How to make metal more reflective?

[Nightmare4into96 (Kev)]

I wanted to make a realistic car for a long time, I tried out many ways to perfect the reflectivity of the material on the car. I turn the reflective scale up but, the metal is not so reflective as I think.

I’ve tried turning up the EnvironmentalSpecularScale to 1
I’ve tried turning up the EnvironmentalDiffuseScale to 1

Here is the result:

It did it’s job but it’s not as reflective.

Metal: The EnvironmentalDiffuseScale definitely made a big change but, the reflectivity in the middle. Not so reflective and not so dull, it looks like unpolished metal.

Foil: The EnvironmentalDiffuseScale definitely made a huge change. It made the shapes appear more than what it looks before. I personally like this texture the most because, it just looks more like aluminum foil.

DiamondPlate: The EnvironmentalDiffuseScale definitely made a big change as well. It made it more polished and clear. This is very good for Sci Fi games.

CorrodedMetal: The EnvironmentalDiffuseScale had made some changes in this one. It made the non rusted parts a little more polished and clear. The rust itself didn’t changed as much. It’s perfect the way it is now.

Conclusion: All of the different metals there is one common detail in all of them. They all reflect on the skybox and light but nothing else. I wanted metal to reflect off objects like decal, parts, meshes, etc. I wanted them to be more like mirrors. Also, why does decals not show up on glass??

This is an example of how light is being reflective of the metal but not the objects around them.

This is an example of what I mean of more reflective. See how all buildings surrounding the ball is being projected to the ball.

If you know a way to metal be more reflective please let me know.

[iccletus (ccletus)]

Try using Lighting.EnvironmentSpecularScale and Lighting.EnvironmentDiffuseScale, (That makes it shinier. But, you will need to use a different skybox from Roblox’s default one as the default one is too blue)

If this helped make sure to give me the solution button so people know you don’t need help anymore.

Results:
this

to

this

[Dev_JayR (JayR)]

@Nightmare4into96

I wanted metal to reflect off objects like decal, parts, meshes, etc. I wanted them to be more like mirrors

When it comes to making mirror-like parts on Roblox, you would need to have a somewhat extensive knowledge of programming. However, if you want to reflect light, I suggest you change the lighting settings from Voxel (or whatever you are using in the pictures) to Future. That way any lights you have near the metal part will reflect off the part in a more realistic way.

Hope this helps!

[Nightmare4into96 (Kev)]

Yes but I’ve already tried that, the light only bounces of the objects but the light is not transferring the image of the object it’s facing.

[iccletus (ccletus)]

Strange… Maybe try grabbing a free model and see how they make their metal or lighting look so shiny?

Or

I found this on the dev forum - How to get a reflective surface

or you read what @Dev_JayR said.

Hope this helped I’m trying my best to help

Like I said, If this helps make sure to give me the solution button so people know you don’t need help anymore >.<

[Scottifly]

Right now having each Part reflect every other Part around it as well as the Skybox would take so much computing power it would probably melt your CPU.
If you want a Part to really reflect use SmoothPlastic. I know that most of the other specific Materials won’t actually change their appearance when you when you slide the Reflectance scale from 0 to 1.
SmoothPlastic does change it’s appearance when you do it:

[aleserverr (Aleserver)]

it reflects objects only indoors

[spoop123 (CHEF)]

For a reflective material you can use any object, then cover it with slightly bigger duplicate of it thats Reflective SmoothPlastic, or glass, then change the glass’s transparency to your liking.
Make sure your lighting is set to Future, and you have your perferred skybox to be displayed on the reflection.

(Metal Sphere Covered In Glass Sphere, Making It Look Shiny. Left Sphere is the one without the effect.)

[Amber_Devit (Flandadelta)]

Just use a white image on the metalness map and a black image on the roughnessmap using surfaceappearance or materialvariant.

i dont think this is possible if you use it on outdoor builds

[Bettercat4 (Lynxmountain)]

What settings did you use to get your thing to be that reflective? I have been trying for a couple of days but even with the materialvariant set to be like that it is still only A tiny bit reflective. Also what material are you using?

(I got a slight bit of reflection but it is barely visible and not that accurate)

This is what Ive got so far using a material variant with your settings, Future Lighting, And Smooth Plastic.

dont mind the frame im still workin on that.

also, this is Ingame

[Amber_Devit (Flandadelta)]

i dont think the material it overrides matters. but can you show me the textures you are using?

[Bettercat4 (Lynxmountain)]

sure. the ID for the MetalnessMap is rbxassetid://14368595368 and the ID for the RoughnessMap is rbxassetid://14565062755. the other 2 options are blank.

Here is a link to the Metalness image. for some reason the id in the link is Different from the ID on roblox studio but the one im using ingame works.

Creator Hub - Marketplace

And Here is the ID for the Roughness Image.

Creator Hub - Marketplace

[Scottifly]

I’m just trying to learn about this now.

I added a MaterialVariant into the Plastic Part I want as a mirror.

I looked at the links @Bettercat4 posted above and got the assetid of each (their posted numbers and the id numbers off the actual links) and pasted it into the MetalnessMap and RoughnessMap of the MaterialVariant. I noticed the white decal was named ‘Images/BlankImage’ so I searched another image for a white decal just in case.

Lighting is Future.

There is no change in the appearance of the Part.

I also tried changing the Part’s Reflectance from 0 to 1 to see if that made a difference.

Please explain the steps involved as if I’m 5 years old

[LaAeroooo (aero)]

material variants go into material service and you can select the variant by using the dropdown below the material property, theres probably documentation on this though.

[Scottifly]

Fair enough, but even looking at the documentation and searching through the toolbox I don’t see any Mirror materials.
I tried creating one and adding the suggested white and black decals, but that only got me the same grayish semi-reflective Material as shown in @Bettercat4’s post.

[LaAeroooo (aero)]

the dynamic indoor env maps arent really great unfortunately, BUT to achieve the most you need to set the lighting ambient to 0, 0, 0 (according to staff ambient is a hack since there is no global illumination), and make sure enviromentdiffusescale and enviromentspecularscale are both set to one.