Uber Matreial

The Uber Material is an asset material based on Nodes. Primarily, this means that the calculation of the material is controlled by Nodes, unlike a Standard Material or a Physical Material. However, Node Material assets are often characterized by the fact that the Nodes involved are not necessarily visible or have to be operated directly in order to edit the material. The configuration can often also be done via the Attribute Manager or even via the Material Editor, entirely without having to open the Node Editor.

This is because Node Material assets are usually designed to represent a specific effect or surface properties. This is also the case with the Uber Material, which can be used to simulate many properties of a Physical Material or a Standard Material with the help of Material Nodes. The Uber Material is very well-suited for slowly familiarizing oneself with the functional principle of the Node Materials without having to forego familiar material channels and their functions. However, unlike the Standard Material or the Physical Material, new Material Nodes can also be combined with the Uber Material.

You can edit the Uber Material in the Node Editor, but you can also open the Material Editor as usual by double-clicking its preview image in the Material Manager, or edit the properties of a selected Uber Material in the Attribute Manager.

in the individual material channels of a Uber Material, Material Nodes as well as textures can be linked via separate connector icons. This is probably the most obvious difference to the Standard Material, which lacks this linking possibility to Material Nodes.

To create such a link, click on a connector icon in the Material Editor or Attribute Manager and then select Load Texture ... to load a new bitmap, Textures to link a texture already used elsewhere, or choose Connect Node to connect to the Material Nodes listed there.

Basic tab in the Attribute Manager

When selecting the parent material, you will find some settings in the Basic tab (do not confuse this with the tag of the same name when selecting the material in the Node Editor) of the Attribute Manager:

In the left column of the Material Editor, or under the Basic tab in the Attribute Manager, you will find the Uber Material's channels, which are largely based on the channels of a Standard Material or a Physical Material. By activating the options behind the material channels you can enable the corresponding properties of the material.

In addition, you can edit the Name of the material and its assignment to a Layer here.

A button below the material channels lets you open the Node Editor to work with the Material Nodes directly.