Layered Materials - Unreal Engine 4

A project example made in Unreal to showcase flexible materials techniques. This workflow enables you to quickly adjust and tweak many surface details directly in the engine like wood grain, color, tiling, how much dirt, grunge or stains the model should display.

It is a blend of multiple material functions revealed by a texture mask. Each layers uses the same base material function and textures can be changed in instances using parameters. This allows for a lot of reusability in textures for a more consistent look across a scene.

Most models in that simple scene are using instances from that material for a more consistent look as a whole, sharing the same wood details, wear and grimes.

The mask texture combines 3 mask into the RGB channels. These were baked from Blender using procedural shading and photobased details.

Here’s a clip of the material in action when tweaked in an instance.