Maybe this is a known issue, but couldn’t find it when I searched:
As in CS3 Extended, Photoshop CS4 Extended is automatically cutting out the background of the image instead of creating an alpha channel.
The workaround in CS3 was to replace the openEXR plugin with the one from CS2. This fix does not work in CS4 however.
Any ideas?
Thanks,
A
I grabbed the ILM open exr plug in. It works but it’s quite slow by comparison, but it only works in cs4 32bit and not in 64bit, which is what I use most of the time. My solution so far was to go back to rendering to .hdr
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OMG…has ADOBE gone the Autodesks way?
have you tried adobe forum?
this is just from memory and is an annoying workaround, but you can try holding down “ALT” while dragging the file into photoshop. it should open with alpha channel and with BG.
it is annoying that they didn’t bother making photoshop play nicer with EXRs for CS4…
hope this helps.
You could always uncheck the alpha on the exr settings and do it as a render element instead.
Thanks for the tips.
@simmsimaging: I can’t seem to get .hdr to save the alpha channel. Maybe I’m missing something?
@ PIXELBOX_SRO: Well, I have googled the topic and found this thread on adobe forum. Its a rather amusing (and absurd) discussion/argument about the alpha channel support in EXR files between an Adobe software engineer and a user:
http://www.adobeforums.com/webx/.59b70e35
@tooves: I couldn’t get that workaround to work, not in cs4 64-bit anyway…
@stef.thomas: yeah, I tried that option yesterday. Its probably the best workaround, but includes the extra steps of saving the alpha channel separately, and then duplicating the alpha channel into the image file.
I am going to try the proEXR plugin. Supposedly it allows photoshop to see all the render element channels if you save as a vray raw image .exr.
OMG!, that discussion on the adobe forum is hilarious, if not shocking.
That user tries to keep his cool for a long time, and tries sooo hard to explain the obvious misinterpretation of PS CS3 ext on the EXR file format, but the arrogant and ignorant attitude of this adobe software engineer keeps him from understand what the real problem is.
I’m affraid that that EXRPro plugin is the best option, unless there is an alternative for PS (the Gimp?) that would supports EXR file format and makes it do what it should.
Now I think of it: Adobe After Effects CS3 ext DOES support the EXR with Alpha channel and does not delete the info. (hope they did not break that in the CS4 version (I don’t have CS4).
I think Adobe could do with taking a leaf out of Chaos Group’s book when it comes to listening to their customers! Can you imagine how different this forum would be if we got the same attitude from Vlado?
Clifton: I can’t save the alpha with .hdr either, I just split the render channels on save, then use the ‘load files into stack’ image script and I made a quick Photoshop action for converting the alpha as an image layer to a layer mask and then deleting the alpha layer.
It’s a bit of a pain but since I’m usually rendering other elements that I need to stack up in pshop anyway it doesn’t add a ton to my workflow, especially once the action is there.
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yeah, that’s totally beyond me. how some things work so well in ae, and are utter and complete crap in ps. don’t know about cs4, which I haven’t tried, but finding out that the enhanced support for 32 bit images in cs3 meant no curves correction was real fun. like: are they having a laugh?
wow thats some funny stuff. How adobe could possibly think that we dont need that background pixels, is beyond me. The adobe engineer says over and over again, that nothing was removed, but he’s hiding behind semantics while saying it. Just crazy. We’re not using cs4 here thank god.
I posted some support for the poor guy (customer). I imagine other people are complaining too. At least I hope they are. I can’t imagine this going unnoticed by very many EXR users.
Me too. “The squeaky wheel gets the grease…”
I didn’t bother to to post, don’t use PS too often with exr’s…but if I did I’d remind them of this exact same issue back when tga’s were more popular, PS would treat tga’s alpha areas the same way until enough people complained and they released a a fixed tga loader… wouldn’t surprise me if it was the same programmer that was behind that debacle too 
heh it was PS 7 back in 2002 http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/detail.jsp?ftpID=1544
This programmer is talking about the tga issue in the discussion; fact is we (users) have been using the tga file format wrong, just like we are using the exr format wrong, we are so stupid.
They do the exact same thing with png files too.
Solution!!!
…yeah i’m an idiot.
This is allready a known work around, clifton starts his topic with it, the thing is: in CS4 it doesnt work!
Yeah, I couldn’t get that trick to work in CS4… tooves, you did?