CompuServe Messages

Hi Michael, from the developer… "> It is understood that EPS output is for the use of Postscript hardcopy > output. The question you are asking is why would anyone want to bring an > EPS file into an image editing program? The idea is to check the image > prior to printing. Of course a targa or tiff file can be loaded in > Photoshop, that's not the point. > > The point is that if the EPS output is ADOBE compatible then I should be > able to open it in ADOBE software. Especially, Photoshop. If it won't > then it isn't compatible. The EPS file format is spelled out in detail in Appendix H of the second edition of "PostScript Language Reference Manual" by Adobe Systems Incorporated also knows as the "red book". A brief quote from that section may be of some use. From page 709 "An encapsulated PostScript file is a PostScript language program describing the appearance of a single page. Typically, the purpose of the EPS file is to be included, or "encapsulated", in another PostScript language page description. The EPS file can contain any combination of text, graphics, and images, and it is the same as any other PostScript language page description with only a few restrictions." The EPS file produced by 3DS R4 is fully compatible with that format. However, Adobe PhotoShop does not claim to be able to import any EPS file and in fact it can not in general read other programs' EPS files. It would in fact have to have an entire PostScript interpreter to do so as implied by the above description of what an EPS file is. > As for the DPI/image size issue. It is a well documented fact that the R4 > manual is less than completely lucid in many areas. Try it. Render an > 8×10 image at 150 DPI and see what you get. The result will be relative to > the resolution of the render image setting, but not the size specified in > the EPS configuration dialogue. This is immediately apparent when the image > is brought into a DTP program like Quark Express. Perhaps "the person > misunderstands" something that is not apparently well documented. … Perhaps the description in the reference manual is not clear. Let me attempt to explain. On page 59 of "3D Studio New Features" manual it says that the page size "sets the width and height of the output on which the output image is centered." Note this is the size of the output page, NOT the image. Also on page 59, the resolution setting is described as "sets the resolution in dots per inch or millimeter … The larger the resolution value, the higher the quality of the image, but the smaller the resulting size." This may seem a somewhat strange way to control the size, but is driven by the way plug-ins interface to 3DS. A BXP plug-in, such as the EPS plug-in, can not control the size of the image in pixels. The user must do this via the Renderer/Setup/Configure menu. So, in the case described above the user runs the EPS PXP and specifies 150 dpi and whatever page size they want the image centered on and in the Render/Setup/Configure menu set a width of 1200 (8 inches times 150 dpi) and a height of 1500 (10 inches times 150 dpi) and then render the output. Hopefully this clears up the confusion."