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MJC, becasue I am dolt and I didn't think of it. That's why. Heh-heh.
I think we have all had those moments of doing something the hard way, because we just never stopped to think about a different or easier way. That is when those with fresh eyes are very helpful.
Kharma, yes UV Mapper only exports bitmaps.
I don't know what I am doing wrong creating a simple black and white texture in PSP, Destiny could you elaborate a bit more on what steps you did in your texturing program and then where you put the textures in DS.
Sure thing. It will be a few minutes.
Layer 1 is the template.
Layer 2 is the black shape that will hide the face of the fantasy mask.
Layer 3 is the pearl trim.
Layer 4 is the lace fill. This is a really good use for Filter Forge. You can make the whole layer a lace pattern, and then use the black face mask as a selection to delete the lace in that area. Put the lace fill layer under the pearl trim layer.
Layer 5 the lace cross.
Put a solid white layer under the black face mask layer. Save this as a jpeg. It is the map that goes in the base color.
Hide all of the layers except for the pearl trim, lace fill and lace cross. Copy merged and paste as new layer.
On the layer you just pasted, go to Brightness/Contrast and turn the brighness all the way to 255. This will make the lace layer completely white. Put a solid black layer under this layer.
Save as a jpeg and this is the map that goes in the cutout opacity channel in Daz Studio. Be sure to save your unmerged file as a PSP file too.
No problem I am going over the tower texturing to see if I can figure out what I am doing wrong. I haven't used PSP very much in recent times and seem to have forgotten how to do some things. I was trying to flood fill my selection with black and it just would not. I tried promoting selection to layer and still nothing just filling in small black spots on the map, then I figured ok change RGB mode for flood fill tool to none and that worked. When you load the texture map of the mask, it is background layer so do you delete that layer when you go to save the completed texture? I didn't and the first time and when I saved it merged all layers so I ended up with this white background.
I'm editing the post above. On your fill tool, make sure you have Use All Layers unchecked.
The first jpeg, the one that has the lace and pearl details on it, goes in the base color.
The second one, the one with the solid white lace on the solid black background, goes in the cutout opacity.
Wow that was quick and very helpful, thank you! Right now I have a couple more questions..where you said layer 4 is the lace fill and it's a good use for filter forge..in what way would I use filter forge? Also once I have this textured as you have done how do I go about making the bump and normal maps and any others that could be used...diffuse, specular etc ?
Oh that is very very helpful thank you!
Thanks for the explantion, Destiny!
Well, I did manage to get my contest entry mostly finished and uploaded. There was some post I wanted to do, but didn't get the chance. I have to say that I really have a better appreciation for those who do texturing on a regular basis! The one uniform I only modified slightly, but the other one (yellow) I had to do from scratch and it was not easy. I think I used almost every tip DG has given in this thread to get it done, too! It is far from perfect, but I don't think I did too badly, either. So, thank you, DG! I couldn't have done it without you!
Kharma, I'm so sorry. I did not see your question buried in between the other comments. Filter Forge is the thing that will let you generate your own texture, at the size you need, and customize the final result. Filter Forge can also make the maps for bumps and normals. I'll have to come back to step by step specifics with screen shots.
Kevin wants to know how to texture hair. Good call! It is easier than you think. Let's do it.
Edit: What version of Paintshop Pro do you have?
The focus here is texturing hair using Bobbie25's Hair Texturing Kit. http://www.daz3d.com/hairtexturingkit Let's take a look at what is in it and how to use it.
In the folder I see some photos of hair, a PSD file and and .abr file.
If you have ever tried to take a good and detailed picture of someone's hair, you will know it is sort of hard to get the strands in focus. This set is pretty good.
First step-figure out what hair you want to texture. I'm going to use April's Leyton hair. A good place to start is to see what the hair creator did to their textures. I'm sure you have noticed, 99% of all hair textures have the strands going vertically. This is helpful. Here are tiny pictures of the texture maps.
In your image editor, make a new image 2048X2048. Why this size? Well, it can be any size you want. Don't go too small though or you will lose the fine detail of the hair strands. I chose a size that works well with the hair resource we are using.
What color should our new texture be? Red, of course.
Open up the hair texture of your choice in your image editor, and paste as a new layer on the new image. If you have Filter Forge, there are some really good ones for hair texture too. Here is one I have used before. https://www.filterforge.com/filters/980.html
I used #19 from the hair texturing kit.
Poor little hair tile, all alone floating in the middle of an empty canvas. Select the Pick tool, and strech the tile top and bottom until it fits the canvas.
You might also want to squish it on each side so you end up with a long thin piece.
Duplicate this layer a few times and spread them out to fill up the canvas.
Merge the layers, and there you go. Save as a jpeg and this is base color.
*8 hours later...* Sorry about the delay. I had to sleep. Next step is a bump map. Duplicate the hair layer and use a combination of Adjust Hue/Saturation/ Lightness, Adjust Brightness/Contrast, and Adjust Fill Light/Clarity to get a greyscale, sort of contrasty texture map.This is what I used.
The exact settings can vary depending on how bright/dark/contrasty, your original hair texture is. Here is my bump map, and this might not have enough contrast, but I won't know until I set up the surfaces.
Save as a jpeg and we can come back and re-do it later if needed. **Remember to also save your file with the unmerged layers because any changes will be done to the origiinal file, and not the jpeg.
Just a few more maps to make while we are here. Duplicate the base texture layer and we need a texture a shade or two lighter than the base color. This is for the translucency.
Duplicate the base layer again and we need a fairly dark texture with brighter highlights. This is the specular or glossiness.
I have one more word about texture maps in general, and specular maps in particular. There is a fine line between making textures that "pop" and making textures that just look "off." So much depends on the surface settings, and the lighting conditions of the final render. In a perfect world, every surface in each render would get custom maps and "specific to that render" surface settings. This is not a perfect world however, and we are going for "looks pretty good in most standard lighting conditions." Specular maps in particular can take your surface from "lifeless", to "wow", to "holy baked in highlights Batman" very quickly.
One more last and final word, you may have noticed that I have completely ignored the part on texture map that covers the hair's skull cap. There are a few reasons for this. Number one, it takes a lot time to do them properly and I have stuff to do today. Number two, they are typically not very visible in the render so the time spent is for little payoff. Number three, we have no control over where on any given texture map a skull cap is going to be placed, and by leaving it off the map we can use this texture on any number of hair models and not just one. If you look up at the original texture again, you can see it is a bunch of strands rotated and placed on the map. If I were to do it, I'd use the lasso selection tool with a small feather and select out bits of my new base color texture, and using the original texture as a guide, rotate and place the new strands accordingly. But like I said, I have stuff to do today.
That will do it for most of the maps, except one. The big one. The transparency map for hair.
The transparency map for a hair model is probably the most important one. It determines so much about how fine or wispy or thick or full or blocky or chunky the hair looks. If you have made your own hair model, you must make a transparencey map for it. [Exceptions: toon hair which is supposed to be blocky, or fiber mesh hair which is a bunch of tiny strands might, or might not, need a transparency map.] If you have not made your own hair model, and just want to make alternate textures for hair models you already have, skip this part completely. I'm serious. Skip it. Any transparency map you make is only going to look good on the one hair model.
I didn't scare you off? Ok then. Read on.
So, what else is in our bag of goodies? A PSD file and an Photoshop brush .abr. Cool. I opened the .psd in Paintshop Pro and it contains 15 different hair swatches. Very cool.
There are a couple uses I can think of for these. I've grabbed layer 14 and copy/pasted it into my working texture PSP file.
Stretch it out to fit the canvas and make copies to fill up the frame. This could possibly work for a bump map if needed.
I can tell right now this isn't going to work very well for transparency. Duplicate the new layer twice and offset them a bit (move the layer sideways) to fill in the map.
Hmm. That might be OK, actually. We have to deal with bottom to make it more whispy,and the top to make it more full. Merge the three hair strand layers. Go to your lasso selection tool, set to a feather of about 20. You want to select jagged bits out of the bottom.
Delete what you have selected.
Pardon me while I have a small fan girl squee. Have you seen the new thing in PSP X8? Right click on the layer pallet - Merge Visible To New Layer? Wow, what a time saver. Holy cow! Best feature ever! Completely worth whatever money you need to upgrade to version X8. *DG calms down and goes back to the tut.*
So Merge Visble to New Layer if you have it. If not Copy Merged/Paste as New Layer. Then Invert or Negative Image.
This is the new transparency map. I'm probably going to hate it.
Actually, you know what? This isn't going to work anyway. Looking at the original transparency map again, I have not accounted for the part of the hair that attaches to the skull cap. I'm going to get a blocky edge on this.
Another possible use for the transparent layers in the PSD file from the merchant resource is transparency maps for eyelashes. Try it out.
What to do with the .abr file and how to make other "hair brushes" will continue on the next page.
Thanks Destiny. You are sooo awesome! I never even thought of posting my question here, when I created that other post. But I SHOULD have! Thanks again.!
And I have Paint Shop Pro version X7 and X8 installed. I have some earlier versions, but they don't run on Windows 10.
I also have Photoshop CS 6. (I would have the latest version, but they won't sell it to you anymore.
Kevin
Cheers Kevin! I was asking about what version of PSP because it can make a difference in what we do with the Photoshop brush. I think it was some where around version 15 that PSP was able to read .abr files without having to convert them to pngs first.
I see that I probably shouldn't post when tired. I've got some typos to fix, lol.
Putting it together, a recap of the hair maps: diffuse, translucency, bump, specular, and transparency.
Setting up surfaces for hair is another one of those things can take a whole thread to itself. Actually, I think there is already such a thread in the commons.
For demo purposes, I'm just looking at how April has her hair set up, and swapping in my new maps. Here is a stack of test renders. Left to right, the first one is a brown color that comes with Leyton, no adjustments. The second one is with the new maps swapped in, including the problematic transparency map. Notice the blockiness on the scalp. That is precisely because of the trouble area I noted above. The tips look pretty good though. The third one is using the new texture maps, but keeping Leyton's transparency map.
That pretty much sums up why I said before not to bother with making transparency maps for hair. They have to be specific to an individual hair set. The rest of the maps look good though. I didn't change any of the surface settings from the first picture to the last, just changed the maps.
No problem Destiny, I have FF 4 Pro, and have been playing around with it but I can't seem to figure out how to make the maps different sizes, most textures I look at are 600 x 600. I also didn't find anything saying that the textures you can download into FF from the site can be used commercially or for freebies. I also find that not all textures will let you render every type of map, some will only let you do a diffuse map and some will let you do more. When you said the lace fill is a good use of FF I wasn't sure if you meant you made it in FF or exactly what you did. A step by step would be great if and when you have the time, in the meantime I have been checking out some FF videos by geekatplay on youtube which are pretty helpful.
I have been looking forward to being happy for a long time now!
Speaking of texturing, I found this link in the Freebies forum here on DAZ.
https://www.thefoundry.co.uk/products/non-commercial/mari-non-commercial/
It's for a free non-commercial version of their texturing software product called "Mari".
There are an amazing number of free tutorials and model assest to go along with the product, including the models (.obj format), the sample textures, and a lot more.
There are a whole slew of video tutorials for Mari 2.0, including asset and project files. (30 videos, if I am remembering correctly)
Then there's a whole new set of video tutorials for Mari 3.0, with project files . (18 videos)
https://www.thefoundry.co.uk/products/mari/learn/
Plus a bunch more video tutorials in the forums!
http://community.thefoundry.co.uk/discussion/forum.aspx?f=273
Definitely worth a look! (Free is good!)
This is one of the models I loaded into Studio.
This is what the interface looks like...well, one of the screens.
David, are you not happy?
Heh-heh. What I meant by that was remember back on page 2 or 3 when we textured a brick wall? You can either go out and take a picture of a brick wall, jump through hoops to make a seamless tile, spend hours making the perfect bump map, and tweak the result to clean up any noise and minimize the repeating look. Or you open Filter Forge, and search for a brick pattern that you like, generate it in the size you want, and then generate a prefectly clean bump and normal map. Need lace, fabric, metal, stone, paint wood, rust, etc.? Filter Forge is there for you, all in the comfort of your own home.
Good find on the free version of Mari. There are a ton of resources which is super handy. I'll go one more for you. Not free, but a lot less than full price, is Modo/Mari Indie on Steam. http://store.steampowered.com/app/433930/ Commercial usage is allowed, but it does have some restrictions over the full priced license. See web page for details. The free version looks like an excellent tool for anyone who wants to try out the features without a finacial commitment.
Here is what I found on the FilterForge site. https://www.filterforge.com/termsofuse.html That is a lot to read through though.
From the FF wiki https://www.filterforge.com/wiki/index.php/10q
"Licensing and copyright questions
You can use the Filter Library filters for commercial or non-commercial purposes as long as you don't violate the law or someone else's rights.
It is ok to modify other filters to your convenience. If someone's snippet or filter inspired you to create your own filter, it is considered polite to mention the author of the original idea in your filter info."
Commercial usage is definately allowed.
Next post will have screen shots for you.
HA, DG, it's not that I'm not happy.
I'm just impatient. Progress is slow, mostly because I can't devote enough time to this hobby. Mari seems promising because there are a ton of resources, like tutorials and project files. And Filter Forge? I have to admit I haven't worked with it enough to be able to even do what you said:
"...open Filter Forge, and search for a brick pattern that you like, generate it in the size you want, and then generate a prefectly clean bump and normal map. Need lace, fabric, metal, stone, paint wood, rust, etc.? Filter Forge is there for you, all in the comfort of your own home."
Maybe if you get time, you could point to a tutorial that can get me at least to that level. I probably need to go back and re-read your earlier tutorials, and stick with it until it sinks in.
Thanks for the encouragement, and for putting so much time into helping us out. It's really appreciated!
If you are using FF as a stand alone, go to File/New Image. You get a box that let's you change the size of your picture.
I find it so much easier to use FF as plugin for PSP. FF will ask when you install it what programs it could be used as a plug-in, but if it doesn't, or you missed it, do this.
PSP - File/Preferences/File Locations
Next box, scroll down to Plug-Ins, click the little box with the 3 dots, and browse to where you have Filter Forge installed. Click OK.
You should now see FF as a plug in and it will work on whatever layer you have open in PSP.
Hope that helps.
Wow! That was fast!
How much different is it using FF as a plugin in Photoshop CC, which is what I have? I'm guessing not much...
Off to have a look at it!
Thanks!
Thank you thank you thank you for the hair! And please please don't apologize for leaving off and doing your own life stuff. As far as I am concerned this thread is a mega bonus and I am willing to wait for whatever time you are willing to give. truly. I already understand far more than I did and far more than I would have learned on my own in a months worth of searching and watching videos etc. (although I contnue to do that as well)
Functionally, it is the same. You can use all the same filters and get the same results. I think it's so much easier to use FF as a plug in so I don't have to bounce between programs. I'm sure you can find the PS equivalent of installing plug-ins. Check the FilterForge forums if you need help on that. Someone has probably already asked.
Sonja, you are too kind. Thank you.
Ok..that was easy!
Started a new image in Photoshop, made it 600 x 600 resolution 72
Launched FF
The FF UI showed my 600 x 600 image from Photoshop.
Did a search for bricks in my library; didn't find any.
Noticed a link that said "Filter Library: Download more filters". Clicked it, and it opened the website where I did a search for bricks. Picked one I liked, and it loaded it into my library on my computer.
It took me back to the FF UI, where my brick selection was loaded into my 600 x 600 document.
Noticed a button that said "Apply"; clicked it.
It took me back into Photoshop and applied my brick selection to my 600 x 600 image.
I stopped at this point. Need to work on bump and displacement maps next, I guess.
Progress!
Oh..and here's the file I created.
bricks.
woohoo.
Another interesting thing:
I closed out FF and Photoshop, then relaunched to see if that brick filter was really in my library, or if I would have to download it every time.
Not only was it still there, there were new factory presets along with it!
That's pretty awesome, if you ask me...!
Heh-I'm cross posting with David. LOL.
Mini tut on using FF. Open FF stand alone, or open a new image in your image editor and go to Plug-In/Filter Forge. (See last screen shot above.) Up in the Search filters box type in brick (or lace or cloth or stone or whatever.) Here it shows me the filters I have installed.
Want a different one? Click on the blue link and it will take you to the FilterForge website. Type brick in the search box and there you are. 376 results.
Click on the one you want to use. On the filter page click the blue box. Pay attention to the version number of the filter in regards to what version you have installed.
You can see on this page that this filter wants version 4.0 or higher, and it will make the extra maps.
This one has no extra maps, but don't worry, we can make it work.
I really like Dungeons and Flagons, so I ran the filter with these settings. There is no signifigance to these settings. I just moved the sliders until I got something I liked. Be sure to have seamless tile checked.
Now, we know that just desaturating this map will never work for a bump map. We need all the tiles to be the same value, and the cracks darker. Remember the bricks with the grout on page 3 and having to outline each and every brick by hand? Don't worry, I'm not going to have you do that. Make a new layer on your image and run the same filter again, with the same settings, making one small change. Change both the tile colors to white.
Ding! Now the grout is seperated from the tiles, and it is a darker color. You can't do that with a photograph. Are you very happy now David? I am. Duplicate the new grout map and open FF one more time. This time our goal is a normal map.
Search your FF library or the website for "Normal" and quite a few come up. I like this one because of the Height and Height Smoothing options that are not in all of the normal map makers. https://www.filterforge.com/filters/8536.html
That is as clean as you can get. Here is a larger shot of my 3 new maps that are ready to go. Total time: about 15 minutes. I'd still be selecting brick grout if I had used a photo.
Look how nice the dents and scratches show up on the bump and normal, but surface dirt does not. Positively perfect. Do keep in mind that FF is just one tool in the tool box. There is a beauty, uniqueness, and organic quality to using photographs instead of filter generated textures. Which tool to use for the job at hand is going to depend on the time you have, and the required end result.
Bricks! Hurray lol! And I am leaving for a week now and can't try any of this new fun stuff out til I get back!