The long method page 4

The purpose of this step is give depth to each object, so that the objects do not look like bunch of flat cutout boards in the middle of the ground. In a nutshell, you select an object, copy the object to another file, open the new file. Now add a new layer on top of the object where the backgound color is the middle of the grayscale (127,127,127 in RGB mode) but keep in RGB mode. Set the transparency of the grayscale layer, so that you see the object and the grayscale canvas as the same time. You may wish to mask selections of the object so that you do not paint outside the selection.example

Now, you can use the gradiant paint, air brush, and smudge to paint on the grayscale layer, and create the gray scale. Remember the closer that part of the object is to the viewer, the lighter you need to paint. I find it useful to use radial gradiant for round objects, like domes. Linear gradiant is useful for sides of walls. The air brush can be used to paint those object can not be defined easily like a human body. The smudge and blur tools are useful for smoothing the transisions of depth. Finally, you can use patterns in the object itself to help create the grayscale. Complex objects like trees and windows, that are too tedious to paint, can be copied and desaturated and adjusted from the orignal and applyed to the grayscale.

You can use grays below the 127 mark if the object has partitions in back of the point where the object meets the ground. In essence, the 127 grayscale is the depth where the object meets the ground.example

Once you are satisfied with the grayscale, you need to save the file so that you do not have the background object image. You do this by setting the transparency so that you do not see the background object, flattening the layers and saving the resulting image as tiff. Now go back to you working anaglyph left image and select the object that you wish apply the depth grayscale map. Depending on the application that you are useing, you shift the object with the gray scale.

For Adobe Photoshop, select Filter, Distort, Displace. For Corel Photo-paint, select Effects, Distort, Display. For the Gimp, right click on the object and select Filters, Map, Displace. For all platforms, you must set the vertical displacement to 0, and set the horizontal displacement to about 10% or 20 pixels. The more displacement that you employ, and greater displacment of depth.

Next, you need to select the grayscale file. For Adobe Photoshop, the file select windows appears after you click OK. For Corel Photo-paint, the you can select the file be clicking the folder button to right of the displacment window. For the Gimp, select the file by clicking list box to the right of the X Displacement and navigate to the gray scale. Finally, apply the displacment.result

Remember, that this step requires practice to get the feel of the displacment filter in reference to the gray scale map that you create from scratch. It is a good idea to copy the object layel that that you wish to displace, before displacing it, so that if you do not like the resulting anaglyph, you can go back to orignal. Also the displacement filter sometimes create artifacts that do not displace in accordance to gray scale. This is due to abrupt changes in the gray scale along the horizonal continum. You need to be aware of the possibly of the filter creating the artifacts and remove them be erasing them or cloning adjcent pixels.