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View Full Version : need help with slime/ectoplasm shader

ewoud84
09-09-2004, 11:53 PM
Hi guys!

The last 2 months I've been working on the ECTO-1, the Cadillac hearse driven by the Ghostbusters. The model is coming along nicely, I'm in the middle of shading and texturing. If every thing goes acording to plan I can begin building the enviroment in the coming weeks. I want to create a scene with all splashes of slime or ectoplasm everywhere, and dripping from the walls, objects covers with slime.
a ghost with a slimy shader.

But I have absolutley no idea how I can acomplish such a thing. How the shaders must be builded, or where to start. I did looked around the forums and noticed that a SSS shader might be apropiate... but I have no idea how to make such a thing.
Or might other Mental Ray shaders be more apropriate? maybe FluidFX?

Could some one share his or hers ideas on how he or she would solve this problem?
many thanks in advance!

Ewoud
DiGiman
09-10-2004, 04:31 AM
It is far from perfect, but here is a quick little shader i put together for ya.
I don't know what look you are after, but this might be a starting point. Look in the hypershade to see what is going on.

http://www.alveymedia.com/test/slime.zip
http://www.alveymedia.com/test/slime.jpg
ewoud84
09-10-2004, 10:12 AM
thanks man!

It sure provides a good starting point!!
But could you give a little insight in how and why you did things in this shader?

for instance, you used both a ramp and curve, why not both ramps or both curves?

again many thanks!
Ewoud
DiGiman
09-10-2004, 03:29 PM
The shader is really pretty simple...
I used a ramp and curves just because its quick and dirty. Ramps are the easy way to go, just because there is a button in the hypershade that creates them. If I was doing things the "right" way, I probably would have used curves for the whole thing. I just find curves more intuitive, and I have more control of the falloff.

Idea behind the shader:
I don't really know how ectoplasm should look, but I started with a water shader I made a few months ago. I thought slime would be green and only semi transparent, so I upped the ambient color to something green. I figured because the slime would be kinda thick its transpariency would falloff pretty heavily towards the edges, as well as the slight incandescence.
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