DSMAX and the contents of the program, not other peoples models and textures. Since that set of textures comes with the program you could use them.

[kcy88]

Here's a better website for you.
http://www.secondreality.ch/