TG Groovey

PARAMETERS

Listing :

  Groove Displacement Amount
  Groove Type
  Vertical Grooves
  Groove Frequency
  Groove Frequency (thousands)
  Groove Threshold
  Noise Type
  Noise Strength
  Noise Scale
  Octaves

Groove Displacement Amount

Range : 0 to 32

Set the amount of displacement for the grooves. Please note that different types of groove respond differently to this value, so this parameter may need adjusting if you alter the Groove Type. Also note that this parameter controls the displacement of the grooves only, and that higher values here do NOT increase the displacement for the Noise part of this shader.

Groove Type

Range : 0, 1, 2, 3 or 4

Determines the type of groove to calculate. 0 is based on a sin wave, 1 and 2 are based on slats, 3 is based on a triangular wave, and 4 is based on a pulse wave.

Groove Type 0

Groove Type 0

Groove Type 3

Groove Type 3

Groove Type 1

Groove Type 1

Sample renders of the different Groove Types.

Note how Type 0 responds differently to frequency from the others.

Type 1 and 2 are similar, but the order of the grooves is alternated (so where “shiny” in Type 1, it’s “not shiny” in Type 2).

Groove Type 2

Groove Type 2

Groove Type 4

Groove Type 4

Vertical Grooves

Range : Checked / Unchecked

If unchecked, the grooves run in a horizontal direction (if rendered on a sphere, default UV mapping, with no SL2 override to the mapping), and if checked the grooves run in a vertical direction. Clearly, the “meaning” of horizontal and vertical may change depending on the UV mapping being used, and on whether you use the SL2 mapping override functions.

Groove Frequency and Groove Frequency (thousands)

Range : 0 to 999;  0 to 100

Sets the number of grooves - a higher value results in more (and so smaller) grooves. The second parameter, Groove Frequency (thousands) increments the groove count by 1000 for each unit shown, to allow for massively high numbers of grooves which can be useful for blurred reflections, or for an anisotropic style look.

Note that moire effects may occur once the grooves are too small to render fully and separately in your output image - see the Tips section for information on this.

Groove Threshold

Range : 0 to 1

Only affects Groove Types 1 and 2. Adjusts the slope of the groove effect for these 2 Groove Types, resulting in thin bands for values of close to 1, and broader bands (similar to the other Groove Types) at values close to 0.

Note that a value of 1 will completely remove the groove effect, so is best avoided - even values close to 1 will likely result in an effect where the grooves are too thin to be seen.

Threshold 0

Threshold 0

Threshold 0.5

Threshold 0.5

Threshold 0.2

Threshold 0.2

Threshold 0.75

Threshold 0.75

Sample renders using different Groove Thresholds, with a Groove Type of 1.

Noise Type

Range : 0, 1 or 2

Set the type of noise to be used - 0 is Perlin, 1 is Classic, 2 is Sparse. Remember that these Noise Settings are separate and distinct from the Groove settings (since the grooves are completely regular and not dependent on any sort of noise processing at all).

Noise Strength

Range : 0 to 1

Sets the strength of the noise. Note that this usually should be kept very small, as low as 0.01 or 0.02, and this can still make a significant difference to the look of the surface. High values for this parameter can completely swamp any effect from the grooves, leaving you with the same effects as from a simple noise displacement shader :)

Note that the effect of the Noise Strength is dependent upon on the Noise Scale - the higher the value of the Noise Scale parameter, then the more pronounced the effect of the noise tends to be, often requiring lower values in the Noise Strength.

Also note that increasing the Noise Strength increases the displacement from the noise, but does NOT increase the displacement from the grooves.

Finally, note that setting this value to 0 turns off the noise processing, resulting in faster render times, as only the groove displacements need to be caculated.

Noise Scale

Range : 0 to 3200

This sets the scale of the noise displacement.

Octaves

Range : 0 to 10

Set the octaves for the noise displacement - smaller values give less detail, while higher values give more detail (at the expense of a slower render). Note that values above 4 do not normally yield much extra detail.

TG Groovey Intro

TG Groovey Parameters

TG Groovey Tips

TG Groovey Samples

TG Pack 2 Index