This $25 PDF lists PBR color values for 600 real-world materials
How red is a tomato? Redder than a redcurrant? Redder than a raspberry? And how just how black is coal? Blacker than black paint? Blacker than ink?
If these questions keep you up at night, you need either a therapist or the PBR Color Reference list, games artist Grzegorz Baran‘s meticulously researched list of real-world material properties.
As of this month’s update, which covers metals, it contains the color and luminance values for “around 600” common real-world substances, measured with a professional spectrophotometer.
The guide – an essential reference for shading and look dev artists – is available as both an Excel spreadsheet and a nicely laid-out PDF for visual reference.
A huge list of PBR values for real-world materials, for VFX, games and visualization
There are a number of online lists of PBR material values, including popular open-source database Physically Based.
The PBR Color Reference List differs from them in two key ways.
First, it’s much bigger: whereas most online lists top out at 100 or so materials, there are well over 500 in the PBR Color Reference List.
Second, it’s much more hardcore: all of the measurements were taken by Baran himself using professional instruments – a NixSensor Spectro 2 spectrophotometer for the most recent values.
Baran – himself a Materials Artist at Ubisoft Reflections – describes it as suitable for “the most dedicated materials nerds”, as well as artists who just need a quick, accurate reference guide.
Latest update adds values for real-world metals
The PBR Color Reference list has been around for a few years (the video at the top of the story is for the original release), but is being updated regularly.
This month’s update – version 11 of the list – is one of the biggest, and adds around a hundred values for real-world metals, in both clean and rusted or oxidised states.
They join previously measured values for a wide range of other common substances, including building materials, ground materials, fabrics, foods and plants.
They are available as an Excel spreadsheet of values that can be used in DCC apps: Baran namechecks the Substance 3D tools, 3ds Max, Blender, Maya, Marmoset Toolbag, Unity and Unreal Engine.
However, the download also includes a nicely laid-out PDF with Substance thumbnails of the materials in question that can be used as a quick visual reference.
Price
The PBR Color Reference List is available as a PDF and a .xslx file. It comes with a PDF of Grzegorz Baran’s technical guide to color calibration, Color Calibration for PBR Materials.
A single-user license costs $24.99; a Studio license costs $499.99.
Get the PBR Color Reference List from Grzegorz Baran’s Gumroad store
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