Height in Substance but not in Image

this is one i've run into many times and rather than make a request in the wish list, perhaps i shld resolve if i've got something misunderstood with the editor and its components first.

i want to create a substance with height. it doesnt matter what; it could be dirt, wax, paint, or anything with a bit of height to it. and i want to map that onto an imported image or our good, old life preserver. this will be a surface filter, taking advantage of the height attributes of such.

now, if i plug the image into 'surface' that only leaves the 'height' to give height to my 'substance'. and that will somewhat work, but gives only a minimal bit of height to the substance and also warps the image in 'surface' a bit as well. if i map the image into the substance and plug that into the surface and plug a grayscale of the substance into 'height', that will map some nice height to the substance, but will also height map the image, which i dont want.

now, i can just make the background transparent and just do the substance all by itself and simply take that and apply it in photoshop (or whatever), but i'd prefer to do this all within FF, if possible.

so, that's my question, is it possible? can i map a substance with height and overlay that onto an imported image within FF without mapping the image itself with any height?

and btw, this is why i made a request before to unlock the height mapping routine from the results component. i wanted to map height on various aspects of a filter/texture/substance without mapping the background imported image. i still see no reason why the results component couldnt have a pass through to another component for multiple height mapping (you wouldnt call it the results component any more, though).

hi infini,

i was thinking that if the results component could be like any other component, that would work, too. you could then have as many as you wanted in a filter. of course, you'd need a new results component as a final one, but that shld be easy enough. i just want the functionality of height control and hdri able to be put and applied to any given part of a filter and not just the end result.

sorry, FF, i know i sound like a nag on this one and if there were a polite way to nag, i'd do it

at any rate, if anyone else knows of a way to do what i requested, please post it.

sphinx, thanks.

what i was trying to say is demonstrated in the posted image. i have a 'mud' substance/texture laying over the image of the life preserver. i dont want to change the look and especially the height of any of the life preserver, but i do want height in the 'mud'. if you notice in my image the life preserver has been height mapped somewhat along with the mud. i dont want that. i just want height in the mud.

Hmm. I think I know what you mean. The answer may be simpler than you suspect, at least if you use FF as a Photoshop plug-in. (Haven't tried on standalone version.) Just make the areas you don't want affected black in the height map and transparent in the color map. Run the filter on an image that is on the Background layer of Photoshop and voila! Running it on any other layer than the Background layer will result in transparency in the transparent areas, Background layer will "pass through" the original image.

The trick is: You don't even import the original image. You just run the filter on it.

As in:

Passthrough.ffxml

oh, i shld also mention that if you notice my posted image here, you'll notice that the 'mud' does not really conform to the heights on the image and that again follows the whole idea of being able to height map anywhere in the filter.

also, we may as well turn this into a height thread... i can turn this mud into an indentation on the image or i can do it like i have, where it's raised above the image. but, what i'd like to do now is, map the 'mud' to the image better, such that the mud looks like it follows the contours of the image, as in displacement type treatments. any ideas?

Quote
Kraellin wrote: jffe, yes it is like that one, but if you look closely, the underlying image does get distorted by height in that one. in fact, i'm surprised it got an editor's pick for that.

----There's a *Use image surface* control that I assume toggles that ?

jffe

ok, the masking is helping. still got some control problems but getting there now

This is the image with the frame width all the way off.

infini, it's the masking on the height layer that does the trick for me and what i was seeking. thanks

here's the latest example. notice that the life preserver image is NOT warped at all in this one. so, the masking did the trick thanks, guys

I have a simple displacement effect on the "Shadow and Light" filter that you could try

http://www.filterforge.com/filters/2134.html

You can also extract the luminosity channel of the original image and overlay it on the "mud" which will further add to the illusion of following the shapes.