Pre-Release: Failed 3D engrave

[cdoug]

Great explanation @mpipes
I use Levels (Ctrl+L) and Curves (Ctrl+M) in Photoshop all the time.
They are Awesome!

[henryhbk]

@mpipes

Yeah that last one, I split into three layers using the lasso selection tool to make layers of the light, medium, and darker areas, then adjusted levels on each layer independently. The trick here is that on each layer, you need to delete the areas you’re not working on. Example: the “medium” layer shouldnt have any “light” or “dark” image information on it, because you wont be able to adjust levels as much.

This one I just kinda hacked it together real quick and lost some of the darker detail in the process, and some of the lasso borders between the three main shades might be visible.

I also used a little bit of airbrush and sharpen tools to give some of the shapes a little more punch.

Wow. OK, that’s impressive…

[mpipes]

Thanks!

I couldnt help take another crack at it…

[dan]

Just remember that if you imagine the engine being, say, a 4" cube, this is like making the Z axis of the cube 3% as big as the other two sides (so smashing it 33x). No matter what you do it’s asking a lot of an eighth of an inch of depth.

[mpipes]

@dan

No matter what you do it’s asking a lot of an eighth of an inch of depth.

Yes this design sure is. I’m basically illustrating the amount of definition that will be needed to produce these shallow reliefs, which is something I’m familiar with from designing cast gold/silver pendants. Those are typically kept to 1.5mm thick or less to save cost (particularly for gold) so the artwork has to be even less than that.

A deep engrave of this design would still look pretty trick.

[Brandon_R]

Me too! Do you reach for their eye droppers first or go straight to the sliders?
I prefer to start with the droppers and go from there.
I also like tweaking the opacity and mask on it as a last measure.

[Tom_A]

Wow. I can’t believe how much you cleaned that up! The detail you managed to squeeze out of it is amazing!

[mpipes]

Thanks! The detail is all there in the original, but if you look at the larger version you can see it did suffer some quality loss from “compressing” the dynamic range. That wouldnt show up in a wood engrave, its may be visible in acrylic although i doubt it.