Blender Render Materials

In Blender Render, all materials are built in the same way: you have a set of parameters and you can build any kind of material using them. For example, you can activate transparency and reflections (Mirror) to simulate materials such as glass or metal. Each one of these attributes has different parameters, such as color, intensity, hardness, and glossiness. Here are brief descriptions of some of the main options available:

Diffuse: The main color of the material.

Specular: The color, intensity, and hardness of a material’s shine.

Shading: The different shadowing over a material. The Shadeless option makes the material completely unaffected by lights and shadows in the scene.

Transparency: The transparency of the material. The basic attribute is Z Transparency and it is very fast to render because it just reduces the material’s opacity. Raytrace is more accurate and offers some parameters for controlling the refraction to make it look more realistic.

Mirror: The reflectivity of the material; this option allows you to define the glossiness (roughness) of the reflections.