# Creating the Texture

A little more planning needs to go into the texture due to how it will be used on the asset. 

As noted in the previous category of [Tileable Textures](/documentation/asset-creation/the-crate-series/tileable-textures.md) materials have the ability to tile a texture horizontally and vertically. As we don't want to use the *entire* texture for one type of surface, we need to break up one axis and tile the other.

Trim sheets can be a mix tileable textures to single elements and everything in between.

We will look at making a single texture for *many* crate assets.

## Texture layout

The first thing we can do is design the layout of the texture for our asset needs. Note it is not just one asset, but many. Designing a trim sheet to be used in a modular asset design is fantastic for optimization and saves time overall as you can easily make many buildings with the final assets.

In the case of crates, the following would be a good starting point : 

* Wood slats + Wood Ends
* Tileable board section
* Larger damage such as chips or dents
* Metal section with Bolts, hinges, and padlocks
* Common Crate decals like arrows, 'Fragile', etc.
* Small area for Palette texturing functionality

With these in mind I design the base layout, considering tileable texture and non tileable textures.

## Creating the texture

With the layout decided, we can start making the texture itself. 

You could of course use realistic textures in a similar fashion. A common approach would be to take realistic textures and place them together in the trim sheet. Good, free, PBR resources for textures include : 

* [AmbientCG](https://ambientcg.com/)
* [Polyhaven](https://polyhaven.com/)
* [CC0 Textures](https://cc0-textures.com/)
* [ShareTextures](https://www.sharetextures.com/)

Note that with PBR Textures you will need to line up the different textures correctly such as Diffuse, Metallic, Roughness/Smoothness, and Normal.

## Normal Maps

*Normal Textures* are textures that allow the game engine to see bumps in the texture purely using the texture. This allows a game engine to display significant levels of detail in an asset such as chips, dents, stitching, cuts and grooves, without having to use polygons to do so.

Normals can be used in both realistic and stylized assets, but we will look at creating custom normal maps in later tutorials due to their complexity.


---

# Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation

If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question.

Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter:

```
GET https://themattempire.gitbook.io/documentation/asset-creation/the-crate-series/trim-sheets/creating-the-texture.md?ask=<question>
```

The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language.
The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation.

Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.