Materials

Materials define the surface of your objects — matte plastic, brushed metal, frosted glass, waxy skin. Facet's materials are physically based (PBR), so surfaces respond to the lighting in your scene the way real ones do.

What "PBR" means (and why it matters)

PBR — Physically Based Rendering — means a material is described by real-world physical properties (how rough the surface is, how metallic, how much light passes through) rather than by faking a look for one specific lighting setup. Because the maths follows real light behaviour, a PBR material stays believable under any environment: change the HDRI and the material re-reacts correctly — reflections, highlights and refraction all update on their own. It's why the same "chrome" reads as chrome in a studio and outdoors without you touching it.

The practical upshot: set your lighting, then design your material — the two are inseparable.

Opening the material panel

Select an object and press M (or click the floating material icon) to open the material panel. Alongside it a live preview sphere shows exactly what the current material looks like, updating as you drag. The panel has three tabs: Simple, Advanced, and Library.

Simple mode

Simple mode is built to get you to a good-looking surface fast. It has two parts:

Presets — a grid of one-click starting points: Matte, Plastic, Metal, Chrome, Glass, Frosted, Skin, Glow, Iridescent. Click one and the whole material is set for you, then tweak from there.

Grouped cards — controls organised into collapsible cards so you always know where a control lives:

• Surface — Glossy ↔ Matte (roughness), Metal (metalness); plus Reflection strength and Base Colour.
• Glass — Amount (transmission) and IOR; plus Depth (thickness), Tint and Tint Depth.
• Subsurface — Gummy/Wax (SSS); plus Scatter Colour and Radius.
• Glow & Sheen — Illumination (emissive) and Iridescence; plus Glow Colour and Iridescence IOR.

Advanced mode

Advanced mode exposes the full PBR model as flat sections for precise control:

• Diffuse — Base Colour, Roughness, Metalness, Reflection, Surface Bump.
• Refraction — IOR, Thickness.
• Transmission — Transmission, Tint Depth, Tint Colour.
• SSS — Amount, Scatter Radius, Scatter Colour.
• Illumination — Emissive Intensity and Colour.
• Clear Coat — Clear Coat, Coat Roughness (a glossy lacquer layer over the base — car paint, varnish).
• Iridescence — Iridescence, Iridescence IOR (the shifting rainbow sheen of soap bubbles or oil).

The core properties

• Roughness — how sharp or blurred reflections are. Low is glossy and mirror-like; high is soft and matte.
• Metalness — how metallic the surface is. Low reads as plastic or painted; high picks up the environment as reflections.
• IOR (index of refraction) — how strongly light bends through a transmissive material (glass ≈ 1.5, water ≈ 1.33, diamond ≈ 2.4).

A polished chrome is high metalness + low roughness; a soft matte is low metalness + high roughness.

Glass & transmission

To make glass or other transparent materials, raise Transmission. Glass bends the light passing through it, so it needs something to bend:

Glass needs an environment. Refraction has nothing to bend without one — set an HDRI environment or your glass will look flat and grey.

Subsurface scattering (SSS)

For materials where light penetrates the surface, scatters inside, and glows back out — skin, wax, marble, jade, milk, soft plastics — raise SSS (the "Gummy/Wax" dial). Instead of bouncing straight off, light travels a short distance through the material, softening shadows and giving that translucent glow at thin edges.

SSS reads best backlit. Put a light behind or to the side of the object so you can see the glow through its thinner regions — that's where subsurface scattering earns its keep.

Your material library

The Library tab is your personal collection of saved materials:

• Save the current material with the "+ Library" button — Facet renders a thumbnail automatically.
• Apply a saved material by clicking it (applies to the current selection) or dragging it directly onto any object in the scene.
• Rename by double-clicking a thumbnail's caption; delete with the ✕.

The library persists with your account, so you can build up a reusable set of looks and drop them onto future projects.

Tips

• Start from the environment. Because reflections come from the HDRI, a material can look completely different under a different environment — set your lighting early.
• Small roughness changes have a big visual impact. Nudge it gradually.
• For a premium product look, lean on low roughness plus a clean studio HDRI.
• Use a preset as a base rather than building from scratch — it sets a conflict-free starting point (e.g. Glass zeroes metalness for you).