nDo normalmap PS toolset

[Synide 0]

I saw this mentioned in another forum and thought it quite nifty... might be of interest to people... nDo.

Cheers, Sy.

[STALKERGB 6]

Looks pretty useful, will be taking a look at this!

[JDog 11]

Looks cool thanks for posting, might try it out

[rstratton 0]

looks cool but cant find actions menu in photoshop to install the thing

[bushlurker 46]

I think you can call it up under "Window" on the menu bar in PS - then you can drag it in beside layers or somewhere so its always there...

B

[orson 0]

it only supports CS2 - CS5 ?

i have 8 and couldnt get it working .

[Fox '09 14]

i didn't like it. it has 'spasms ' every time you adjust something.

[PuFu 4600]

you could try crazybump. You got 30days trial

You can create normal, specular, AO, displacement from the same map file. It is NOT a PS plugin, which means you can use GIMP or whatever...

Edited October 18, 2010 by PuFu

[soul_assassin 1750]

Crazybump is cool and I always use it but it's always better to have one less tool in the pipeline.

[icebreakr 3159]

I use xNormal :)

[PuFu 4600]

I guess it is about each ones workflow.

Indeed the best thing would be to use one program, or at least when exporting exporting things around, it remembers its attributes.

Unfortunately, even the most complete software packages, such as maya or max, can't do just everything better or faster than some 3rd party applications designed with a specific thing in mind. For instance, UV mapping: there are a lot of software out there for this job, some free some commercial, but getting your model/scene in means (usually) exporting to a generic file (colada, obj, 3ds). There is a reason autodesk developed FBX file format, in order to make the pipeline flow easier between their own products.

Case of point, everyone will use the software they are accustomed with, and aditional plug-ins/scripts/3rd party software that fir their workflow. There is no such thing as good or bad ;)

[lennard 447]

Crazybump is cool and I always use it but it's always better to have one less tool in the pipeline.

It's really cool indeed, but it's not free unfortunately.

For a poor student like me it's only a dream to have full acces to the program as I get the best results with it over any other program.

[Binkowski 26]

so, i downloaded this. and i have no idea how to install. but it looks rather promising.

[soul_assassin 1750]

It's really cool indeed, but it's not free unfortunately.

For a poor student like me it's only a dream to have full acces to the program as I get the best results with it over any other program.

Actually, I bought a student lisence which was quite cheap. And waaaay worth it.

About this nDo, tried it and have to say it's quite cumbersome to use. Many options but having it in the form of actions makes working with it pretty unpredictable and tedious as u can't see the changes realtime as you would with CB for example. In any case I'm sticking with CB until this can be integrated into plugin form for realtime preview.

[Synide 0]

so, i downloaded this. and i have no idea how to install. but it looks rather promising.

Just follow the instructions on the website.

About this nDo, tried it and have to say it's quite cumbersome to use. Many options but having it in the form of actions makes working with it pretty unpredictable and tedious as u can't see the changes realtime as you would with CB for example. In any case I'm sticking with CB until this can be integrated into plugin form for realtime preview.

Yeah, I saw it mentioned in a 3D app. forums. Thought it looked kinda interesting. After installing and having a bit of a play I too found it a bit cumbersome.

Oh well, cest la vie.

Personally, most of the time I've just used high/low bakes outta the 3D application, with occasional tweak up's in Photochop, s'enough for me.

[PuFu 4600]

Yes, i got the same student licence as SA for CB.

nDo is a bit weird to work with (although the idea is very good indeed) because it comes in the form of action, rather than a plug in. I guess that is a plus and a minus in the same time, since otherwise it wouldn't be able to adapt the normal map to aditional painting on top of it

[bushlurker 46]

I've used the NVIDIA normals plugin for PS quite a bit... it does the job fairly well on the normals front, and I like the idea of being able to treat a layer at a time, so I can lay it on heavy on, say, a bricks layer, and ease off quite a bit on the settings for windows or some other feature - then you can sort of assemble an overall nohq thats different in different areas...

B

[Robster 11]

I've used the NVIDIA normals plugin for PS quite a bit... it does the job fairly well on the normals front, and I like the idea of being able to treat a layer at a time, so I can lay it on heavy on, say, a bricks layer, and ease off quite a bit on the settings for windows or some other feature - then you can sort of assemble an overall nohq thats different in different areas...

B

Did you make the layers in the falklands source??? The sand and greycliff ones are really impressive... the nopx file is not made as every other normals i've been reviewing to learn how to do a good terrain texture...

could you tell us more about it... ??? :D

[bushlurker 46]

Those are parallax textures Robster... try a greyscale of the _co texture as a displacement map in the Alpha channel of the normal...

The ones in that demo terrain are just Chernarus textures with edited .nopx's...

B

Edited November 7, 2010 by Bushlurker

[soul_assassin 1750]

sorry to dig up old topic but nDo 2 BETA has been release, with a full release targeted at October:

http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=1005808

[PuFu 4600]

@Alex: that looks nicely

In other news, related, nVidia DDS PS plug ins have been updated, and now works on 64 bit as well:

http://developer.nvidia.com/nvidia-texture-tools-adobe-photoshop