Would this be possible?

Id like to have two layers in Photoshop,each with their own color information along with a mask. What id like to know is if there is a way to link the 2 masks. So for instance if i use the smudge tool or paint on the mask on the top layer,the mask on the layer below will also be affected.

Not exactly sure if this is the solution you're looking for but you could have the first layer selected, then add the second mask to your selection.
Edit: nvm I think I know what you're talking about, lol

The reason i am asking is because i am working on at a start up game company as lead artist. I have 3 artists who are straight out of uni and i need to tech them how to work in the hand painted style for textures.

This project has deadlines that need to be met and these deadlines are tight and we have no time for lots of rework of textures. The artists have work methods in photoshop that will cause them problems when it comes to the ever changing form of the development cycle. For example they all were used to working in a single layer in photoshop when they make textures. So i have encouraged them to work in layers in photoshop, encourage them to use masks,etc so if we need to make changes in texture and i assigned this task to an artist, the artist will not have to redo the entire texture if a small change is requested or if one color needs altering and replacing.

So these artists are a little bit daunted by the fact that they have had to rethink the way they have worked ever since they came out of uni and i want to find a way to blend colors together to get a nice final result but i also want to have the elements in the PSD separated so if we need to make changes,it will take minutes and not hours.



Ive worked for years in the industry and i have a good idea about what are huge time sinks when it comes to creating artwork and i want to avoid this problem from the beginning,especially since we have such tight deadlines.

No. Photoshop is a layer-based image editor. And you want to have a node-based (Nuke for example) workflow features Actually it would be the best CG event ever - node based photoshop ;))

Originally Posted by pasha_sevez

No. Photoshop is a layer-based image editor. And you want to have a node-based (Nuke for example) workflow features Actually it would be the best CG event ever - node based photoshop ;))

Bah ok,so i guess,blending through the use of opacity in the mask and in layers is the best i can hope for.

Damn, that's kind of disappointing that unis don't teach them this kind of vital stuff.

Originally Posted by nordahl154

Damn, that's kind of disappointing that unis don't teach them this kind of vital stuff.

Yes it is,sadly the quality of unis vary and there can be teachers who have never been involved in the game development process and have not experienced any of the put falls.

I don't know if that's what you want, but you could include those two layers inside a layer group that has its' own mask besides their individual ones.

Try using clipping masks?

Make the mask a base layer then apply the two colours on top as seperate layers with ctrl alt g

two distinct layers at various points in the document, sharing one mask.. that'd be sweetness.

if you group the textures then you can paint a mask on the group that affects both layers

Originally Posted by cptSwing

two distinct layers at various points in the document, sharing one mask.. that'd be sweetness.

Instanced masks, that would be really awesome indeed.

BTW, Photoshop DOES HAVE a bit of such functionality - instanced Smart layers. For example, you have some smart layer, duplicate it. And now you if change the original smart layer - duplicate will change too. But it's not applicable to Masks - they can't be instanced (( So pity...

New masking features for photoshop would be awesome. It would be really nice if you could instance a layer set into mask slot. You could do something like use baked out cavity maps + a brush painting layer to do something similar to those heightmap vertex blending shaders.

Instance and reference layers is something I've wanted for a long time...also:

Realtime mirror. You should be able to drag out a center line in any direction, and the mirror is based of off that.

Photoshop could learn a lot from Zbrush;

Tiling without the use of filters. Just hold the shortcut button, click and drag on the image and you pan the canvas, which repeats forever.

Lazymouse, and other neat brushes and brush settings.

I don't understand why you want the two masks to be linked together.

Can you give a practical example of what you would use this for? I can only assume that you're talking about painting a mask on say the diffuse and specular at the same time? For those sorts of cross-grouping mask links I just copy/paste from one to the other, which works pretty easily, although it does suck you can't instance a single mask across them.

I can't think of any other reason to use two separate masks off the top of my head.

Originally Posted by Ghostscape

I don't understand why you want the two masks to be linked together.

Can you give a practical example of what you would use this for? I can only assume that you're talking about painting a mask on say the diffuse and specular at the same time? For those sorts of cross-grouping mask links I just copy/paste from one to the other, which works pretty easily, although it does suck you can't instance a single mask across them.

I can't think of any other reason to use two separate masks off the top of my head.

That's pretty much what i'd need it for, yeah. It gets tedious.

Unfortunately Photoshop is a photographers oriented software - and they have rather straightforward workflow - they rarely need to perform such a complex tasks as texture artists usually do. I have doubts that Adobe gonna one day change this run of things - photoshop is an industry standard and real changes in this case are usually made very slowly...

You can put two layers in a folder and then put a mask on the folder. This will mask both layers with the same mask. You can even have masks on the layers in the folder as well. Is that what you're asking about?

yeah, i'm aware of that.. my workflow is a massive psd file with groups for diff/normal/spec etc. and accordingly subgroups for organization. so if you're adding, say, scratches in the diffuse layer XYZ and want to 'mirror' them in your spec layer XYZ, you're copying selection masks to and fro all the time. not a big hassle, just mind-numbing after a while ;-)

Fonfa had it, if you want one mask to edit two separate layers, you group them and apply the mask to the group and disable the two masks on the layers. Awesomeness.