Snow

Category: Texture Generators

Shader Family: Texture

Output: Color

Creates a realistic snow texture, which simulates the effect of snow sticking to objects such as trees or buildings. Based on a coordinate input, this shader examines the normal of the object's surface and uses this information to decide whether the snow will stick or not. You can achieve a realistic effect by using this shader in combination with a bumpmap texture shader. This will cause the snow to follow the bumping of an object.

You can also simulate dust or dirt on an object by applying a noise shader to the snow.

Name	The shader's name. Enter any name you like, or leave the default.
Coordinate	Defines the X, Y, and Z texture coordinates.
Snow Color	Defines the color of the snow. Unless you are simulating a planet or a layer of ash, make this white.
Surface Color	Defines the color of the surface beneath the layer of snow.
Threshold	Defines the maximum slope at which snow sticks to an object. High for snowdrifts; low for wet, heavy snow
Depth Decay	Defines how much the snow thickness decreases with the increasing slope. The higher the value, the sharper the changes between the snow and the surface underneath.
Maximum Thickness	Defines the maximum overall thickness of the snow.
Randomness	Controls the random variations of the snow's thickness. A value of 0 will probably result in unrealistic-looking snow. Remember that wind and terrain usually cause snow to fall unevenly, hence this parameter.
Random Frequency	Defines the frequency of the snow thickness variation. High for jagged peaks and valleys; low for a smooth layer

Render Tree Usage

Use this shader to drive a parameter with a texture effect anywhere in a render tree. This shader generates a texture that can be used as a color, a Weight value in a Mixer shader, or to drive any surface shader parameter.

Connect a Texture Space Controller shader to drive the Coordinate value of this shader.

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