Unreal Engine 5.2 - Crystal, Ice, Gemstone Materials Tutorial

Topic: Shading In Unreal Engine 5.2+ / 5+

In this video we look at how to create materials of Crystal, Ice and Gemstones in Unreal Engine. The approach in this video can be used in Unreal Engine 5.2 Substrate, as well as older versions of Unreal (Unreal 4 & Unreal 5) in the Default Shading System.

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Tags:
Computer Graphics, Strata Shading, Substrate, Ice, Gemstones, Gems, Crystals, Lava, Magma, Shading & Materials In Unreal

[renderbucket]

If your not familiar with POM (Parallax Occlusion Mapping) in Unreal, Check Out This Tutorial:

[DArtAR]

Thank you for the tutorial, I have a tip for the Viewers, try to use a panner after the POM for the Surface Texture, you will love the result!

[carlosrivadulla]

You've been doing an amazing job lately! I'm so excited to see what you'll be able to do when SideFX relaunches COPs and expands the MaterialX nodes, allowing you to layer them further in Substrata.

[doc.skillz]

Amazing tutorial friend. I used a panner and a texture sample to add some movement to the glow, then used a time and sine node with some other math so give a smooth pulse to the glow, which make it (in my opinion) a fully fledged material. its still relatively simple in terms of shader complexity. I also hadn't seen tutorials mentioning switches or grouping before. That will actually enable me to make a master material and turn features on and off as needed

[tsurello]

One of the best tutorials I've seen. Great pacing, descriptions, everything. Thanks so much!

[OX_Tools]

Awesome materials! It's so hard to get crystals to look good in real time materials.

[OliverEnde]

You are doing great turorials! I really learn much stuff out of them, keep going on! Thank you so much!!!

[Diegobch]

This is a fantastic video man! I love the way you explain and make it look so simple! and also easy to create following your steps, not evading any explanation or skipping shortcuts or anything, you take your time to explain every single thing without it being redundant or unnecesary, its really usefull and fun to watch as well! thank you!

[NoTengoIdeaGuey]

One other thing that could help sell the crystal effect re: normal maps is to use a clearcoat normal map.

Clearcoat normal is for materials like carbon fiber covered in resin where the outer surface is very smooth, but just beneath it is a secondary surface e.g. carbon fiber weave, that has its own variation that can scatter light.

So youd use the POM normal for the primary normal and then use the regular UV normals for the clearcoat normal, get the best of both worlds 🤌.

Idk how it works w/substrate, my job right now still uses 4.27 so im not as practiced with the new 5.0 stuff.

[no_damage]

FOr some reason I dont have substrate available in my project settings. like its not there.

[tbk_]

Super helpful. Total noob to UE here. Also looks great.

[Slowness]

Setting the texture of the POM heightmap to parameter, changes the POM behavior, making it seem like there's no depth
Look at the material preview at 23:40

[galvaro]

Thank you so much for this amazing guide, really appreciated

[LightWorkerBass]

Awesome bro! I’m finally diving into materials now and this tutorial was fun! Thanks. I would like to see how to make a fine haired shaggy carpet like material without using groom. If that is possible or would you need geometry to do it?🤔

[FireballVFX]

It was super useful and well explained. Thank you!

[rhinoreign]

Great & feature rich overview on Substrate. Thanks for sharing!

[danielbalzer]

Great tutorial - and material 🙂 Thanks for putting this together

[RAM_industrial_death_metal]

Great video and thank you for it. Any chance you would make a similar video but without substrate?

[abhinav]

I'm glad to have found your channel!

[jimluckhardt]

Heya thanks for the tutorial!
Could you please explain how you do it without the substrate? You said nothing is substrate specific but I have no clue what to use instead of the substrate materials that u you are using. I dont know that much about all the unreal 5.1 nodes and which ones to use instead for i.e albedo diffuse etc.. Would love some help on that!
Cheers :)