Exr Importer

[Kyle_Grace]

Does anyone know of a free Open-Exr importer for Photoshop (I'm using CS3) that retains all the channels? The same way that the Pro Exr plugin works?
I've done a quick search on the forums but the pro-exr is the only importer that seems to be mentioned...

Cheers

[vlado]

There is a plugin for PhotoShop on the official EXR site (http://www.openexr.com/downloads.html), but I do not know how useful this is.

Best regards,
Vlado

[Aldaryn]

Sadly the provided official plugin is pretty simple. More pain than gain. The integrated PS one is quite the same.

I don't know if any free importer exist, but there is a commercial plug called ProEXR that can import channels correctly. I've only used the demo once, and the plug imported every channel except Z and Alpha, and since I needed only these two, I went back to Fusion..

Also, ILM provides a decent SDK for their file format, so if you're into that kind of wired sicko kink stuff (programming), you just might want to give it a try.

best regards,

A.

[m_hinks]

Kyle me old mucker

What's wrong with ProExr? Does the job?

Funnily, Im working on trying to get an exr with all the layers in to CS3 this morning!! I've emailed the maker of the plug-in to see if he can explain things better. I have a 32 bit file all good to go, but we need 16 or 8, and the gamma of some of the layers gets messed up and can not comp correctly anything other than 32 bit space.

Ill let you know!

[Kyle_Grace]

Greetings my pert nippled friend!

Nothing wrong with Pro Exr... just wondered if there was a free one knocking about... As a company we're not using LWF (yet). So didn't want to have to try and explain why I needed it... and justify the expense (yes mark, I know it's not expensive). Currently rendering non LWF and sorting the Exr native gamma in PS (0.4545).

When i get time (working 65hr weeks the past fortnight), I'll put a case together and hopefully get us all switched over at some point. Might wait a while to see how v-ray progresses before i do that. Doing some nice stuff, very high turnaround so might need to buy some wacom nibs soon at the rate I'm retouching....

Maybe there will be a day when we can render straight to a 32bit PSD with all channels, then use it as a 8bit Smart layer in Photoshop for retouching.... now that would be nice...

[Da_elf]

i thought your not supposed to use LWF when using exr's and hdri's

[Kyle_Grace]

Yeah, you use LWF, you just don't burn in the gamma.

[percydaman]

hmmm...ive never heard this. Remember lwf just isn't about the final image output. Its also about more efficient sampling which brings quicker rendertimes.

[rivoli]

Its also about more efficient sampling which brings quicker rendertimes.

I guess that's why don't affect colours has been added in colour mapping. so that you can have vray sampling for a gamma corrected image without actually affecting its gamma, and output to a linear format.

[Kyle_Grace]

Better rendering times and correct calculation as well in order to get a better image if my understanding is correct, Lele and others have many posts in in depth descriptions as to the exact details.

I render to 32 bit floating images in order to use Photoshop's exposure controls. Mr Hinks and myself did a lot of this when we worked together as we both spend a lot of time and effort in post (stills + animation), it's a fantastic technique that allows you to have that extra control (+ it reduces the amount of time lighting/rendering etc). Especially useful when doing camera matched work.

[m_hinks]

Yup, I concure

[Aldaryn]

i thought your not supposed to use LWF when using exr's and hdri's

I think a hdr workflow has nothing to do with "LWF" or anything fancy like that. LWF is basically just a "get exactly out what you've put in in 2.2 like gamma" thingie. Saved as a hdr image, gamma and exposure loose their importance, since these transformations will not distroy any data in the image, (will not clamp it in any way) and thus can be applied later in PP.

Sampling efficiency is another thing.

best regards,

A.

[Kyle_Grace]

Open Exr saves the image in linear colour space and displays it with the 2.2 gamma curve, so it does have a lot to do with LWF.

Further info: http://www.openexr.com/TechnicalIntroduction.pdf

I.E - When Rendering to an Open Exr image, there is no need to burn in the gamma through colour mapping or any other route.

[Aldaryn]

By "hdr image has nothing to do with gamma and exposure values", I meant that later you can change those without any data loss. For example, if you saved out an exr image or sequence with "double 2.2 correction" , you can just apply a gamma function in many application without clamping any image data.

OK, exr stores the image info in a linear space, but imo that goes for all image formats out there. The displaying of that information however is out of the formats hand, displaying anything goes to the image viewer, or the editting application. And I think it is pretty easy to spot, if the gamma is way off in the displayed image.

best regards,

A.

[m_hinks]

Please could Vlado, Lele, Cpnicols, instinct, daforce or anyone clear this up. For myself, having spent many hours with Kyle going through a LFW and exr workflow it seems stupid for people to start chimming in with incorrect information. Whether a problem with communicating the same thing, there are hundreds of posts on this subject.

The original question is getting missed. Back to the point!