NprTools

Al Hart · 15 May 2009, 15:56

One more thing, in the thread where I posted the pictures; the view from the top - there's shadows missing on the ground.

(Excuse all these long answers - but I want to give complete answers to questions so I can use this as a basis for how to improve the documentation)

For the Pattern Sketchy Shadows (as opposed to the watermark shadows which will come later), I cannot put them on the ground. I make the patters by applying the pattern material to the entire SketchUp model and then saving an image, and these is no easy way to place the materials on the ground.

So you will have to draw a face on the ground large enough to hold all the shadows.

(Also in this histogram filtered version of the shadow patterns you can see that the texture is not fully dark. So the shadows wil not be any darker than this pattern.)

thomthom · 15 May 2009, 16:14

@al hart said:

So you will have to draw a face on the ground large enough to hold all the shadows.

That's the thing; there is a ground plane face there. You can see in the other examples there's shadows there. Just not in the top view.

Al Hart · 15 May 2009, 16:26

@thomthom said:

@al hart said:

So you will have to draw a face on the ground large enough to hold all the shadows.

That's the thing; there is a ground plane face there. You can see in the other examples there's shadows there. Just not in the top view.

I see some very slight things on ground on the right of the top view. (It is very difficult to look at images of other people models and know what is missing)

Reprocess the top view image, and look in the TemporaryImages folder.

Compare the shadow_histogram.png file and the histogram_pattern.png file (or upload them here) to see if there is a clue to what might be missing. (These are the images which are merged with the Base.ong image to get the final image.

Al Hart · 15 May 2009, 16:30

@sorgesu said:

No Al, I can't think of anything like that. But there is a neat demonstration somewhere where you can use the "fog" setting within SketchUp to accomplish the same sort of thing. Something in "black" that conveys the depth by degrees of gray in the alpha channel

That is essentially how it works in Piranesi. If you were to look at the "depth channel" ,which you can indeed do, for any image imported from SketchUp, it is displayed as degrees of Grey ( Gray?) and I believe that is how it is recognized in Piranesi as having differing depth.

It turns out that Piranesi uses a TIFF format format with extra channels added for Z-depth and material ID. I may be able to use it directly, or I may be able to export the same information from SketchUp. I would be easier to have the actual Z-data, rather than having to reverse-engineer it from fog colors.

sorgesu · 15 May 2009, 22:50

Yes, that's right. I didn't realize that that would have been helpful info, sorry.

Al Hart · 15 May 2009, 23:13

@sorgesu said:

Yes, that's right. I didn't realize that that would have been helpful info, sorry.

Not really very helpful, because I can't find any software anywhere that already reads it. Still, it would be nice to get the "exact" z-depths rather than having to guess them from fog.

Chris Fullmer · 16 May 2009, 01:15

What about the .eps format? I thought that Piranesi was using that format? But I know very little about it really.

EDIT Hmm, I see that have their own epx. I must have got the last letter confused in my head.

Chris

sorgesu · 16 May 2009, 01:26

Ya did, Chris. It is epx which is just a Tiff with 2 extra channels. I can't think how to unravel that info because epix is proprietary and I somehow doubt they would want to share the data therein

Al Hart · 16 May 2009, 19:45

I added a couple of handy things today (But you won't get them until Monday)

Mask Soft Shadows

I added a "Mask soft shadows to the shape of the original shadow" option.
This lets you you very broad soft shadows, but not let them overwhelm the size if the shadow itself.

Original shadows from ShetchUp

Soft Shadows over a wide area.
(I used just a few iterations so you could see the effect better.

Soft Shadows masked to original shadow shape.

Image Resolution

This options lets you set the resolution to be larger than the SketchUp screen.
(We still are limited to 3,000 pixels or so whatever the SketchUp Wxport 2D limit is)
(Also, be aware, it can take a long time to save hundreds of shadows images for high resolution soft shadows)

Al Hart · 17 May 2009, 15:07

In playing around with NprTools, I ran into an interesting philosophical question.

In this image, is the wall on the left in a shadow?

One obvious answer is YES - since the sun is not shining on it.

The other answer might me NO - since SketchUp does not show it in the same intensity as the shadows on the ground.

If it is in shadow, then this Sketchy Shadow image (the way it works now), is correct:

However, you might prefer to draw the Sketchy Shadows only where the shadows appear on the ground.

One other complication is that if you turn shadows off in SketchUp, the wall on the left does not change.

So you could argue that the shadows don't really effect it. (This might be the way for me to solve the problem - if we don't like the Sketchy Lines on the wall - by comparing the image with the sun on and with the sun off to find the shadows. Currently, I use a SketchUp hidden-line image to determine where the shadows are.

Any thoughts?

Chris Fullmer · 17 May 2009, 16:51

There have been places in some of the images that I've seen with the sketchy shadows on them and I've thought - that should not have a shadow like that on it. And then I realize it is lightly shaded in SU, so it gets the shadow effect. I think that often I would prefer that the wall, in this case, did not recieve such intense sketchy shadows.

Thats my thoughts,

Chris

Al Hart · 17 May 2009, 17:44

The trick is how to get the shadows.

One way is to compare two images and process the differences.

SketchUp gives 2 different results.

Here are two hidden line images (with and without shadows)
(I compare these two images to get the shadows)

Here are two monochrome images (with and without shadows)

I can compare these two images instead.

I will probably make this an option. But what to call it? ("Use monochrome shadow effect" - I hate check boxes which even I don't understand, or "Use only full shadows")

Al Hart · 17 May 2009, 18:38

Comparing the two monochrome images worked pretty well.

I wound up calling the new option: "Use only full shadows"

Image with option checked

Image with option unchecked

There are times when you will want to pattern all "non sunny" areas - especially for interiors.

Al Hart · 17 May 2009, 18:56

Yes,

I'll keep NprTools discussions to the the NprTools topic.

But I felt that this was a more general question for any SketchUp users who were interested in what should be treated as a shadow. People might be interested in how Hidden line treats shadows one way, while colored and textured rendering treat them a different way.

Al Hart · 20 May 2009, 06:07

@unknownuser said:

When I choose the Launch option, the default image viewer opens
without any image. It's blank.

Default image viewer associated with most images is Irfanview while
default image editor for SU is PS. Irfranview loads quick. That's
good to quickly view the plugin results.

Some options would be to choose default program to view images and
have a choice where to save final output.

I like having only one TemporaryImage folder. I suppose the user will
have the responsibility to clear it out. It is possible to direct
CCleaner to include user defined folders to clean out under Options.

I am copying this from another forum. I will respond to it later.

Al Hart · 20 May 2009, 15:39

@richcat said:

Al just tried out latest IE19 version and soft shadows appears not to be working.
Reverted back to IE3 which produced first image below then next one with some PS filters applied.

Ps The average shadow image produced in temp file looks interesting as gives better shadows in my opinion, so I tried blending in PS with base image,and then adjusting in PS - which gave me that third image below (edges are wrong but look at the shadows on the wall - luv it)

Fourth one is just for fun

I am not sure what is wrong with IE19. (I wish you could have been more specific)

I appreciate seeing the PS images. You will always be able to do these same things, or better things, in PS. We are just trying to make it easier for SketchUp users. That is why we are adding more features to the "Save Image" section of NprTools - so you can save special image and take them to PS. (In the latest version, we added "Save shadows only")

The latest version also added "Mask to original shadow" which applies the soft shadows only to the original shadow area (rather than letting the shadows get bigger.) That may be what is failing in IE19. It looks like it might be aplying the mask all the time.

However, your last two images, with the soft sun on the wall, inspire me to have a similar feature called "Soft Sun". It will mask the soft shadows to the area not in shadow (for interiors this is where the sun appears on the wall). If it works well, you should be able to soften the sunlight rather than the shadows. (More to come)

richcat · 20 May 2009, 16:23

Al
I re installed IE19.
Basically I could not get any soft shadows as images above, only as image below, also see setup image. Do I need to change anything as this is what gave me original soft images, tried various settings but no soft shadows appeared - may be I'm missing something simple.

Also imagine produced still does not open by itself.

richcat · 20 May 2009, 16:27

Al just tried out latest IE19 version and soft shadows appears not to be working.
Reverted back to IE3 which produced first image below then next one is this original image with some PS filters applied.

The average shadow image produced in temp file looks interesting as gives better shadows in my opinion, so I tried blending in PS with base image,and then adjusting in PS - which gave me that third image below (edges are wrong but look at the shadows on the wall - luv it)

Fourth one is just for fun

Al Hart · 23 May 2009, 15:44

richcat,

This new feature - "Soft Sun", is based on one or the images you have uploaded.

Here we restricted the Soft effect to the area already lit by the sun.

You get a sharp boundary, but a soft effect for the sunlight itself.

Al Hart · 23 May 2009, 16:00

We have added a new dialog box to use to set the application to use to launch an image.

If you uncheck Launch When Complete, this dialog will be loaded. If you change the application to use to launch an image, the new application will be used in the future.