1
$\begingroup$

I have this nice soda can: enter image description here

I want to put a label on it, so I did some research:

On the press, four (up to six) different ink rollers supply the colors that will coat the individual printer plates. Printer plates contact a rubberized blanket on a rotating wheel, resulting in a complete negative color image on the blanket. Clean cans are fed into the printer and are placed on a steel mandrel. The spinning mandrel then rotates the can body against the rotating blanket, resulting in the transfer of the final graphic image onto the can body. Other coatings are applied after the ink, and then are sent to the UV ovens. Next, the vacuum belts stabilize and support the cans in an optimal geometry for UV light exposure. The ovens operate at about 110 F and contains between six and eight 10-inch, 300 watt/inch, microwave energized mercury lamps. The lights focus maximum illumination on the exterior surface of the aluminum cans, as well as the interior to insure all ink is cured properly. Finally, internal coating is finally applied and dried through a gas fire oven.

The technical details (above) don't really seem to make it clear how the paint interacts with the can visually, so here is a comparison:

enter image description here

As you can see, the roughness stays about the same from the painted can to the non painted can, but, the painted can is colored. However, its not just changing the color of the metal because the white color apears to be less reflective than the rest of the colors.

Here is a screenshot of my current node setup. How should I make the can paint material? enter image description here

|improve this question
$\endgroup$
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ Since the ink layers over the metal each color may yeild different surface properties, so you may actually need different shaders for each different ink finish. I'd say make separate textures to use as masks to mix between different shaders inside the same material, if you are aiming for an ultra realistic result $\endgroup$ – Duarte Farrajota Ramos♦ Dec 3 '16 at 2:10
  • $\begingroup$ @DuarteFarrajotaRamos Interesting, I haven't actually made the texture for the soda can yet, so separating the colors by drawing it in illustrator may be better than stealing it off the internet and using many many color ramps and mix shaders. $\endgroup$ – 10 Replies Dec 3 '16 at 2:14
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ @DuarteFarrajotaRamos The problem with that is that performance would drop like a rock when using a bunch of shaders. Better would be to use a mask to control the shader properties within the same shader (they will all be relatively the same setup, just with different degrees of roughness, "metalness", anisotropy, etc.). $\endgroup$ – JakeD Dec 3 '16 at 3:35
  • $\begingroup$ Yeah that is also totally possible, but adjusting the texture grey values manually to get the right amount of properties (metalness, glossyness etc) can be a pain, also makes them pretty much non-reusable elsewhere. If you just make masks you can tweak any value directly in Blender to your taste, regardless of the texture. You can reuse the texture to make a can with the same design and different colors, and you can also reuse the shader to make different can designs by replacing only the mask textures $\endgroup$ – Duarte Farrajota Ramos♦ Dec 3 '16 at 5:22
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ @10Replies Check this: imgur.com/a/utZbp. It's based on CynicatPro PBR materials, with roughness texture. If it's acceptable to you I can make an answer. Only thing thats bothering me is that we do not know which colors are more/less relfective. $\endgroup$ – cgslav Dec 3 '16 at 9:21

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service, privacy policy and cookie policy

Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.