This seamless 8K PBR texture captures the intricate details of recycled cardboard, emphasizing its fibrous composition and characteristic surface folds. The material primarily consists of densely packed cardboard pulp fibers, which create a rough yet structured substrate. These fibers are naturally intertwined and layered, resulting in a slightly porous surface that exhibits subtle variations in thickness and density. The visible cardboard grain follows a predominantly linear orientation, shaped by the pulp’s manufacturing process, while the random fiber strands and occasional folds add organic complexity to the texture’s form. This interplay of fibers and folds reflects the natural wear and compressions typical of recycled cardboard sheets, giving the texture a tactile and authentic feel.
The surface finish of this material is matte and uncoated, preserving the raw, natural appearance of recycled cardboard without any lamination or gloss. Its coloration is a muted blend of earthy browns, beige tones, and off-white fiber highlights, revealing the presence of both virgin and reclaimed pulp fibers. These subtle color variations correspond closely to the BaseColor (Albedo) map, capturing the material’s inherent heterogeneity. In the Normal and Height maps, the detailed fiber strands and surface folds are carefully represented, providing depth and dimensionality that enhance the perception of roughness and irregularity. The Roughness map reflects the cardboard’s generally coarse texture, with slight variations where compressed folds appear smoother, while the Metallic map remains near zero, as cardboard is a non-metallic organic material. Ambient Occlusion adds natural shading to fiber clusters and crevices, emphasizing the layered structure and enhancing realism.
Geometrically, the texture exhibits a subtle laminated pattern formed by overlapping pulp fiber layers, interspersed with natural creases and indentations. These folds are irregular but follow the overall planar form of the cardboard sheet, creating a seamless tile that works well for repeated surfaces. The texture’s porous quality and visible grain make it ideal for simulating environmental effects such as dirt accumulation and wear over time. Its neutral lighting setup and seamless tiling ensure compatibility with physically based rendering workflows in Blender, Unreal Engine, and Unity, supporting detailed close-ups as well as large-scale applications without noticeable repetition or distortion.
For practical use, it is recommended to carefully adjust the UV scale to match the intended model size, as the high-resolution 8K detail can reveal excessive repetition if tiled too frequently. Additionally, fine-tuning the roughness values can help balance the matte finish while preserving the subtle highlights on fiber strands and folds. When layering this texture in a PBR material setup, blending the height map with parallax or normal maps can enhance depth perception, especially in scenes requiring close camera interaction or realistic light scattering over the natural fiber surface.
How to Use These Seamless PBR Textures in Blender
This guide shows how to connect a full PBR texture set to Principled BSDF in Blender (Cycles or Eevee). Works with any of our seamless textures free download, including PBR PNG materials for Blender / Unreal / Unity.
What’s inside the download
*_albedo.png — Base Color (sRGB)*_normal.png — Normal map (Non-Color)*_roughness.png — Roughness (Non-Color)*_metallic.png — Metallic (Non-Color)*_ao.png — Ambient Occlusion (Non-Color)*_height.png — Height / Displacement (Non-Color)*_ORM.png — Packed map (R=AO, G=Roughness, B=Metallic, Non-Color)
Quick start (Node Wrangler, 30 seconds)
- Enable the addon: Edit → Preferences → Add-ons → Node Wrangler.
- Create a material and select the Principled BSDF node.
- Press Ctrl + Shift + T and select the maps
albedo, normal, roughness, metallic (skip height and ORM for now) → Open.
The addon wires Base Color, Normal (with a Normal Map node), Roughness, and Metallic automatically.
- Add AO and Height using the “Manual wiring” steps below (5 and 6).
Manual wiring (full control)
- Create a material (Material Properties → New) and open the Shader Editor.
- Add an Image Texture node for each map. Set Color Space:
- Albedo → sRGB
- AO, Roughness, Metallic, Normal, Height, ORM → Non-Color
- Connect to Principled BSDF:
albedo → Base Colorroughness → Roughnessmetallic → Metallic (for wood this often stays near 0)normal → Normal Map node (Type: Tangent Space) → Normal of Principled.
If details look “inverted”, enable Invert Y on the Normal Map node.
- Ambient Occlusion (AO):
- Add a MixRGB (or Mix Color) node in mode Multiply.
- Input A =
albedo, Input B = ao, Factor = 1.0.
- Output of Mix → Base Color of Principled (replaces the direct albedo connection).
- Height / Displacement:
Cycles — true displacement
- Material Properties → Settings → Displacement: Displacement and Bump.
- Add a Displacement node: connect
height → Height, set Midlevel = 0.5, Scale = 0.02–0.08 (tune to taste).
- Output of Displacement → Material Output → Displacement.
- Add geometry density (e.g., Subdivision Surface) so displacement has polygons to work with.
Eevee (or lightweight Cycles) — bump only
- Add a Bump node:
height → Height.
- Set Strength = 0.2–0.5, Distance = 0.05–0.1, and connect Normal output to Principled’s Normal.
Using the packed ORM texture (optional)
Instead of separate AO/Roughness/Metallic maps you can use the single *_ORM.png:
- Add one Image Texture (Non-Color) → Separate RGB (or Separate Color).
- R (red) → AO (use it in the Multiply node with albedo as above).
- G (green) → Roughness of Principled.
- B (blue) → Metallic of Principled.
UVs & seamless tiling
- These textures are seamless. If your mesh has no UVs, go to UV Editing → Smart UV Project.
- For scale/repeat, add Texture Coordinate (UV) → Mapping and plug it into all texture nodes.
Increase Mapping → Scale (e.g., 2/2/2) to tile more densely.
Recommended starter values
- Normal Map Strength: 0.5–1.0
- Bump Strength: ~0.3
- Displacement Scale (Cycles): ~0.03
Common pitfalls
- Wrong Color Space (normals/roughness/etc. must be Non-Color).
- “Inverted” details → enable Invert Y on the Normal Map node.
- Over-strong relief → lower Displacement Scale or Bump Strength.
Example: Download Wood Textures and instantly apply parquet or rustic planks inside Blender for architectural visualization.
To add the downloaded texture, go to Add — Texture — Image Texture.
Add a node and click the Open button.
Select the required texture on your hard drive and connect Color to Base Color.
