JavaFX - Material Property

Until now, when we addressed the properties of a JavaFX shape object, it always only included the color of shape fill and type of shape strokes. However, JavaFX also allows you to assign the type of material for a 3D shape.

Material of a 3D object is nothing but the type of texture used to create a 3D object. For example, a box in real world can be made of different materials; like a cardboard, a metal, wood, or just any other solid. All of these form the same shape but with a different material. Similarly, JavaFX allows you to choose the type of material used to create a 3D object.

Material Property

The Material property is of the type Material and it is used to choose the surface of the material of a 3D shape. You can set the material of a 3D shape using the method setMaterial() as follows −

cylinder.setMaterial(material);

As mentioned above for this method, you need to pass an object of the type Material. The PhongMaterial class of the package javafx.scene.paint is a sub class of this class and provides 7 properties that represent a Phong shaded material. You can apply all these type of materials to the surface of a 3D shape using the setter methods of these properties.

Following are the type of materials that are available in JavaFX −

• bumpMap − This represents a normal map stored as a RGB Image.

• diffuseMap − This represents a diffuse map.

• selfIlluminationMap − This represents a self-illumination map of this PhongMaterial.

• specularMap − This represents a specular map of this PhongMaterial.

• diffuseColor − This represents a diffuse color of this PhongMaterial.

• specularColor − This represents a specular color of this PhongMaterial.

• specularPower − This represents a specular power of this PhongMaterial.

By default, the material of a 3-Dimensional shape is a PhongMaterial with a diffuse color of light gray.

Example

Following is an example which displays various materials on the cylinder. Save this code in a file with the name CylinderMaterials.java.

import javafx.application.Application; 
import javafx.scene.Group; 
import javafx.scene.PerspectiveCamera; 
import javafx.scene.Scene; 
import javafx.scene.image.Image; 
import javafx.scene.paint.Color; 
import javafx.scene.paint.PhongMaterial; 
import javafx.scene.shape.Cylinder; 
import javafx.stage.Stage;

public class CylinderMaterials extends Application {  
   @Override 
   public void start(Stage stage) { 
      //Drawing Cylinder1 
      Cylinder cylinder1 = new Cylinder();         
   
      //Setting the properties of the Cylinder 
      cylinder1.setHeight(130.0f); 
      cylinder1.setRadius(30.0f);   
     
      //Setting the position of the Cylinder 
      cylinder1.setTranslateX(100); 
      cylinder1.setTranslateY(75); 
        
      //Preparing the phong material of type bump map  
      PhongMaterial material1 = new PhongMaterial();  
      material1.setBumpMap(new Image
         ("http://www.tutorialspoint.com/images/tplogo.gif"));   
      
      //Setting the bump map material to Cylinder1 
      cylinder1.setMaterial(material1);    
       
      //Drawing Cylinder2 
      Cylinder cylinder2 = new Cylinder();         
      
      //Setting the properties of the Cylinder 
      cylinder2.setHeight(130.0f); 
      cylinder2.setRadius(30.0f);   
      
      //Setting the position of the Cylinder 
      cylinder2.setTranslateX(200); 
      cylinder2.setTranslateY(75); 
       
      //Preparing the phong material of type diffuse map 
      PhongMaterial material2 = new PhongMaterial();
      material2.setDiffuseMap(new Image
         ("http://www.tutorialspoint.com/images/tp-logo.gif")); 
      
      //Setting the diffuse map material to Cylinder2 
      cylinder2.setMaterial(material2);         
       
      //Drawing Cylinder3 
      Cylinder cylinder3 = new Cylinder();         
      
      //Setting the properties of the Cylinder 
      cylinder3.setHeight(130.0f); 
      cylinder3.setRadius(30.0f);   
  
      //Setting the position of the Cylinder 
      cylinder3.setTranslateX(300); 
      cylinder3.setTranslateY(75); 
       
      //Preparing the phong material of type Self Illumination Map 
      PhongMaterial material3 = new PhongMaterial();  
      material3.setSelfIlluminationMap(new Image
         ("http://www.tutorialspoint.com/images/tp-logo.gif"));  
      
      //Setting the Self Illumination Map material to Cylinder3 
      cylinder3.setMaterial(material3);  
       
      //Drawing Cylinder4 
      Cylinder cylinder4 = new Cylinder();         
      
      //Setting the properties of the Cylinder 
      cylinder4.setHeight(130.0f); 
      cylinder4.setRadius(30.0f);   
      
      //Setting the position of the Cylinder 
      cylinder4.setTranslateX(400); 
      cylinder4.setTranslateY(75); 
       
      //Preparing the phong material of type Specular Map  
      PhongMaterial material4 = new PhongMaterial();  
      material4.setSpecularMap(new Image
         ("http://www.tutorialspoint.com/images/tp-logo.gif")); 
      
      //Setting the Specular Map material to Cylinder4 
      cylinder4.setMaterial(material4);  
       
      //Drawing Cylinder5 
      Cylinder cylinder5 = new Cylinder();         
      
      //Setting the properties of the Cylinder 
      cylinder5.setHeight(130.0f); 
      cylinder5.setRadius(30.0f);   
      
      //Setting the position of the Cylinder 
      cylinder5.setTranslateX(100); 
      cylinder5.setTranslateY(300); 
       
      //Preparing the phong material of type diffuse color 
      PhongMaterial material5 = new PhongMaterial();  
      material5.setDiffuseColor(Color.BLANCHEDALMOND); 
      
      //Setting the diffuse color material to Cylinder5 
      cylinder5.setMaterial(material5);   
       
      //Drawing Cylinder6  
      Cylinder cylinder6 = new Cylinder();         
      
      //Setting the properties of the Cylinder 
      cylinder6.setHeight(130.0f); 
      cylinder6.setRadius(30.0f);   
      
      //Setting the position of the Cylinder 
      cylinder6.setTranslateX(200); 
      cylinder6.setTranslateY(300); 
       
      //Preparing the phong material of type specular color 
      PhongMaterial material6 = new PhongMaterial();  
      
      //setting the specular color map to the material 
      material6.setSpecularColor(Color.BLANCHEDALMOND); 
      
      //Setting the specular color material to Cylinder6 
      cylinder6.setMaterial(material6);    
       
      //Drawing Cylinder7 
      Cylinder cylinder7 = new Cylinder();
      
      //Setting the properties of the Cylinder 
      cylinder7.setHeight(130.0f); 
      cylinder7.setRadius(30.0f);   
      
      //Setting the position of the Cylinder 
      cylinder7.setTranslateX(300); 
      cylinder7.setTranslateY(300); 
       
      //Preparing the phong material of type Specular Power 
      PhongMaterial material7 = new PhongMaterial();  
      material7.setSpecularPower(0.1); 
      
      //Setting the Specular Power material to the Cylinder 
      cylinder7.setMaterial(material7);         
      
      //Creating a Group object  
      Group root = new Group(cylinder1 ,cylinder2, cylinder3, 
      cylinder4, cylinder5, cylinder6, cylinder7); 
          
      //Creating a scene object 
      Scene scene = new Scene(root, 600, 400); 
       
      //Setting camera 
      PerspectiveCamera camera = new PerspectiveCamera(false); 
      camera.setTranslateX(0); 
      camera.setTranslateY(0); 
      camera.setTranslateZ(-10); 
      scene.setCamera(camera); 
       
      //Setting title to the Stage 
      stage.setTitle("Drawing a cylinder"); 
         
      //Adding scene to the stage 
      stage.setScene(scene); 
         
      //Displaying the contents of the stage 
      stage.show(); 
   }      
   public static void main(String args[]){ 
      launch(args); 
   } 
}

Compile and execute the saved java file from the command prompt using the following commands.

javac --module-path %PATH_TO_FX% --add-modules javafx.controls CylinderMaterials.java 
java --module-path %PATH_TO_FX% --add-modules javafx.controls CylinderMaterials 

Output

On executing, the above program generates a JavaFX window displaying 7 cylinders with Materials, Bump Map, Diffuse Map, Self-Illumination Map, Specular Map, Diffuse Color, Specular Color, (BLANCHEDALMOND) Specular Power, respectively, as shown in the following screenshot −