Trouble with displacement maps

Hi

THIS IS DRIVING ME NUTS!! :mad:

I'm having heaps of trouble applying a displacement filter to my flattened images. I think i know how to create the displacement map. I right click on any one colour channel; duplicate it; save as a new channel; and save this new b&w image as my disp. map.

But then i go back to the image that i want 'displaced', click on the appropriate layer, go to Filter>Distort>Displace, click OK on the little dialog box and then open the previously created disp. map. Then nothing happens.

Have i missed a step??

In case it helps, i have CS3 Production Premium installed.

Thanks

jg0484 said:

Hi

THIS IS DRIVING ME NUTS!! :mad:

I'm having heaps of trouble applying a displacement filter to my flattened images. I think i know how to create the displacement map. I right click on any one colour channel; duplicate it; save as a new channel; and save this new b&w image as my disp. map.

But then i go back to the image that i want 'displaced', click on the appropriate layer, go to Filter>Distort>Displace, click OK on the little dialog box and then open the previously created disp. map. Then nothing happens.

Have i missed a step??

In case it helps, i have CS3 Production Premium installed.

Thanks

dunno if it's the problem you're getting, but when i was messing w/ disp maps, i found you had to save the map using the Maximise Compatibility option (Edit > Preferences > File Handling > Maximize PSD File Compatibility )
and make sure the map size is relevant to the image.

Nope, still not doing anything.

about at the limit of my experience i'm afraid, don't use DMaps much. the only thing i can think of other than that is, have you input a sufficiently large distort amount to actually make a difference?

Ok, no probs. Thanks for the help neway. I'll keep playing around with it. I checked which version of directx i had installed just in case itr had to do with 3d performance but i have ver.9.0c which i guess is pretty new. The last thing i tried was getting the latest PS CS3 path. No change with that either.

Not really sure what you are doing wrong, but when I do what you seem to be doing by applying the BW saved PSD file to the original, I get a distortion appropriate to the settings used in the Displace dialog.

Here's a simple example using Horiz = 5 and Vert = 21

Perhaps if you listed exactly the steps you are taking at the moment, I might be able to see if you are missing something out.

OK, sure. I make an image of a flag with the vector tools in PS. Then I press ctrl+A to select all the image and then go to Edit>Copy Merged. I open up a new document of same dimensions, and paste the flag image which is now flattened into one layer. Then i save this new PSD doc.

I open up a jpeg image of a slightly scrunched up piece of red satin material. The idea is to use this as a displacement map to make the flag look a bit wavy. So i right-click on the green channel, duplicate it as a New document in the dialog box, and then sasve this b&w image as a PSD file. Then i close this.

Back to the flag, with the RGB channel selected and the appropriate layer selected (the only other layer being the locked white background), i go to Filter>Distort>Displace. I've tried all sorts of variations here, inclouding your example of Horiz = 5 and Vert = 21. When i choose a setting the box opens for me to choose a disp. map. So i pick the b&w image... click open... and yeah, the box disappears and returns me to the flag... unchanged.

The strange thing is that in the history pallette, there is no trace of me ever applying or attempting to apply a disp. filter. I have tried this process like 5 times in a row before, and no change in the history box. And just to make sure i'm not going insane, i test some other filters to see if it's not me. I've tried going to Filter>Displace>Ocean Ripple and pressing OK and this cool effect comes over the flag and it's recorded in the history pallette.

I don't know what else to tell you about this but i hope someone out there has some ideas... peace out. :P

I've just gone through the steps you describe exactly and this is the result I got. The bottom image is the saved green channel I used.

I used 25 for both inputs to exaggerate the effect.

I don't know why you're not getting similar results.

It may be time to do a preferences reset. CTRL + ALT + Shift as you start up PS will reset your preferences. Make sure you have saved any actions, brushes, styles etc before doing this or you will lose them. I've often found in the past that resetting prefs fixes a lot of these unexplained type of problems with PS. It might be worth a try.

Good luck.

I managed to reset PS -- still not working... thanks for the input though. I just can't believe i'm still having trouble with this. Do you think it may be my computer?

can't see your puter being the problem.
is the disp map the same size as the image? in DPI as well as size? i take it you did remember to save the map pic w/ the compatability option, but the fact it's not in history is very odd.

just as summat else to try, go here
http://www.heathrowe.com/tuts/displace.asp

and try this tute from scratch and see if it works. again, use the max compatability option when saving.

if this works, your displacement filter's fine etc, if it doesn't i have no other ideas other than to reinstall PShop, or at least the Displacement filter ( believe you should be able to just copy/paste it into the Filters folder and overwrite the current version.