I have photoshop cs4 and can simply take the v4 skin map load it and then in photoshop desaturate it and it becomes a grey scale.

but this process seems not dark enough compared to other bump maps I have purchased for V4.

I am trying to make my own skin.

Is there something I should be doing to the desaturated map once I make it?

thanks Rowlando

There are entire threads on this forum that discuss bump maps for skin, and the gist is NOT to use a desaturated skin image. Have a read and you'll be convinced. You have CS4? Great! You have everything you need to draw your own bump map.

You might have to scrounge around some of the 3D sites to see how they did it. If they tell you to simply desaturate a skin texture, walk away. It's not what you want. I guarantee it.

Agree with Robyn.

Hi Robynsveil

Thanks, I did do a search on the subject called bump maps and got nothing much in return, I did this befor this post.

I don't believe bump maps should be that difficult since I should be able to base it off the texture map.

Can you suggest a link please

Thanks Rowlando, you advice is much appreciated

The problem with basing bump maps off a desaturated texture (you might want to change the mode from RGB to Greyscale to make the file size smaller by the way) is that the dark and light parts of the texture usually do not correlate to the high and low features of the skin.

For instance, say the texture map shows a mole or beauty mark on the figure's face.  If you take that into Photoshop and desaturate it you'll discover the problem when you use it as a bump map.  In bump maps, white is high and black is low, right?  That dark mole or beauty mark is going to create a pit on the figure's face.  If there are veins visible on the texture, they are going to create shallow grooves on the figure.  Wrinkles are going to become cracks and fissures.  Shadows that are part of the texture are going to create depressions.  And if there are any highlights that are part of the texture they are going to cause bumps on the figure because they are white.

It's ok to use a texture as a bump map if you need to give an object like wood or stone a little bit of texture provided that texture is relatively even.  But even then you might have problems.  If you took a brick wall and made a bump map out of the texture, the mortar between the bricks would stick out because the mortar in the bump map is white.

OK thanks Manofsteel

I guess don't use desaturated maps, I was looking for a way to create a bump map from the texture file but perhaps its best not to use one?

Thanks Rowlando

You can but you're going to have to fix any major light or dark areas and even out the skin areas with an image editor like Photoshop or GIMP.  For instance, I made a bump map out of a head texture but first I had to fix the eyebrows.  Since they were dark on the texture they were dark on the bump map and created deep grooves above the figure's eyes.  The texture was that of a man who had a fair amount of five o'clock shadow.  Each whisker made a tiny pit because it was dark.  In photoshop I changed the dark eyebrows to white and I isolated the beard area and inverted it so that the stubble was white dots instead of dark dots.  Oh!  The texture is the one you see in my avatar.

Now the eyebrows show as raised above the surface of the skin and the stubble doesn't look just painted on.  You can almost feel it in your imagination when you look at it.

I hate when vendors make a texture and state "Includes bump map!" and you look and see that it's just a greyscale picture of the texture.  It's a lot of work to make a real greyscale bump map because you have to analyze the texture and figure out what's raised and what's lowered and then alter the greyscale image accordingly.  But when it's done right, it looks great.

By trying to create a bump map from a colour texture, you are trying to answer the question "What is the relationship between colour and the variations of surface height ?"

The answer (which people attempting to do this haven't realised) is that you get low grade noise (due to the small variations in colour).
You'd achieve more or less the same effect by using the scaled down output from a noise node.

Thanks all

I have learned a lot about this and have been reading some info re bagginsbill posts seems very tec though.

I think I can handle using a low grade noise node, as nruddock suggests thanks and saying that, I will not bother with a desaturated bump map.

thanks again. I think I can settle for my renders with no bump really, since I am not looking high realisim.

Rowlando

Quote - Thanks, I did do a search on the subject called bump maps and got nothing much in return, I did this befor this post.

What ManOfSteel explained so thoroughly (thank you, ManOfSteel! Well done! ) was essentially what I was referring to. In other places (like CG Society, for example - might be a bad example, actually :lol:), people do draw bump maps. Tutorials? They are scant, but there are some... this was what I found by entering "skin texture bump map tutorial" into google - this was the second entry:

http://www.madartgraphics.com/tutorials/face5.htm

Quite decent tutorial, I reckon...

And, just to add on what Robyn and ManOfSteel have already posted, most of your best bump maps generated are hand drawn.

Quote - ... this was what I found by entering "skin texture bump map tutorial" into google - this was the second entry:

http://www.madartgraphics.com/tutorials/face5.htm

Quite decent tutorial, I reckon...

That link gave couldn't come up for me.  It only took me to the Rendo link.

However, I corrected that link below.  Thanks RB for this info.  Been pondering how to make bump maps as well.  Have a good one....

http://www.madartgraphics.com/tutorials/face5.htm

Oh dear... why did it do that?? I'd pasted the link text, and then did the link thing itself afterwards using the same CTRL V (clipboard paste)... I guess I best double-check anything I do in these threads... :blink: thanks for checking that, Jartz!

Re nruddock comment

You'd achieve more or less the same effect by using the scaled down output from a noise node.

Hi could someplease explane how this is done perhaps a pic would help

Thanks Rowlando

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?thread_id=2715507

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?message_id=3179186&ebot_calc_page#message_3179186

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?thread_id=2796835&page=2#message_3617166

THanks Bagginsbill

Great lessons I am getting a better feel for things, but I am trying to keep it as simple as possible.

Rowlando

Quote - THanks Bagginsbill Great lessons I am getting a better feel for things, but I am trying to keep it as simple as possible.

Rowlando

Good luck with keeping it simple doing bump with drawings. What Bagginsbill has showed you is the easiest way to create bump. The way I was suggesting is definitely far more time-consuming with a greater chance of getting less than what you want. Don't be frightened of the nodes... it's like following a recipe: just get you 30-minute cooking mode on it, and you're sure of success. And BB's recipes are easy to follow.

Almost as easy as Jamie's ... :biggrin:

Quote - And, just to add on what Robyn and ManOfSteel have already posted, most of your best bump maps generated are hand drawn.

I have purchased almost every high-quality V4 skin available  and I have NEVER ONCE seen a "hand painted" bump map.  I don't know why everyone keeps telling people who are trying to learn that they are going to have to "hand paint" everything.  From what I have seen, most of the bump maps are grey-scaled images of the original with eyebrows, veins, moles, etc. corrected.  This is fairly simple to do in Photoshop.  I have also seen a couple of bump maps made using the emboss filter.  The best I have seen are made using (primarily) the high-pass filter. Even DAZ's "Elite" texture bump maps are not "hand painted".  I've been using photoshop for so many years that I can look at one of these bump maps and figure out either exactly how it was done, or at least how to recreate the effect in PS.  I was able to recreate this particular DAZ Elite bump map using a combo of greyscale, highpass filter, blending modes, then correction of the eyebrows and a buttload of sharpening on the lips.  The solarize filter can also come in handy for bump map and specular map creation.    Just play around a bit and see what works best for you... it's really not that difficult.   I'd say it's actually more of a matter of learning photoshop and everything it can do. 

P.S. -- I dare anyone on this thread to show me a V4 bump map (which is what the OP asked about) that is "hand painted".  It is NOT difficult to make a high-quality bump map for V4. 

Quote - I don't know why everyone keeps telling people who are trying to learn that they are going to have to "hand paint" everything.  From what I have seen, most of the bump maps are grey-scaled images of the original with eyebrows, veins, moles, etc. corrected.

(Once again with feeling) The greyscale version of a colour texture is not a proper bump map.
The variations in colour do not equate to ups and downs in the skin surface. You'll find that most of these bump map are applied in very small amounts, and would fail the true test of a bump map, which is if applied as a displacement map with a realistic maximum, would give a sensible result.

Quote - P.S. -- I dare anyone on this thread to show me a V4 bump map (which is what the OP asked about) that is "hand painted".  It is NOT difficult to make a high-quality bump map for V4. 

You used two different phrases and demonstrated the problem yourself. Use the same phrase.

Let's take that over again:

I dare anyone on this thread to show me a V4 bump map that is "hand painted". [ Hint to those looking - there are none. ]

I dare anyone on this thread to show me a V4 bump map that is high-quality. [ Hint to those looking - there are none. ]

Note: At the heart of this dispute we have people using a phrase without agreement on what each person thinks that phrase means.

A high-quality bump map is one that

1. Is of the state of the art in CG - movie quality.

2. Is not something that was made in a half hour or even 2 hours. It took hundreds of hours. Otherwise, what do you call the maps that were made over hundreds of hours by the greatest CG artists in the industry, if the half-hour maps are "high quality". Are those other ones "ridiculous god-like quality" or what?

3. Cost somewhere around $10,000 to $100,000 to make, given all the people and technology and footage that went into getting it to its final state. If that's not the case, then what do we call the quality of the texture set that did actually cost $100,000 to make?

Converting the color map to a bump map is mainly done a) because the texturer doesn't know any better, or b) because when you look at the time invested compared to how it will pay you back, it doesn't really make sense to spend hundreds of hours on a V4 texture you're going to sell for under $15 (agreeing with #2 of Bagginsbill's post). 

Hi all

I don't think this should be a matter of argument but rather of what is important to each ones needs.

I don't seek perfection nor do I seek bad quality in a bump map, but want to just be able to create a map that would suit my own needs. Saying that I do not want to enter such a learning curve that it takes me from what I really like doing.

The advice on this post is very helpful, but its up to me to sift through it all and decide how I approach what I want.

I like to click and past so Photoshop is good for me, even though I am still learning so much.

Now its clear to me that I can go to an awful lot of trouble to create a bump map and then find that different lights make it look crap, so having said that. I just need a bump map that works OK and lights that compliment it the way I want. Giving me a skin result I am happy with.

The lighting can really mess up a good texure and bump map.

Getting the best results is the fun of doing it all.

Thanks so much for all your input. Rowlando

Just because everyone does it or just because everyone wants it, doesn't improve the actual quality of what is being done. Pretty much every vendor that sells eye colour textures adds a reflection component: fake reflections. This is added because all the customers want it. The customer doesn't know any better, and the vendor is happy to comply because that is what generate sales. Whether it is right or not is immaterial. Along comes a dufus like me who wants a non fake reflection eye colour, and I get weird responses from vendors asking why the heck I would want that. When I explain that the super-imposed reflections they put on it interferes with my scene lights based reflections, they quickly dump me in the too-hard basket and ignore me.

This has happened too often. Wrong becomes right through frequency.

Here in Oz, we have a substance called Bactrim. It is a sulfonamide, also known as a sulfa drug. Because "UR" is pronounced "AH" here, dim-witted clerks writing drug allergies on patients charts are interpreting the sound to an element: "Sulphur". Whilst there are some sulphur atoms in these drugs, there are a lot of other element atoms as well. The words may sound alike but this doesn't mean they are the same nor that there are cross-reactivities to allergens.

Despite the fact that this is true, because everyone with this on their charts believes they are allergic the "suphur"... sheesh, what do you do? Educate a nation?? :rolleyes:

Economics drives the quality of what we receive from vendors, large and small. Whether we want to take this to the next step is up to us. Me, I'd rather not settle for the lowest common denominator. If you want to do like everyone else, sheesh, look at their work and copy it. That's not hard to do. There's heaps of "tutorials" out there on how to achieve that "quality" of work.

If a lesson on how to use CS4 was all the OP wanted, well, okay, fair enough. I guess we didn't actually answer the original question:

Quote - I have photoshop cs4 and can simply take the v4 skin map load it and then in photoshop desaturate it and it becomes a grey scale, but this process seems not dark enough compared to other bump maps I have purchased for V4. I am trying to make my own skin. Is there something I should be doing to the desaturated map once I make it?

Anyone care to answer that question? I don't.