This section describes the parameters situated on the controls page that are used by all textures. These include controls common to both colour bump textures. To go directly to a particular section click on the links above. Back will take you back to the contents page.

For colour textures the do blend check box controls whether, for a particular pattern, the colours are blended from one colour to the next. With this option enabled (i.e. checked) the colour will blend, based on the defined blend points otherwise there will be discrete steps between the colours. To understand how the blending and colours work see the manual section entitled "Gradients".

The blend affects not only the colours but the colour and any alpha parameters that are being used for controlling the transparency, reflectivity or layering of the object.

The figures below shown the affect of having no blending and blending on the rjlinear and rjbozo textures. TIP: For Colour1 to be seen when blending is disabled the Blend1 value must be greater than 0.0.

For colour textures the affect colour check box controls whether the object's colour will be affected by the pattern. When this option is enabled the object's colour will be modified otherwise it will remain unchanged.

Shown below are four figures. The first figure shows a plane with vertical stripes. The second figure shows the same plane with a second rjlinear texture, horizontal stripes, applied having its affect colour check box checked. The third figure shows the same plane but this time the second rjlinear texture has its affect colour check box unchecked. Here, it can be seen that there is no modification of the object's colour by the second rjlinear texture. The final picture simply shows the two textures merged, using the alpha channels, so both layers can be seen.

For colour textures the affect reflect check box controls whether the object's reflectivity will be affected by the pattern. When this option is enabled the pattern will be used to affect the reflectivity of the object. NOTE : For the affect reflect to work the base reflectivity of the object must first be set. The other parameter that affect the object's reflectivity is the Use Colour/Alpha option. When this option set to colour then colour1 to colour4 will be used directly to affect the reflectivity depending on the blend points, blend1 to blend4. With the option set to alpha then alpha1 to alpha4 will be used to affect the reflectivity depending on the blend points blend1 to blend4.

The figures below show how the affect reflect check box controls the object's reflectivity. The initial figure shows the basic texture with no reflectivity set. In the next two figures the base reflectivity was set to 255,255,255 and the affect reflect check box checked with the colour being used for the reflectivity. Of the two figures the first one has its affect colour checked and the second one does not. The final two figures show the same but with the alpha channel being used to affect the reflectivity (alpha values were set to 255 for the red sections of the texture). The best way to think of the alpha channels is to imagine them as a being white, i.e. a colour of 255,255,255. Remember The Do Blend check box also affect the application of the texture and will therefore directly affect the application of the reflectivity.

For colour textures the remove spec. check box controls whether the object's Specularity is removed for filtered parts of the object. One problem with highly specular objects is the highlight appearing on filtered parts. This is OK for glass or clear plastic but if the filtered parts are supposed to be holes then the object will not look right. When this option enabled the Specularity is reduced proportionally to the amount of filter applied.

The figures below show four objects. This first two show two highly specular objects with bits cut out. You can see that where there are holes there is still Specularity. The second two figures show the same objects with the Specularity removed, that is the remove spec. check box is checked. The cut outs now look like holes.

Texture maps provide a way of using one texture to control the application of two other textures. For example, imagine starting with a base texture like rjscheck. You can then add two further textures and specify that the first appears on on set of checks and the second appears only on the other checks. The texture map option can also be used to control the scaling of following colour or bump textures and to control the height of bumps on following bump textures.

In order to use the texture map function to generate texture maps you must first add the texture that is going to control the application of the following textures. This is known as the material map. The important thing about this texture is that the blend1 to blend4 parameters control the application of the following textures. It is generally advisable to disable the affect colour option as we only want to use the function of this texture. The next texture that is added will be the first "material". In order to enable this the texture map check box must be checked as well as the affect layer option. The affect layer option must be enabled so that the texture can control the fading. Now, the blend1 and blend2 controls of the material map (that is the initial texture) control the application of the first material. This will be applied using the material maps pattern until blend1 and will fade until no application at blend2. The third texture added will work in the same way as the previous one except that it is controlled by blend3 and blend4 of the material map. In this instant there will be no material application until blend3 is reached. The material will be applied, based on the material map's pattern, with increasing intensity, until blend4 where it is applied "full on". Hopefully, you can now see that by adjusting blend1 to blend4 the material map pattern can be used to blend any two textures. Of coarse, there does not have to be two textures. This function can use a material map to control the application of just one material texture.

TIP: The easiest way to start out is the add the three textures and set all of the material map's blend points to 0.5. Each of the two materials will then be applied for half of the material maps pattern.

The first set of figures below show an example check material maps. The first figure shows the material map, in this case rjscheck. Next red/green rjbozo was applied to one set of checks, (what were the black checks). The final figure shows a blue/yellow rjbozo applied to the other checks (what were the white checks). For the second set of figures the first figure shows a rjlinear material map. Here the two blending texture are merged so that the two rjbozo textures blend together. With the blending an issue is raised. You may notice that as the texture merge they lighten. This is the original object colour or pattern showing through, in this case white. To over come this simply apply one of the textures being blended full on before the material map.It is important to remember that the affect layer check box must be checked for the blending to occur. Also the material map should have its affect colour check box unchecked so that its pattern is not applied to the object.

In the same way two colour textures can be blended together so two bump maps can also be blended. IN FACT ANY COMBINATION OF COLOUR AND BUMP MAPS CAN BE BLENDED. IN THE EXAMPLES ABOVE ANY OF THE TEXTURES BEING BLENDED COULD HAVE BEEN A BUMP TEXTURE. Here blend1/blend2 control the bump height of the first texture and blend3/blend4 the height of the second texture both based on the material maps pattern. The bumps will be applied using the material maps pattern at full height until blend1 and will fade until flat at blend2. The difference between blend1 and blend2 controls the length of the transition. The third bump texture added will work in the same way as the previous one except that it is controlled by blend3 and blend4 of the material map. In this instant there will be no material application until blend3 is reached. The bump texture will then be applied, based on the material map's pattern, with increasing height until blend4 where it is applied "full height". As before, The difference between blend3 and blend4 controls the length of the transition.

Again, the first set of figure below shown the rjscheck pattern to use as the material map. Here, vertical and horizontal rib bump are used as the materials. Similarly, the rjlinear examples are given using the rib bump texture.

The use last layer option allows a previous texture's function to be the function used by this texture. This can be used after a bump texture to allow the bumps to be coloured or after another colour texture to extend the colour map past the four colour limit imposed by just one texture. Both options are detailed below:

As stated above, the use last layer option provides a way of extending the number of colours in a colour map. With a colour texture already added a second texture can be then added (this may be any colour texture but its generally easier to just duplicate the first) and its use last layer check box checked. The function of the first texture will now be used. The blending of the colours/alpha settings will now occur across the two textures. So the colour blend will occur between colour4 on the first texture and colour1 on the second using the difference between blend4 on texture one and blend1 on texture two. This means that blend4 on texture one must be less than 1.0. The same will happen for alpha parameters. Also bear in mind that with the use last layer check box checked it is the first texture that controls the pattern.

The figures below the how a colour map of four, eight and twelve colours can be created. Each time a texture is added and it use last layer check box checked. The blend point then follow on from the previous texture's last blend value forming a contiguous colour map. Check out the tutorial on colour maps

For colour textures the affect layer check box controls whether the texture will be merged with the current colour of the object (including any textures that have already been applied). The amount of merging is controlled by the alpha settings. With this option enabled and an alpha setting of zero then the colour will be applied full on. With an alpha setting of 255 the colour will not have any affect and the current colour/pattern will show through completely. Settings in between these two values will mix the current colour with the new pattern colour proportionally.

NOTE: For the texture map options to work correctly when creating material maps the affect layer check box MUST be checked so that the texture can modify the alpha application of the texture.

The figures below show the affect of varying the alpha settings with the affect layer option set. The plane has a base texture applied giving vertical green and red stripes. A second texture, rjlinear, was applied giving horizontal yellow and blue stripes. The second texture had all its affect layer option enabled. All of the alpha settings for the second texture were then changed, in steps, from 255 to 0.

For colour textures the affect filter check box controls whether the object's transparency will be affected by the pattern. When this option is enabled the pattern will be used to affect the transparency of the object. NOTE : For the affect filter to work the base transparency of the object must first be set. The other parameter that affects the object's transparency is the Use Colour/Alpha option. With the option set to colour then colour1 to colour4 will be used directly to affect the transparency depending on the blend points blend1 to blend4. With the option set to alpha then alpha1 to alpha4 will be used to affect the transparency depending on the blend points blend1 to blend4.

The figures below show how the affect reflect check box controls the object's transparency. The initial figure shows the basic texture with no transparency set. In the next two figures the base transparency was set to 255,255,255 and the affect filter was checked with the colour being used for the transparency. Of the two figures the first one has its affect colour checked and the second one does not. The final two figures show the same but with the alpha channel being used to affect the transparency (alpha channels were set to 255 for the red sections of the texture). The best way to think of the alpha channels is to imagine them as a white, i.e. a colour of 255,255,255.

The force filter option when enabled will cause the current texture to force it filter pattern on the object irrespective of any of the previous layers. Normally, without this option enabled, the first layer will provide a filter pattern and subsequent layers will sit on top of this but without removing any of the solid parts of previous layers. This is fine unless you want a pattern to phase out a previous texture. The force filter option allow this to happen.

The figures below show the affect of enabling and disabling the force filter option. The first set of two figures show a green rjlinear fade down the object. Without the force filter option enabled the fade does not affect the under lying texture which in this case is the red stripes. By checking the force filter check box the rjlinear texture now filters all the object irrespective of any previous textures. The second set of figures show how the option can be used to fade out texture, in this case creating a flame affect.

The texture scale option allows a material map to control the scaling of the current texture. This feature work with both bump and colour texture.

To use this function with colour textures a texture must first be applied to act as the scale material map. This must be a colour texture. Generally, the affect colour option will be disabled as the colour function may not be required. A second can then be applied. For the scaling to function both the texture map and the texture scale check boxes must to enabled on the second texture. The second textures scaling will now be affected by the material map (i.e. the first texture). The first texture's function controls the second texture's scale proportionally. So, where the materials map's function equates to 0.0 the scaling will be zero and will increase to full scale when the material maps functions equates to 1.0. The range of the scaling can be controlled using blend3 and blend4 of the material map. Blend3 controls the minimum scaling that can occur and blend4 the maximum. NOTE: The blend1 and blend2 controls of the material map still control the fading of the colour texture is the same way as with normal colour map. The affect layer options needs to be checked for this to function.

The simplest way to understand how this works in to see the results. The examples below show rjlinear controlling the scaling of the rjdot texture. The following pictures show the affects of the texture scale with different values for blend3 and blend4 for the rjlinear material map. The final picture shows how the texture blending can still be used by changing blend1 and blend2 on the material map.

The colour alpha radio buttons control whether the colour (colour1 to colour4) or the alpha (alpha1 to alpha4) will be used to control the transparency or reflectivity of the object when enabled to do so. The see the affect of this option check of the sections on Affect Filter and Affect Reflect.