BirdSeed Substances
Examples of each kind of seed, rendered in Substance Painter.
A screencapture of one of the particle systems from Modo that was used to generate the seed for the initial texture maps.
The basic wild bird seed, rendered in Substance Designer. Millet, sunflower seed, safflower seed, milo, and wheat.
Wild bird seed, but with more than the usual amount of sunflower seeds.
A wild bird seed that is composed of mostly sunflower seeds.
I wanted to make a contrasting seed in light colors, but my system couldn't handle a mixture that was mostly millet (the tiny round seeds), so this mix is mostly composed of safflower seed.
I knew that for all of the bird-themed projects I wanted to work on, I was going to need some seed, both 3D and some 2D textures. So, to make life a bit simpler for the long run, I first modeled some 3D seed, generated particle systems to drop it and spread it in layers, and then used the regular camera to render out color, depth, and normal layers. This allowed me the freedom to create several different mixes by adjusting the rates of emissions for each of the different seed emitters.
These layers of renders, I then composited in Substance Designer, in order to create these seed-mix Substances.
As a bonus, I can take my original seed models and use them to add finer details in my projects by scattering real 3D seed over the Substance materials. Win-win! (This is something you can already see in my bird feeders and seed balls.)