Welcome to My Tutorial on Importing Textures and Turning them into usable materials in game.
So you found some great textures or the provided textures with the editor doesn’t meet your needs…but now we need them in a useable form in game.
Lets begin.
With the editor open. Look to the left
In your Content Browser, Select your Texture Folder then at the top you can click on IMPORT
Browse to where you downloaded your new texture.
You will need to select both the material texture, the part that is visible in game. And the Normal Texture which is the part that gives it depth.
Click OK.
You should now see both the material texture and the normal texture in the content browser. If you do not click on the search function and type the name of your texture.
Before we can use our textures we need to make them into a usable material
In the content browser click on the material folder
Click New, Then click Material
Rename your new material to match the downloaded texture your working with. this helps you keep your project organized and tidy.
Now that we have our material made. double click it to go to the material editor.
In the content browser go to your texture folder. select both version of your new texture. and drag them into the material editor.
Create two separate “constant” from the palette window or by right clicking in the material editor and selecting constant. so that we can adjust the values to our materials for roughness and metallic
Link your material texture to base color.
Link your Normal Texture normal
Link your 1st constant to Metallic
Link your 2nd constant to Roughness
At the top of the Material Editor click Apply.
As you can see in the top left of our material preview we now have a new material.
You can click on either constant to adjust the values of both Roughness and metallic to get the desired look and feel that you want in game.
remember to click apply when you change the values of roughness and metallic anytime you are satisfied with the look and feel of your new texture to save it.
If you have not done so. i highly suggest you watch the UE4 Material Tutorials on www.unrealengine.com
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZlv_N0_O1gaCL2XjKluO7N2Pmmw9pvhE
Thank you and good luck with your project.
Billy Jackson
Project Athena VR