Here we go. Seven steps coming up.

Step 1 - Start with a nearly empty shader and add your displacement map.

Don't use JPEG. JPEG images have tiny artifacts at all times. When used for color, we often can't see them because they are nearly zero, but even tiny errors become obvious when used as a displacement.

If you're in Poser Pro make sure you set the Custom Gamma to 1 on this image. This image is data, not a visual. We don't want it processed like a visual.

I use medium sized (around 1K) 8-bit PNG when I'm casual, and larger 16-bit TIFF when I'm intensely serious.

It's really, really important that the areas that are not buttons should be absolutely zero.

For Diffuse_Color, use white.
For Diffuse_Value, use .8.

The actual color of the surface is Diffuse_Color * Diffuse_Value, so that will be an 80% gray for the time being.

For now we don't want any specularity, so set Specular_Value to 0.

Add your Image_Map node to hold the button displacement map. Do a good job on this map. I spent over an hour futzing with Photoshop and couldn't do what I wan't. So I wrote a shader to generate the map, rendered it in Poser, and saved it as a PNG.

Also by good job I mean that the peak value in the displacement map should really be white. If you don't do that, you're not using the full range of numerical values possible, and you will get quantization noise that could be avoided.

If you need help making a really good button displacement map, I can assist.

Mine has a skewed aspect ratio and the buttons look elliptical, but that's only because the cloth image I want to use later is 1024x768. So pay no attention to the fact that my buttons look odd in preview. When rendered, they look round. I'm rendering off center here so we can more easily see the displacement. The buttons are truly round.

Connect the displacement map to your Displacement channel. You will have to be aware of your chosen Poser Display Unit (PDU). My PDU is inches. My Displacement number is .1. With my good map, this means the buttons stick out exactly .1 inch.
 

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