Photoshop CC: The Missing Manual

Chapter 22. Photoshop and 3D

One of the big new features in Photoshop CC is the inclusion of all the 3D tools that used to live only in the now-deceased Photoshop Extended. But if you don’t know anything about 3D, do all these features mean anything to you? They could. If you’ve ever dreamt of dabbling in 3D modeling, Photoshop is a great place to start. Just as you can buy stock images, video clips, and audio clips, you can also buy 3D objects. Do a quick Google search and you’ll find oceans of 3D models for sale. If those objects are already painted and lit (some aren’t), you can bring all that info into Photoshop. You’ve also got a fair amount of control over the object’s textures and lighting in Photoshop. If the object comes with a separate texture file, you can edit that file in Photoshop and then see your updated model when you save it. You can also add and adjust lighting to make the model blend into your scene better.

If you’re feeling particularly brave, you can paint directly on the surface of a 3D model in real time (meaning you see your brushstrokes as you make them). It’s really nice to be able to do this kind of painting in Photoshop, especially if you don’t have a dedicated 3D painting program. You can even render (apply lighting and reflections using a technology called ray tracing) a portion of an object and even pause the process, which is a great timesaver when you want to focus on an important area of detail.

Learning to do a little 3D work can be both fun and ...