Trouble with displacement maps

jg0484 said:

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?

I doubt it is anything to do with your hardware.

Let's try a more basic test. Try creating a basic black and white map rather than using the alpha channel method.

Here is an example. Create a similar map to the one shown below and then apply that to your image with a 10,10 distortion on a 800 x 600 px image and see if you get the same sort of effect in the flag as I have.

If this works OK, you might try converting your silk image to grey scale and playing with the contrast a bit to see if that will give you the sort of distortion you are looking for.

Short of advising you to re-install PS, I don't know what else to try.