Realistic diamond shader?

In the entirety of Fab (as well as the previous UE marketplace), I’ve only ever found ONE plugin [Crystal Renderer] for creating realistic diamonds and gems with good refraction and flare rendering. But like… only ONE. All other plugins and “addons” are all either cartoonish in nature, “ghost” material with high gloss surfaces [which really looks weird], or is practically variants of high gloss over textures [fine for opaque and non-translucent gems and stones]. But you’re kinda hard pressed to find a plug in/addon/etc. for a gem quality stone, let alone a cut stone with high refraction and dispersion [like zircon, sphene or diamond]. Does anyone know of another?

Hey there @TajiyaO! Welcome to the community! I was coming to recommend Crystal Renderer but it looks like you’d already found it. Realistic crystal rendering is going to be somewhat difficult to find in a mostly video game based material economy. Using caustics you could probably get some great visuals.

A couple users have a few examples or directions they took on this thread, though it’s older:

Here’s a video that could get you started with a less realistic setup, and you could add more realistic features as you go:

Alternatively, you could start with a free glass material and try to modify it to suit your needs:

Disclaimer: One or more of these links are unaffiliated with Epic Games. Epic Games is not liable for anything that may occur outside of this Unreal Engine domain. Please exercise your best judgment when following links outside of the forums.

Hmm let me see if I can help here.

If you’re using substrate, you’ll likely have a lot of luck getting a realistic diamond look due to its layering system and real-world values. That being said, Substrate is a relatively untouched feature so it’s very difficult to learn and find assets for. Here’s probably the closest you’ll get:

Now, for traditional materials, this effect would need to be completely faked, as materials contain no actual depth values for realistic light dispersion. This is a very advanced effect so it is unlikely you will be able to find a good version of it for sale.

What basic pieces would that entail?

-A modeled raised surface
-An interior texture with a bump map offset to fake depth. The texture and height map would have to be carefully crafted
-A version of the texture with colors, which with some math can randomly show colors / brightness based on camera angle (similar to this tutorial https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSRM3n14k3A)

Here are some assets / tutorials that should give you a good jumping off point:

TLDR: It can be done, but if you’re not a technical artist you’re likely in way over your head.

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