using an image to define a crater shape?

[scott8933]

I thought about posting this in the "Fun with Craters" thread, but that one hasn't seen any traffic since March; so here goes - I need to create a shape that looks like a giant hand slammed down (giant, like REALLY big) and the crater shader seems like a natural. Nice controls for the rim and all; but is there a way to use an image to define the shape so it is something other than round?

Thanks!

[Oshyan]

There's no easy, direct way to do this with the Crater Shader, but you could just use a Heightfield or Image Map Shader (with displacement enabled) and an image of a handprint, scaled to appropriate size. Find or make the image, load it in your choice of shader (either of those two), then adjust displacement/height to taste.

- Oshyan

[scott8933]

I did a brief search for some good threads on using an image map, but am coming up a little short. Is there any tutorial or thread or -really- basic example project that could get me started? As a 10+ year Electric Image user, the whole concept of node-based anything is completely foreign to me!

Thank you,

Scott

Edit-> Is there a way to print out the docs in this forum and get the pictures to be included? Sounds like a kind of dumb question, I know...but the "print" command removes the images, and printing directly from my browser won't get the frames only the stuff around the frames and a bunch of blank pages. Or a place where the docs are that isn't forum-based?

There's no easy, direct way to do this with the Crater Shader, but you could just use a Heightfield or Image Map Shader (with displacement enabled) and an image of a handprint, scaled to appropriate size. Find or make the image, load it in your choice of shader (either of those two), then adjust displacement/height to taste.

- Oshyan