I have long struggled with achieving a photo-realistic live edge. Here is a link to the Rhino model, keyshot file and rendering I am working with. Any insights/guidance are most appreciated!
Some specific questions: how do I separate the side edges from the top to play around with scaling so they don’t look so blown out? How can I duplicate a material to allow me to reapply it to the edges?
Google Drive files: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1hBYeGmlId3Kq6RURkGm_fp_M5eHILU3s?usp=sharing
I’m getting ready for some online racing with old people, but I learned already what ‘live edge’ is. thanks Google 
I’ll give it a go later but if you want to separate the surfaces, you can right-click the table top and select ‘separate object surfaces’. Since you’ve beveled edges I would pick like 2-5 as splitting angle and if you than click the top of the table you see it will be green. Than you click ‘split surface’ and it will be a separate object.
Do the same for the bottom and you basically have the edges and top/bottom as separate mesh. Tweaking the angle a bit can help you selecting a part of the bevelled edge or none.
If you’ve done so and click apply you have the 3 meshes with all the same, linked, material. Now click for example the side of the table and do right-click > ‘unlink material’. Basically that will give you a copy of the material you can change without changing all.
I appreciate this reply so much, Oscar. Thanks and I’ll dive into this tips asap and report back!
I had to google “Live Edge” and it is certainly an interesting design concept for table surfaces.
From the images I seen of Live Edge surfaces, I feel your model has top and bottom surfaces too perfectly parallel. From the examples I have seen, it is very rarely the case to have a perfect straight edge from the top to bottom surface following the organic natural curves of a tree.
I think also adding some parts that divot inwards on the sides would add some interest to the overall geometry. Also adding in imperfections to the surface I think would also help sell the render as well.
I think after splitting your surfaces, adding an outer tree texture would make it look like it was off an actual tree. Then the internal textures, I don’t believe the color is so uniform. Adding some different shades of grey would help sell the realism. Having such perfect color and lines makes it look more like laminate vs. actual wood.
Happy I wasn’t the only one who needed Google. That top example is cool one but makes the texturing even harder I think because the shape is basically caused by the texture in like how the tree grew. That’s also irregular but easier.
Might be actual worth to find first a really nice and detailed picture and model the shape of the top a bit like the texture flows. A nice one to try sometime.
You’re right about the inner part and if I look at your examples that can have a lot of different appearances.
