Photoshop textures help Thread

Hi, I am trying to get everything I need ready for materials in UDK. So I have the Nvidia plug-in for photoshop that allows me to create a normal map of any texture I make. Can I also use PS to make specular maps, ambient occlusion maps, etc.? Are there are plug ins or does anyone have any tutorials that would help? Thank you

about nvidia plugin and normal map creation, it's not that easy.
if you just take your diffuse map (or color map, or however it's called in udk) and run nvidia filter on it, you will most likely get poor results. that's because plugin doesn't have a brain and doesn't know which parts should be convex and concave. it uses a simple interpretation - the brightest areas will be most convex, darkest areas will be least convex.

to create good textures you will need experience and lots of trial and error. general knowledge of photoshop and digital painting skills also really help.

for normal maps, check this tutorial out:
Katsbits.com
the final result may not be too spectacular in that one, but it teaches the correct approach and techniques.

occlusion, etc. - it's best to bake it off a model, along with the normal map. but if you have no modeling skills then you will have to paint it by hand or use layer effects etc.

specular - no plugins needed. usually just playing around with levels is enough.
however i recall udk uses colored specular maps and it's usually harder to predict how colored specular maps turn out ingame. but they can do some things that you can't achieve with grayscale specular maps.
i's essential to understand how specular maps work, just like with every other kind of map.

it's a helpful to take a look at actual game textures and try to figure out what tricks were used to achieve particular effects.

Thank you, very helpful.

Give CrazyBump a try. It can provide decent results if you can't map from geometry.

You can actually create AO-maps inside of Photoshop - it's great if you are only going to make something simple (if it's not simple, then the advice is to bake it off your hipoly and lowpoly).

First make a neutral grey layer (thats 127 or 128 ^3) and then paint your "heights" with a white brush. Make sure that the neutral grey represent the deepest regions. Once your heightmap is done, clone it. One of them you run through the normal map filter to create a normal map (which you already seem to be familiar with) - the other one will be used for the AO.

Now make sure that the neutral grey and the white heights are on the same layer (merge em if you have to) and then go to: Filther -> Other -> Hipass filther and enter a small number like <10 (I even use <5 here). After that, create an adjustment layer (black and white icon in the layers window): Levels.
Reduce the input to 0 1.0 127
Then create a new adjustment layer above that, Selective Color. Select Neutrals and increase the Black slider to 100%.
And then you are done. You now have a simple AO based on your heightmap.

On specular and photoshop previews:
Manufato.com