Oops! Sorry - forgot you were kinda new to PS. #2 - that blur filter was Filter>Blur>Guassian Blur - I think I made it something like 10 - something really out of focus, but not SO blurred that it has no contrast. To create #3, click on the little icon at the bottom of the Layer stack that is a diagonally split B&W circle - that is to create what is called an Adjustment Layer. Choose Brightness/Contrast. Up will pop the dialog box for you to lower the contrast, then click Okay - it creates a new layer that adjusts everything BELOW it. WHY, you might ask? Becasue you can make all kinds of adjustments with a seperate Adjustment Layer, and it doesn't ACTUALLY affect the layers below, that way you can change it or delete it later if you don't like it, and you haven't hurt the work below. It gives you incredible editing capabilities LATER in your work. #5 question - I just filled the layer (paint bucket would be easy for you) with a medium blue (you san see the general color I used in the Layer stack). I then chose a rust color and painted the globby streaks coming down. And the Color Mode - look in the image above - look at the upper left of the Layer Stack (even though the Crosshatch layer is selected) and see that it reads: "Soft Light"? THAT is where you change a layer's "mode". For #5, choose "Color" (it's almost ALL the way at the bottom of the list). #6 - duplicated #5 (which is why it says "copy"), changed it to Overlay Mode, hit "D" so my colors would be B&W default, and got my brush and painted black streaks from the top, and white streaks from the bottom. Yeah, I kinda machine-gunned through it knowing what everything meant - but didn't slow it down taking into account that YOU didn't know what it all meant. Sorry about that one. Hope that clears some things up- -Lew ;-)

Funky image!! Me likes!! Go on, girl!!

How were the images made? Here ya go! From bottom to top (looking at the layers stack at bottom right): 1 - Base Background Image - nada there, just left it blank - dunno why I didn't start it there... 2 - Layer 1 - Fill w/White, Filter>Render>Clouds, hit Ctrl+F 5-6 times, Filter>Blur>something fairly heavy (exact number?) to make it pretty fuzzy, Ctrl+L and increased contrast to make it more "blobby". 3 - Brightness/Contrast Adjustment Layer - reduced contrast tomake it not start black&white - more on why later. 4 - Layer 2 - Filter>Noise>30%, then Filter>Brush Strokes>Crosshatch (adjust to taste). 5 - Layer 3 - Color Mode - Blue w/Rust color "dripping". 6 - Layer 3 Copy - Copied Layer 3 (obviously), changed to Overlay Mode, added Black "dripping" and White "collecting" at the bottom. Flatten at this point and you have the "Color Image". UnFlatten, hide both Layer 3 and Layer 3 Copy, Click on Layer 2 and Image>Adjustments>Brightness/Contrast - reduce contrast a bit so the white isn't so stark, Double-Click on the Brightness/Contrast Adjustment Layer, raise the contrast to make it more "blobby" without the whites completely blowing out - this was there's not only texture but the "whites" of the Crosshatch show as well giving extra bumps. Flatten and save as your "Bump Image". (sorry if the image is difficult to read - fairly heavy comression to make it under 200KB) Ta-Da! Enjoy, and go play- -Lew ;-)

Sorry everyone who's reading this - meant to put this in the Bryce Forum, but did it pretty quick and just put it in the Photoshop Forum since that's where our conversation started in the first place: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?Form.ShowMessage=2490796&Form.sess_id=55780595&Form.sess_key=1134478246 Sorry for any confusion. -Lew ;-)

Oh I know know about the notebooks (not just some photographers, MOST did) - used to carry one myself. Look in just about every photo publication and you'll see their shoting data - it's made that much easier with the EXIF data. But look at most of the data and you'll read something like 1/125th at f8 - nothing Earth-shattering there. 9 times outta 10 it's simple data like that. Not something like (in broad daylight) setting their camera to ASA 1000, shooting 1/4000 at f22 so they could not only freeze everything in sight, but have a tremendously deep focus. Or using ASA 50, and shooting 1/4th sec at f16 so they could get the water motion-blurred yet just slow enough so the greenery doesn't obviously motion-blur in the mild wind on an overcast day. Learn, learn, learn! I am ALL for sharing info, but people are now able to publish their shooting data and sound professional when they're using a digital point&shoot - when if you and I went out there with our DSLRs we wouldn't have nearly the same data with our shots. And how many people shoot manually these days? We live in a world where just about everything is in "Program" mode (or the Canon "green box") where the camera completely takes over, or Aperture Priority or Shutter Priority - I'm not knocking these because they're truly helpful, but 1/2 of the shooting equation is left to the camera, not a purposeful choice on the shooter's behalf because of something they specifically wanted to achieve - unless they NOTE that they specificaly wanted THIS F-stop or THIS shutter speed to acheive THIS effect. And... as you may have guessed... this could ONLY be shared in the image's description - not the EXIF data - which is why I don't care if it's shared in the data of an image if someone right clicks on my post and chooses "Save Picture As" to their hard drive.

Print sizes and their cropping are tricky because they weren't made for the 35mm film frame. 4x6, 6x9, 8x12, 11x17, 12x18, 16x24, etc. are the correct aspect ratio for 35mm film (1:1.5 now known as 3:2). 4x5, 5x7, and 8x10, and 11x14 are the result of those actual sized camera films. They were merely contact prints, or direct proportional blowups (excepting for the 5x7 camera negatives) starting with 4x5 (double is 8x10, quadruple is 16x20, get it?). When those like Kodak and Fuji started making 35mm film (or the camera manufacturers, I can't remember which - chicken/egg?!) and settled on a negative that was 24mmx36mm, no one ever stopped making the 4x5, 5x7, 8x10, 11x14, etc. FRAMES. So, nowadays, the cropping just drives people nuts and no one knows where this all came from. As for digital sensors - the first digital cameras were made with VIDEO CCDs - 1:1.33 (look at your averagve TV set in the living room - and the ratio is now known as 4:3). People want their 4x6's and don't know why they are cropped. Only somewhat recently have camera manufacturers made their DSLR censors 1:1.5 (or 3:2) to reflect their normally used proportions.

I realize I'm going to get shot for saying this, but unless there's something extreme about the image (had to use 1/2000th sec shutter speed to freeze everything in the frame, used a 10 minute exposure for a night shot to be properly exposed at f32, etc.), I NEVER look at the shooting data. Never saw the point, really. Reason being, if you wanted to duplicate the shot, even if you went to the exact location, used the exact same camera/lens combo, your settings would be different because you'll NEVER get the exact same quality of light twice. It will always be a little more hazy, sunny, overcast, generally cloudy, etc. The shooting data may give you a general idea, but you're going to have to tweak YOUR exposure anyway. And if saving for the web, or as another format entirely (you're saving a different version in the first place - not changing the original), I never cared about my EXIF data being there since I'll have it in my originals. If I WANT someone to know what I did to get the shot, I'll tell them.

Sweet model - thanks for the freebie!

I use XP Home and Pro, and before that Win98 - never had a problem with Quicktime - an excellent format all around. Yeah, weird... Did you try downloading the newest version - QT7 is out and free, of course. Cool video - yeah, been curious what can be done with Vue aside from their demo reel. Been looking to see a "real world" project. -Lew ;-)

"There's just one thing though...." Yeeeeeeeessssss? Cool image, BTW!! Seems ya got it without any trouble. Sorry - no bigger images - I actually made them 512x512, but I had to save them at Quality:8 jpegs so they'd upload to RR. That would explain the fuzziness. I'll gladly remake them - It was quick and dirty and fun - and VERY easy to duplicate again since I remember what I did in the first place. Sooooo... How do I send you the images without compressing them? I don't know how to upload stuff for the freebies section yet - got a bunch of stuff I'd put up if I knew how. Just haven't had time to investigate it yet. -Lew ;-)

http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?ForumID=12366&Form.ShowMessage=2500092 Here ya go - take a gander, and save the images for your texture to play with in this tut. I usually start out with a flattened cube, apply my textures to the TOP ONLY and then rotate them up and around for walls and ceiling and stuff - this way the texture is applied in full view, and not rounding a corner or something. -Lew ;-)

Now you have a surface with chuks TAKEN OUT. Now have fun, play with settings to make the bumps less severe, yaddah, yaddah, yaddah. If this is going to be a wall inside a bulding or something, I usually set the Reflection to ZERO. BTW - the atmo is turned off, color set to black (instead of the default chroma-key blue), and the sun has been turned off. Should have mentioned this above I realize but hey, better late than never, huh? Hope this clears some things out. -Lew ;-)

Now try this.

This is what you should end up with - or at least close considering your lighting will not exactly match mine. This is "lumpy" metal - or rock, or whatever you think it looks like. Now go back into the Material Editor.

I forgot to put for you to ALSO go to the window where your texture's being displayed, click on the lower right button and choose "Object Top" for the exercise.