Alpha textures are the fastest way to add details to a model. | Blender Tricks

Alpha textures are the fastest way to add details to a model. Previously we had a look at using these to make a sword, and we looked at how to create your own alphas. They are used a lot for hard surface sculpting as well. You can find a lot of free alphas and buy big packs of them on Gumroad and Artstation. Usually they are sold as Zbrush alphas, but really they are software agnostic and will work just as well in Blender.

For this example I'm using these free alphas from JROTools: https://environmentdesign.gumroad.com/l/LvAzW