Photoshop® CS4 Bible

27.4. Saving 3D files

You can save your editable 3D scenes and layers in any of the file formats that support layers, including native Photoshop PSD, PSB, TIFF, and PDF. For maximum compatibility with older versions of Photoshop and other graphics software, make sure you select Always from the compatibility menu in the File Handling section of Photoshop's preferences. This at least ensures that a flattened composite version of your file is saved and can be viewed with programs that don't necessarily support Photoshop CS4's advanced 3D features.

27.4.1. Generating high-quality renders

When your 3D scene is ready for publishing, or to be composited with other artwork, you should generate a high-quality render of it. This produces a version of the scene with all the lights, textures, reflections, and shadows fully smoothed and anti-aliased. To generate a high-quality render of your image, choose Render for Final Output from the 3D menu. Depending on a number of factors, including your computer's processor speed, the graphics card in your machine, the complexity of the scene, the dimensions of the canvas, the number of lights in the scene, and the amount of reflections that Photoshop has to calculate, rendering the final image could take as long as an hour or more.

When the render is completed and you've given yourself a moment to appreciate your fine work, you should save a flattened version of the image and retain an editable version as your master file. Any changes to the position ...