@Michaelab

Are you using the default lights? They tint the scene in a way that (maybe) looks nice on human-centric renders, but certainly not for archviz.

But I suspect that the problem stems from the Tile1 colour.

@Bagginsbill

Your shader is coming out fantastically. I do have some suggestions that could make it stand out even more. My observations stem from my almost 9 years working as chief designer & do-it-all in a marble&stone workshop.

Floor tiles are never 100% coplanar in respect of each other. What I mean is, that a mortar is laid on top of a surface, and the tile (whether ceramic, stone, or whatever) is pressed down on top of it. This makes the mortar... spill on the edges and stand out, and depending on performance-aesthetic choices, is how much of the mortar you then ... scrape away.

Now to the tiles themselves. Laying them on top of the mortar, which is not by any means completely planar nor smooth, and that before hardening behaves like a fluid makes each tile subtly non-planar in respect of each other, or in other words, each has a subtly different x,y, and z rotation. This is minimized a bit with the mason using a long piece of log-metal-plastic plank-thingy, but for practical reasons, it can only be so long, certainly never longer than 2m, which limits how many tiles can be more coplanar to each other. That, and that you cannot lay out all the tiles in one go.

The mortar also usually alters visibly (and sometimes physically) the sides of the tiles. As an example, a polished carrara marble tile (which is quite soft and scratchy) commonly loses a bit of it's polish on the sides because the mortar is a bit abrasive, and when the layer cleans the mortar excess, it scratches the polished surface. BTW, there are lots of translucid stones out there, carrara marble being one of them. Which means that when the tiles are not too thick, the colour of the mortar influences the percieved colour of the tiles. And makes any repair a living hell.

 

Ok, so maybe all this detail is a bit too much, but I thought you could use some of this information and incorporate it into your shader ;) It certainly is amazing as it is now, so maybe this is overkill.

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