Filter Forge 1.017

Filter Forge 1.017 offers an effective tool which helps computer artists to build their own filters ? seamless textures, visual effects, distortions, patterns, backgrounds, frames, and more. The key features of Filter Forge include a visual filter editor and a free online library of user-created filters to which anyone can contribute. Filter Forge can work as a Photoshop plugin or a standalone application.

Filter Forge can produce a wide range of textures and effects which include organic structures, metallic and rocky surfaces, distortions, abstract textures, repeating patterns, color corrections, and more. All filters are adjustable and editable, seamlessly tiled, resolution-independent, and support real-world HDRI lighting. Also, filters can automatically generate diffuse, specular, bump, and normal maps, which makes Filter Forge an essential tool for artists creating 3D models and environments, architectural visualization and high-end game content.

The key feature of Filter Forge is the Filter Editor, a visual node-based environment allowing users to build custom filters without writing a single line of code. Filters are assembled by connecting components into a network to combine their effects. Components include familiar operations such as blurs, gradients, color adjustments, distortions, and blending. For end-users, the filter internals are hidden behind a simple set of filter controls ? anyone can immediately benefit from filters without knowing what is inside them.

Filter Forges rendering engine takes full advantage of multi-core processors ? for example, a dual-core processor can speed the rendering up to 96%. A high-precision floating-point rendering pipeline allows Filter Forge to support 16- and 32-bit image modes and eliminates unwanted artifacts such as color banding. Filter Forges custom memory manager allows it to render large bitmaps? up to 65536x65536 pixels? even on moderate amounts of RAM.

Filter Library (5983 Filters)
Woeful Wood Woeful Wood
Twill Weave Twill Weave
Suburbia Suburbia
Old Parchment Old Parchment
Trusswome! Trusswome!
Ammonite Ammonit
Pen and Ink Crosshatch Pen and Ink Crosshatch
Jelly Jelly
Cell Leather Cell Leather
Metal Panels Metal Panels
Techno Lights Techno Lights
Vintage Clay Tile Vintage Clay Tile
Psycho texture Psycho texture
Q*Bert 2.0 Q*Bert 2.0
Caviar Caviar

Major Features:

1. Filter Editor
   • The most important feature of Filter Forge – a visual node-based editor which lets you create your own visual effects and procedural textures without a single line of code.
2. Online Filter Library
   • Filter Library is a free online repository of filters submitted by Filter Forge users. You can access the Library directly from the user interface of Filter Forge. Users who contribute good filters can earn rewards, including a free copy of Filter Forge.
3. Seamless Tiling
   • All filters in Filter Forge support seamless tiling, even for non-square textures. A simple one-click operation, Seamless Tiling works no matter whether you have downloaded the filter or created it yourself in Filter Editor.
4. Bump and Normal Maps
   • Filter Forge can generate diffuse, bump, specular and normal maps for its filters, all seamlessly tiled, fully anti-aliased and perfectly matching each other – a real life-saver for artists working on textures for next-gen games.
5. Resolution Independence
   • All filters in Filter Forge are generated procedurally and don't depend on external bitmaps; therefore, they are resolution-independent. You can render the same filter in any resolution without losing any detail.
6. Technology
   • HDRI Lighting
   • • Instead of the old-style point lights, Filter Forge lighting system uses high dynamic range images that capture real-world lighting conditions. As a result, you get real-worldlighting which takes almost no time to set up.
   • 16- and 32-Bit Image Modes
   • • Filter Forge uses a full floating-point rendering pipeline, which allows it to support 16-bit images and the new 32-bit image mode in Photoshop CS2.
   • Floating-Point File Formats
   • • You can save your work in high-precision image formats such as OpenEXR or PFM. Unlike the traditional image formats such as JPG or BMP, these formats use floating-point numbers to store the pixels, which allows to retain every single bit of precision.
   • Smart Anti-Aliasing
   • • Anti-aliasing, when done in the usual brute-force way, can be devastating to rendering speed. Filter Forge applies anti-aliasing only to those areas of the image that tend to produce aliasing artifacts, which results in vastly improved rendering times.
   • Dual-Core CPU Support
   • • Filter Forge rendering engine is built to fully utilize the power of dual-core and quad-core processors. A dual-core processor can speed the rendering up to 96% (83 to 86% is the norm). Once we even saw a speedup of 115% – don't ask, we have no idea how that is possible!
   • Huge Resolutions
   • • The biggest one we tried was 65536x65536 pixels – and it worked! Granted, it took hours, but anyway! Furthermore, the interface remained responsive – we were able to zoom and pan the preview while rendering that monstrosity.
7. Interface
   • Standalone Version
   • • Filter Forge can work as a Photoshop plugin or a standalone application. Actually, the plugin part of Filter Forge is tiny – all it does is sending and retrieving the images. All processing is done within the main application.
   • Adaptive Previews
   • • The preview window in Filter Forge is always fully interactive – you can pan and zoom during the rendering. Plus, if you zoom in on a region of the image while rendering, Filter Forge will increase the rendering priority for that region so that you can see the results faster.
   • Presets
   • • You can save the settings of any filter as a preset to recall them at any time. All filters included with Filter Forge come with factory presets that give you a glimpse of what a filter can do and provide a good starting point to explore the filter's settings.
   • Randomizer
   • • With Randomizer, you can randomize filter settings in one mouse click – a relief for those who don't want to learn the controls just to explore a filter. You can configure the randomization strength, plus there's a Back button allowing you to return to the previously generated settings in case you click Next too eagerly.
   • Favorites
   • • Favorites allow you to quickly access the filters you use most frequently – just add a filter to Favorites and its shortcut will appear in the Favorites folder.

Requirements:

• Pentium III
• 733 Mhz
• 128 Mb RAM