Procedural textures are a category of textures used to generate patterns that can be used by themselves or in combination with the Mapping and Color textures to create common surface effects. This is a memory-efficient way to generate patterns, as the calculations require less memory than loading bitmap images. Procedurals can create rock and marble surfaces, chequered or wooden textures, Bump maps, and other advanced materials with minimal impact to GPU memory. It is advantageous to explore creating materials using these textures before resorting to image-based textures.


Procedural Textures


Figure 1: The Checks procedural texture used in the specular component of a Glossy material