Filter: Advanced Displacement Map.

Displacement mapping is a bit of a black art. It is the art of using grayscale images to push pixels around. Our Advanced Displacement Map (ADMap) filter is a refined way of creating displacement effects and it's easy to use. Make a Solid layer, add some Fractal Noise or a grayscale Ramp, and import the image that's going to be affected. Then apply ADMap and start playing!

Use ADMap to layer multiple instances of an image. [play] Learn to create this on our Tutorials page.

Swirl water footage into an interesting texture [play]

ADMap is your middle man.

Truth is, the ADMap filter isn't really creating this distortion. The image that you're using as the graymap causes the distortion. Black pushes pixels one way, white the opposite, and all gray values in between have specific directions as well. Think of the ADMap filter as a 'middle man' for the composite. Here is a great example of what ADMap does:

The source image.

The displacement map.

Resulting ADMap image.

By using ADMap, the resulting image contains distortion effects that would be normally difficult or impossible to do. A common use for dis. maps is to create naturalistic distortion, like a flag waving or water running over an image.

Control globally or individually.

In ADMap, there are multiple ways to control your displacement. The plugin has global controls that operate on all of the dis. maps that you are using. The plugin also contains individual controls for other aspects of the dis. map.

You can load in up to three Image Maps. Global Controls are basically a multiplier for the individual controls in each map. They contain the most important controls found in each individual Map section, like Horizontal Displacement and Vertical Displacement.

Each map has its own set of Map controls, like Scale, Rotation, and Contrast. They also repeat Global Controls on an individual level, like the Vertical and Horizontal Displacement Amount.

When multiple maps are used, the way in which they blend together is important. The Multiple Map pop-up helps to control their effect. Happy displacing!

Advanced fire effects. [play] Learn to create this on our Tutorials page.

Global Controls (top) and Individual Map options (below).