Autodesk 12812-051462-9011 User Guide 3 - Page 15

such surfaces, you need to use reflection mapping on page 5964 or ray tracing (see Raytrace Material on page 5490). The three color components blend at the edges of their regions. Between ambient and diffuse, the blending is calculated by the shader. Between diffuse and specular, you set the amount of blending by using the standard material's highlight controls. Choosing Colors for Realism Materials add greater realism to a scene only if you choose their colors and other properties to appear like real-world objects. This topic presents some general guidelines for choosing standard material colors. When possible, you should also observe colors in the objects you are modeling, especially under different lighting conditions. For objects on which you want the viewer to focus attention, an unmapped standard material doesn't often provide the level of realistic detail you probably want. However, for distant and peripherally visible objects, as well as some kinds of real-world materials, such as molded plastic, an unmapped standard material can work well. Keeping the number of maps to a minimum can help keep down the file size. Indoor and Outdoor Lighting Whether a scene is indoors or outdoors affects your choice of material colors, just as it affects the way you set up lights on page 4970. Full sunlight is bright and unidirectional. Most indoor lighting is less intense and more even (that is, multidirectional) than daylight. However, some special indoor lighting (and nighttime outdoor lighting), as for the stage, also features intense, directional light. Direct sunlight has a yellow tint. Materials for objects to appear in daylight should have a specular color of a pale, unsaturated yellow (for example, RGB values of 240, 240, 188). The ambient color should be the complement of the specular: a deep, dark purple with a hint of the diffuse color. Materials for objects to appear under normal interior lighting should have a specular color that is close to white. (Our perception compensates for the yellow or green tint that is often present in artificial light.) The ambient color can often have the same hue as the diffuse color, but with a darker value. 5270 | Chapter 19 Material Editor, Materials, and Maps