where do i find .mat files

[Master chief]

ok i know that i have a pretty go .mat collection that came with AM but i was wondering where i can get more as i only have one water type mat and its a dark ocean and that does not look so good for a puddel

[Caroline]

Water is pretty hard to do - you could try a search for "+water +material" (without the quotes)

 

Although a puddle is just reflectivity and maybe transparency / refraction? You could try changing the surface attributes, like in this thread:

http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=10187

 

There are the DarkTree materials from

http://www.darksim.com/Repository/

with rendered examples here:

http://www.pixelburg.com/am_materialtest/d...nt21/index.html

 

There's a fairly complicated tutorial (that I have not done yet) here, using animated displacement maps, I think:

http://www.babbagepatch.com/water.htm

[Caroline]

To use Darktree in A:M - I am assuming that you have a fairly recent version of A:M (12 or 13 onwards):

 

1. Download and extract the Darktree materials - the Darktree Repository with Thumbnails - you should now have them split out into folders, like na_water. If you have a look in the folder, you should see a .dsts file, which is the material, and a jpg of the material.

 

2. In A:M right click Materials, and click New Material.

 

3. Click the plus sign next to Materials

 

4. Right click Attribute

 

5. Click Change Type To > Plugin > DarkSim > SimbiontAM

 

6. In the Properties for this Attribute, click Load DarkTree

 

7. Find the .dsts file that you downloaded.

 

Apply it like a regular material (as in TaoA:M exercise 14 - Marble). Under the attributes properties, you will find lots of tweaks, so you can change colour etc.

[Caroline]

If you do not have a recent version of A:M (though why wouldn't you? ) I believe you can download and install the free Simbiont plug in from:

 

http://www.darksim.com/html/simbiont.html

[Eric2575]

For a simple puddle, why would you use a material? Just set the attributes for the water puddle surface and you're done. Simbionts are nice but take a hit on rendering times. You can also make your own materials or do a search on materials in the tutorial section of the forum.