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Rougher Dent Plugin?


Humility

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I tried searching for a rougher dent program using the word 'rough' but all the plug ins used words I don't understand like 'height map' I am basically looking for something that'll create an effect like dents does but more jagged. Like crumpled metal or rippling muscle. I am hoping to apply the 3d gloss plug in to that to make it look nice and glossy as well afterwards. But first I need a rougher dent plug in. Are there any?

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A height map is an image in which the color at any particular point indicates the height of the surface at that point. Typically height maps are black and white (and gray), with black representing the farthest distance from the viewer, and white representing the nearest distance. You can think of black as the ground plane, and the lightness of a pixel as indicating its height above that plane.

 

Though height maps may be useful for what you want to do, there may be a problem. Most height maps only represent 256 height levels, so if the map represents a large distance, the changes in levels may not be smooth, but will instead be steps, which can result in the appearance of waterlines.

Edited by MJW
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So if I took one of those height map plug ins and used noise it would umm... do the jaggedish dent like effect I want? If so is there a recommended plug in of them for this?

Edited by Humility
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Each height-map plugin has its particular advantages and uses, but I'm biased toward Texture Shader, because I wrote it. As far as I know, it's the only height-map plugin that combines both distortion and shading (or perhaps I should say lighting). You can't just use any old noise. Using the Add Noise effect will result in a very fine grainy texture, like a rough surface. You could, for instance, generate smooth black-and-white Clouds then apply a height-map plugin. The problem you may have is the one I mentioned above. As you increase the amount of distortion, at some point the lack of precision in the height map will result in waterline-type ridges. Adding some noise to the height map, to roughen it up, will disguise the effect, but then you wont get the smooth, glossy finish you seem to be after.

The problem with waterlines is mostly confined to plugins that use the "gradient" to compute the displacement. The gradient is the slope of the surface at the given point, and is computed by taking the difference between the pixel and its neighbors. Because of the height map's low precision, areas where the height changes slowly have zero magnitude gradients over an area, interrupted by fairly large magnitude gradients at the points where the height steps up to the next level. Red Ochre's Clip Displace uses the height directly to determine the displacement, so it doesn't suffer from that problem.

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Actually old Clipwarp can do a reasonable foil/crumpled paper texture.
See Yellowman's post #50, page 3, on the thread for the old version  (the idea should work with the new version in the pack too).
http://forums.getpaint.net/index.php?/topic/25860-clipwarp-for-glass-metal-new-plugin-6th-jan-2013/page-3
 
http://i1127.photobucket.com/albums/l621/Red_ochre/Clipwarp%20examples/Yellowmanfoilsmall.png

MJW - I must update ClipDisplace soon, with your subpixel sampling method. (Just been busy on other stuff). ;)

 

Red ochre Plugin pack.............. Diabolical Drawings ................Real Paintings

 

PdnForumSig2.jpg

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