Keeping albedo, roughness synchronized in PS?
polycounter lvl 3
Hi,
I often came across this problem while doing diffuse + specular: how to keep both maps synchronized, after I made changes in one of them.
This wasn't a great problem though, because most of the time I was OK with using Adjustment Layers (with simple masks) over a copy of diffuse group to get specular group.
Now, in PBR workflow, it became a big issue for me. We have 5+ types of maps now and 3 of them need to be in sync - albedo, roughness and metalness.
Substance Painter solved the problem well, but there's a moment in each work when I need to use Photoshop. It's faster for mechanical patterns, texts. Then I have to propagate every such change in all of the maps.
How do you approach this problem in your work?
Some PS automation, smart objects cloning, specific workflow?
I try to have as many layers as I can manage, then copy them to other groups. I paint mostly masks on solid colours, with PS effects on it like internal glow, instead of painting purely raster layers. That allows me keep layers as brigtness in Metalness and as color in Albedo - copying mask between them is easy.
I often came across this problem while doing diffuse + specular: how to keep both maps synchronized, after I made changes in one of them.
This wasn't a great problem though, because most of the time I was OK with using Adjustment Layers (with simple masks) over a copy of diffuse group to get specular group.
Now, in PBR workflow, it became a big issue for me. We have 5+ types of maps now and 3 of them need to be in sync - albedo, roughness and metalness.
Substance Painter solved the problem well, but there's a moment in each work when I need to use Photoshop. It's faster for mechanical patterns, texts. Then I have to propagate every such change in all of the maps.
How do you approach this problem in your work?
Some PS automation, smart objects cloning, specific workflow?
I try to have as many layers as I can manage, then copy them to other groups. I paint mostly masks on solid colours, with PS effects on it like internal glow, instead of painting purely raster layers. That allows me keep layers as brigtness in Metalness and as color in Albedo - copying mask between them is easy.
Replies
- Saving masks to channels and/or layers : You can save them as selection inside a channel (selection - save selection) which makes it easy to call them back whenever you need them. Another, dirtier way is to "save" selections as pixels, into layers used only for quick ctrl-click selection. (this dirtier method can be a little faster than the proper selection saving approach, since it allows you to call back selections without having to go the channels palettes, or to go to the selection - load selection menu items which is lacking of any visual preview). Selection saving/loading can be used for both material surfaces, and smaller details.
- Smart objects : One little known feature of smart objects is that, once you create one from a layer or a bunch of layers and then ctrl-j the smart object to duplicate it, the newly created smart object is actually an instance of the original. (as opposed to dragging a smart object into a document, which makes the dropped one into a standalone copy) This is very useful for all kind of synchronization scenarios.
Hope this helps !
Great tip! I didn't know this at all and just thought Smart Objects were just for images referenced from outside PS. Going to try it out now
Hey pior,
Could you give an example of where smart objects would be useful with texturing? Since it is layer related, to make changes apply to the original you have to be modifying the instanced smart object in a new document. Meaning if you have a grunge layer you can't really see it interacting with the rest of your texture because it will just be a instanced layer in a new document.
@tynew: Lack of dynamic refreshing of smart objects in Photoshop is a problem obviously. But in complex cases it can be better than copying the layer to each group, I mean benefits could be bigger than the trouble.
If you generate the specular map by using a series of adjustment layers, then you just have to clone the diffuse map smart object to specular's group.
Krita - the new painting software which aims to be PS replacement specifically in digital painting and texturing - has Clone Layers (as in Pior's solution) which can be painted upon in the original window. I don't remember if they can be scaled independently though.
This would be a perfect solution. If it had to be done in PS, the plugin would have to copy the results of painting to the smart object, applying all transformations. OK, but I digress :P
Smart Objects are pretty useful for all kind of things - I am often surprised to hear that not many people use them.