One depth map. Four ways to look at it.
However you build it — Auto Prep, Manual Workflow, or the Relief Generator — every job in Depth2Beam ends up as the exact same thing underneath: a single grayscale depth map. What differs is how you're viewing it at any given moment, and only one of those views is what your laser or CNC actually receives.
Three ways to build the depth map
All three hand off to the same place — a finished depth map ready for Panel Shape and Export.
Auto Prep
Tell it whether your source is Logo/Crest or Mixed, and Depth2Beam picks the engine and settings for you. A real photo or portrait upload is detected and blocked with a message instead.
Manual Workflow
Pick the engine yourself and tune Refine Detail by hand. Only needed if Auto Prep's result isn't quite what you want — not a required step.
Relief Generator
Describe a subject and get a sculpted depth map back directly. It loads as your working image already finished — nothing further to generate.
Four previews, one export
Height Map, Lit Relief, Slope Map, and Interactive 3D Relief all read the same underlying data — but only Height Map shows it unfiltered.
| Preview mode | What it shows you | Is this what gets exported? |
|---|---|---|
| Height Map | Brightness is depth, pixel for pixel — no lighting or shading applied. | Yes — this is the file |
| Lit Relief | A simulated raking light across the surface, so subtle depth is easier to judge by eye. | No — presentation only |
| Slope Map | Highlights where depth changes fastest — the actual predictor of visible laser stairstepping. | No — diagnostic only |
| Interactive 3D Relief | A rotating solid model at real millimeter dimensions, for judging the physical shape. | No — visualization only |
Switching between them never changes what any export produces — every export, from the 8-bit Height Map to the Complete Job Package, is built straight from the underlying depth data, not from whichever preview happened to be open.
A shiny or one-sided Height Map preview
If you're looking at the Height Map tab and it still looks like it has real gloss or a directional shadow, that's not the app adding it — Height Map never applies lighting. What you're seeing is genuine data, and a Relief-Generator-built depth map can occasionally bake in a photographic-looking light source from the AI itself, the same way it can occasionally add stray text. If the brightness looks uneven in a way that suggests one light direction rather than the design's own shape, re-roll the generation for a new seed — same fix either way.
See it for yourself
Load an image or open the Relief Generator, then switch between Height Map, Lit Relief, Slope Map, and Interactive 3D to see the same data from every angle.
Launch Depth2Beam →