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[Solved] Best way to generate grayscale/height maps from 3Dcoat


Omni-Moulage
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Hi everibody,

With 3DCoat it is very simple to create a low relief model from a grayscale picture.

But I would like to find a way to generate a grayscale picture from an existing 3D model.

Somebody could help me for that ?

This morning I prepared a short video to show my method but the result is not tottally correct because the relief i created missing round shapes.

All help will welcome :)

2021-10-30 07-51-01.mkv

 

direct link if you prefer: https://photos.app.goo.gl/vAhhpgGANgZThQWz6

Edited by Omni-Moulage
video link added
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Hi

Your method is correct, remember to save it as 16bit scale

try render using black as background color, fine tune light curves on any external editor and blur borders to get smooth transition between silhouette borders and background

8fdbb8940e2cb30bea371fa753ff6a673c9e2d2b.png

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Also can create images using Creating Brush alpha using 3d-model (On brushes Panel)

Brushes.jpg

And then export it

Export_2.jpg

--------------------------------------------

This video is outdated, but procedure is still the same

 

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53 minutes ago, Carlosan said:

Hi

Your method is correct, remember to save it as 16bit scale

try render using black as background color, fine tune light curves on any external editor and blur borders to get smooth transition between silhouette borders and background

Are you sure is this correct? He wants zdepth map, but rendering composite pass by default. But i just test 3dcoat rendered all passes  the same, looks like a bug.
3dcoat have depth pass not sure if it's the same zdepth. 

Just tested in 4.9 it's really a bug with passes, but depth pass looks just black, do not know how to use it, in zdepth you should set distance to bake depth to black\white color

Edited by sprayer
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Okay i found out it working but only with fog settings and it needs to be inverted so still it's not zdepth, maybe we should ask this feature.

Edit. It is also works in 2021 with fog, but i found it works in different way, i cannot achieve the same result as in 4.9 to have on model depth gradient from white to black, just in gray range.


Note you have to change shader. it won't work with matcap shader...again

IMLbTFW.jpg1409845951_screenshot2021-10-30003.thumb.png.c1216742812fa002ef8a6907feaf6455.png

 

Edited by sprayer
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Thank you very much for taking the time to answer me.

After several tries, I decided to use "Fog Mask" then an external editor.

To begin with, I took 19 photos by varying the value of "Fog Density" (from 810 to 500)

Then from the external editor I compiled all the images to create a single inverted one.

The result is better than this morning but I think it can be improved a lot. (I just added two spherical shapes for the eyes)

 

 

image.thumb.png.458b095d63752d862fc914b00b89ac12.pngimage.thumb.png.7e8374953c7fecb692956f0b8175db19.png

image.thumb.png.b0d9cc2ec007d199852912d8274db968.png

image.thumb.png.ed501c47abc2acaf22acd5d2cd746ad9.png

 

the relief is poor :(

image.thumb.png.3f52fae47ac1aa135f7a15b9e49571a7.pngfinal result on a medalion

 

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It is poor because 3dcoat save in 8bit image, this is very small to store gray colors, only 256 colors in full range, you need atleast 16bit or 32bit image. Try to save it from photoshop

So this depth map is useless if you cannot save it in better quality. 

@Andrew Shpagin Can you take a look on this? zdepth map is pretty useful feature

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@Carlosan Maybe i don't understand but how to increase image bitrate on save? Because 8bit (256 colors for alphas blacks and white) is not enough for displacement especially if you cannot to set it range between black and white because of fog restriction, you can see on screenshot from topic starter it is visible steps in depth. All displacement map saves in 16 or 32bit per channel

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After a lot of trying, I'm a little confused now.
I could not find better than to make several images by varying the value of "Fog Density" (especially to detail the eyes of the bear)
Are you sure that the bit level should exceed 8 ?
Because when I take a look at the precision of the first frame I show on my first post, the precision is only 8 bits.

image.thumb.png.3ffe60ea2c6d9bee8b57aafe9303740d.png

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