Sweetening 3D Renders by Using Photoshop

With a rendered image completed and outputs ready (either exported separately or included in a layered PSD file) you can start post-processing. In this section, you will look at some simple adjustment and corrective editing as well as some features that can be added to stylize the finished render. Many of these effects can be achieved in a render without post-processing, but the ability to do these things and adjust them in seconds as opposed to waiting on new renders can be a great benefit to any workflow.

To start working with render outputs, place the Diffuse layer underneath the Transparent Shading and the Reflective Shading layers. Start by setting the Transparent and Reflective layers to a Screen blending mode. If you have a Specular layer, this can also be layered and set to Screen. Once this is done, your image should look nearly identical to the beauty pass (if not indistinguishable). In the case of Figure 12.32, I left out the Specular pass because I did not like the effect on the finished render. Alternately, you could keep that layer and simply reduce the opacity to lessen the effect.