How To/walkthrough For Stainless Steel

[DakotaContractor]

Do any of you more senior CA users/members have or know a how-to on how to get stainless steel to render accurately in CA? Or a link to one? Or a source for a good material to achieve the goal? I'd even be ok with it requiring a 3rd party render engine like Thea etc. long as there is a walkthrough involved to explain the process step by step. As it stands I've tried every texture/material I could find via the forums and google( at least the ones that CA would successfully import). Also tried every suggested lighting arrangement I could find in the forums and then some and none of them create a realistic representation of stainless steel on the appliances. I would LOVE some help with this.

 

Attached a couple examples I've come across of what I'm trying to achieve. Unfortunately the example images were rendered outside CA since I have yet to find even an example image of anything resembling realistic looking SS inside CA.

 

Thanks in advance for your help.

[country]

Have you done a forum search? There have been a lot of stainless materials that users have shared.

[CJSpud]

There are some users who have done "fairly well" with SS ray traces in Chief but I believe the best ones I have seen posted on Chief Talk used other software.  Many of those other programs, as I am sure you know, cost some pretty big $'s to purchase.  As Sherry suggested, search the forum ... especially the Time To Share Your Goodies" (or whatever it's called) ... and see what others have been doing/using.  Many have shared the settings etc. they like to use which may be helpful to you.

 

Now if Chief could give us ray traces close to what you see in this photo (the SS), that would be GREAT:

 

[Dennis_Gavin]

Curt - to me that is too reflective.  Real SS is not that reflective. 

How about this?  It is a hairline SS texture set to SS material finish in Chief.

[CJSpud]

I think that was a real photo I posted .... I captured it from Houzz or Home Stratosphere a day or two ago.  Yours looks pretty good for Chief, but the SS to me looks too grainy, almost like coarse sandpaper.  Maybe that graininess can be improved on by tweaking the material settings.

[DakotaContractor]

Agree with CJ on the render example..Sorry Dennis the one you posted is no where near the quality I'm hoping for. Thank you for trying though =)  

 

Thanks for the insight CJ & Country. Unfortunately I've already scoured the CA forums and Google like crazy trying to find stuff, but it all creates inferior looking SS and anything that shows promise CA won't import. Unfortunately using any texture with reflections already in it makes it look fake unless the stars align and your lighting just so happens to match the reflection locations on the material then one can pull off something halfway decent. The materials without reflections tend to result in a overly matte surface. Ideally we'd have a quality material with a few associated bump map options to create the actual "brushed" texture look on the material. Right now it just results in a box covered in SS wrapping paper.

 

Yeah CJ they are definitely costly, but after purchasing two copies of X7 Premier to find that it doesn't achieve the desired result, what's a few more bills right? lol. It looks like my only option may be to shell out another $500 bucks for something that creates quality SS surfaces and with it quality renders . That or I'll just keep my fingers crossed for a better engine in X9 =) Thanks for trying guys.

[VisualDandD]

"Real" stainless is quite reflective.   When I was looking to improve my renderings, I actually took the time to take a close look (in real life) how it behaves.   I was surprised at just how reflective it is.   The grainy thing is difficult to achieve.  I dont shoot for doing many "photo realistic" renderings and do most in just watercolor/line.  But this is from X6 I think where I was playing around.  If I spent more time on it, I think I could improve it some from here with a good bump map.

 

 

I have started doing more stuff in Lumion and still playing with making my SS better.  It takes some work, but this is where I left off.

The difficulty is real SS has some minor distortions in it.  Our CAD models want things in perfect planes.   Places where handles attach to faces, distort the material slightly and give distorted reflections.  At some point,  I may attempt to tackle this with an alteration to bump maps....but as I said, I dont worry too much about trying for perfect realism.

 

 

[DakotaContractor]

That is probably the best looking SS inside Chief that I've seen to date Justin. Did you use the default SS chief materials in that render? Do you already have an associated bump for it that you're using?

[VisualDandD]

That is probably the best looking SS inside Chief that I've seen to date Justin. Did you use the default SS chief materials in that render? Do you already have an associated bump for it that you're using?

No bumps in that render.   I think if one were added, it would improve greatly.

 

I did that a few years back.   I probably tweaked the material.  It was a few years back.  I will try to pull it up and will share it when I get a chance.

[jcaffee]

This is the best SS I've ever achieved in CA.  On the countertop, I used the built-in Predefined Metal, Stainless Steel, Brushed, 30%/8% and a custom bump map.

 

jon