How it works...

We've used the present recipe to learn about the material editor and we've also created our first material. Knowing what each section does within the editor will help a lot in the immediate future, as what we've just done is but a prelude to our real target—creating a physically based material. Now we are in a much better position to tackle that goal, so let's look at it in the next recipe!

Before moving on though, let's check the nodes that we have used to create this simple material. From an artist's point of view, the names that the engine has given to something like a color value or a grayscale value can seem a bit confusing. It might be difficult to establish a connection between the name of the Constant3Vector node and our idea of a color. But there is a reason for all of this!

The idea behind that naming convention is that these nodes can be used beyond the color values we have just assigned them. At the end of the day, a simple constant can be used in many different scenarios—such as depicting a grayscale value, using it as a brightness multiplier, or as a parameter inside a material function. Don't worry if you haven't seen these other uses yet, we will—the point is, the names that these nodes were given tell us that there are more uses beyond the ones we've seen.

With that in mind, it might be better to think of those elements we've been using in more mathematical terms. For instance, think of a color as an Red Green Blue (RGB) value, which is what we are defining with that previous Constant3Vector node. If you want to use an RGB value alongside an alpha one, why not use the Constant4Vector, which allows for a fourth input? Even though we are at a very early stage, it is always good to familiarize ourselves with the different expressions the engine uses.