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Add .RAW file editing for Game Development.


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Game Development programs can produce “Hight Maps” as “.RAW” files which are just grey scale images which determine the hight based on the value of the pixel color. When opening the file in “PhotoShop” this is the dialog box.

 1986756815_ScreenShot2020-04-11at1_17_50PM.png.0bf97a5eb2a9facf723231a500b2eb3a.png

Right now “PhotoShop” is the only photo editor that can open these files and there isn't any reason Affinity Photo shouldn't be able to do the same. There are many people like me who are trying to remove themselves from the Adobe eco system and if Affinity would add this simple feature it would help us Game Developers / 3D artist say goodbye to Adobe. I’m attaching a sample of the “.RAW” file for you to test. 

When opened in Photo Shop the "terrain.raw" image looks like this.

terrain.jpg.0be4030305167a34c47730efa31116d7.jpg

thanks

-Randy 

terrain.raw

Edited by Purgpow
Added a new image to help illustrate my request.
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Using the .raw file extension for greyscale image is not a standard used or recognized by most apps. The three most common uses for this extension are listed here.

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6 minutes ago, v_kyr said:

See for example: RAW Height Maps

From that (emphasis added):

Quote

Note there are different formats within the RAW format, but we will just cover the default unsigned short 16 bit RAW version.

To create RAW files you generally need terrain building programs like World Machine to build them for you since you can't paint 16 bit RAW files manually. And likewise to view them you need to use another program or something you have written yourself that is 16 bit RAW file aware.

Also note that the file extension used is .r16, not .raw.

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1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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I remember vaguely that people dealing with Hight Maps” for game developments (Unity etc.) also often tended to use some XnView/NConvert steps during their toolschain productions. - However I think the whole  is generally more a special niche usage (for a certain dedicated field, namely interesting for game developers) and not something used elsewhere widely by people.

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6 minutes ago, v_kyr said:

I remember vaguely that people dealing with Hight Maps” for game developments (Unity etc.) also often tended to use some XnView/NConvert steps during their toolschain productions. - However I think the whole  is generally more a special niche usage (for a certain dedicated field, namely interesting for game developers) and not something used elsewhere widely by people.

I'm just looking to be able open the file in Affinity Photo and at least i can export it out as a .jpg or .png. so i can use it in other Apps. I was thinking that if Photoshop can do it Why couldn't Affinity Photo do it as well. It is just a few things like this that keep me tied to Adobe and i'd rather not me tied to them. 

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5 minutes ago, MikeW said:

The file extension can also be .raw

Sure, but to open them you still need an app that understands the format & does not mistake it for some other kind of .raw format file.

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33 minutes ago, v_kyr said:

Maybe it will in future versions (who knows), see also this slightly related forum thread for exporting as raw "How to export/save as a raw format file?".

Well that is depressing, that is exactly the same format i'm talking about and also for the same reason i want it in Affinity Photo.

Now i have no Hope for this being added to Affinity Photo, since that was brought up back in 2017 and now it is 2020 and it hasn't been implemented. Affinity should consider capturing more of the 3d / GameDev market. There are a lot of indie Game devs looking to cut ties completely with adobe.

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1 hour ago, R C-R said:

From that (emphasis added):

Also note that the file extension used is .r16, not .raw.

The file extension used by that C++ app is pretty irrelevant here, since never checked in code and the file name is taken from inside of a setup.txt file, thus you can also name your input raw file .rc-r then.

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12 minutes ago, Purgpow said:

Well that is depressing, that is exactly the same format i'm talking about and also for the same reason i want it in Affinity Photo. ...

Can't tell if Affinity will try to please that field too in the future, or may at least offer some extension API, so that third parties could jump in with some add-ons. Although I would not bet on these things to happen soon. -  However actually it doesn't and can't deal with these things. Thus you will now and yet have to look elsewhere for some other supporting software and workarounds.

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10 hours ago, Purgpow said:

Game Development programs can produce “Hight Maps” as “.RAW” files which are just grey scale images which determine the hight based on the value of the pixel color.

 

@Purgpow: a workaround is to use GIMP to convert your height map to PNG or TIFF for getting it into Affinity apps.

Change the .raw filename extension to .data then open in GIMP where you'll be prompted for the width, height and data format similarly to Photoshop, and then export to 16 bpc grey PNG or TIFF.

103108043_loadmagefromrawdata.thumb.png.e0f336ffa0999757b5bd1afe80c9e9d8.png

 

874305878_exportimageasPNG.png.95c0b8e432e4d010a92fcbd41cb3c763.png

 

1985480166_terrraininAP.png.daf1825b947dfd83e22859dfee8e186a.png

 

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On 4/12/2020 at 12:48 AM, anon2 said:

@Purgpow: a workaround is to use GIMP to convert your height map to PNG or TIFF for getting it into Affinity apps.

Change the .raw filename extension to .data then open in GIMP where you'll be prompted for the width, height and data format similarly to Photoshop, and then export to 16 bpc grey PNG or TIFF.

Thanks Anon2 for this information, i'll give it a try. Maybe GIMP is a better choice for game development needs. 

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