Definition: Materials in Unreal Engine define surface properties of objects, controlling visual appearance like color, reflectivity, bumpiness, transparency.
Functionality: Materials tell the render engine how surfaces interact with light using data from images (textures) and node-based Material expressions.
Getting Started
Material Creation: Node-based workflow allowing the creation of varied surface types.
Recommended Resources:
Essential Material Concepts: Introduction to Unreal Engine materials.
Physically Based Materials: Overview of primary inputs for physically based materials.
Material Editor User Guide: Practical guide to using the Material Editor.
Material Inputs: In-depth look at available material inputs.
Material Data Types: Introduction to data types in Material Editor.
Substrate Material Framework
Status: Experimental system.
Material Workflow Concepts
Material Instances: Optimize workflow by customizing materials to produce multiple variations from a single parent material.
Material Functions: Package parts of a material graph into a single node for reuse in other materials.
Layered Materials: Methods for creating complex surfaces by layering materials.
Tutorials Index
Types of Content: Step-by-step, project-based documents to teach specific aspects of material creation.
Examples:
Animating UV Coordinates.
Using Texture Masks.
Material Reference Pages
Material Editor: Contains numerous expressions and functions for use in the Material graph.
Reference Pages: Organized by categories like Blends, Gradients, Math, Coordinates.
Additional Concepts and Tools
Intermediate to Advanced Topics:
Bent Normal Maps: Using bent normal maps.
Bump Mapping Without Tangent Space: Achieving bump mapping without classic tangent space.
Curve Atlases: Access curve linear color data through materials.
Customized UVs: Performance optimization with vertex shader calculations.
Material Analyzer: Tool for analyzing materials.
Refraction Using Pixel Normal Offset: Overview of refraction mode.
Storing Custom Data Per-Primitive: Workflow for storing custom data accessible through Blueprint.
Lit Translucency: Method of lighting and shadowing translucent surfaces.