CrazyBump Beta 8.5

Ryan Clark

Denizens of Polycount:

CrazyBump Beta 8.5 is ready for testing. This one makes better-looking normal maps.

-New code makes a nicer blend of shape recognition with image detail.

-Mixer combines normal map layers more accurately than before.

-Overall awesomeness improved by 27%.

Download from http://crazybump.com/beta/upgrade.html

Michael Knubben

27%? sign me up!

EarthQuake

Hey one thing that i've forgoten to mention, when using crazybump with cs3 i seem to have a lot of performance issues, i dont think this was the case with older versions of PS, now i dont know if theres actually anything you can do about that but jsut thought i would bring it to your attention and see if anyone else has the same problem.

romi

thanks Ryan! sign me up as well.

cheers,
Rom
snowblindstudios.com

Tumerboy

Woot! I'll dl when I get to work.

Ryan Clark

Thanks for the report, Earthquake!

CS3 uses Direct3D, while older photoshops don't, so I suspect the performance trouble might have something to do with D3D.

Does photoshop have an option to disable use of D3D? If so, does it seem to help?

Are you seeing these performance issues in phtoshop, or in crazybump, or both?

thanks very much,

-Ryan

EarthQuake

PS tells me there is no GPU settings under xp, but i'm sure its using the 3d card for some stuff here as its never really interfered with 3d apps before. You know come to think of it i generally only have problems when running other 3d apps along with crazybump and photoshop. For example i often have modo(opengl) our model viewer(opengl) and PS and CB open, and that generally kills everything... Which makes sense because its just a bit retarded for me to expect that all to work.

The thing is that i think with older versions of PS that wouldn't really affect PS at all, just the 3d apps, oh well likely a photoshop problem. =(

sherrell

crazybump to be honest never heard of it, this is going to be stupid but wat does it do, does it generate normal maps or cleans them up

Tumerboy

yes. and does it very well.

Download and try it out, you won't regret it.

sherrell

it does both generate normal maps and cleans them up then?

Ryan Clark

Hi EarthQuake,

This needs further investigation. CrazyBump should play nice with other 3D software... if it's not doing that, then something needs fixing!


Hi Sherrell,

CrazyBump is a multipurpose bumpmap creation/manipulation thingy which really needs a more informative website.

-It uses image recognition to make normal & displacement maps from photo-source textures.

-It combines normal maps in multiple layers, and blends them properly in 3D. This looks much better than trying to blend them with a photoshop action.

-It removes directional light from photo-source textures, to make them suitable for use as diffuse maps.

-It has a tool to help create specmaps

-It has a tool to make fake (but decent-looking) ambient occlusion maps.

I'm sure it has features that I'm forgetting to mention. If you're running windows, then please download the free beta test, and give it a spin!

thanks,

-Ryan

arrangemonk

puny developpers are instructed to write documentations

Tumerboy

HA HA!

TheSplash

Crazy bump doesn't need documentation... It's so simple.

I gave the new version a spin, the first image I tried creating a normal map for I didn't get very good results but the second I got amazing results. I think it might be because the first image the light source was adjacent to the the object, I dunno. What is the ideal image to use in crazy bump?

Ryan Clark

Hey, TheSplash!

Would you be willing to show me your first image... the one which got poor results? If you could show it to me, then I might be able to improve my algorithm to handle it better, or at least offer specific advice about it...

TheSplash

Hey Ryan, I found that putting the shape recognition on 0 gave a much better result for that image, although thats basically a blurred and desaturated version of the diffuse its a lot better.

I realize shape recognition is very difficult but it seems a lot of images I try it on sort of have a diagonal gradient across the heightmap. So like instead of parts that are the same height being the same-ish value the parts on one corner are lighter and the ones on the opposite are darker.

Anyways, love the program it's great to see you are always improving on it.

here is a link to that first image if you are still interested. http://img86.imageshack.us/img86/5909/ornaments0098slk7.jpg

Slum

Crazybump doesn't need documentation, it's so damn easy to use. If you can't use it, you're doing something wrong :P

Ryan Clark

Thanks, TheSlum!