14.9. Solid Noise

14.9.1. Overview

Figure 17.346. Example of turbulent solid noise

Filter “Solid noise” applied

Solid Noise is a great texture maker. Note that this noise is always gray, even if you applied it to a very colorful image (it doesn’t matter what the original image looks like — this filter completely overwrites any existing background in the layer it is applied to). This is also a good tool to create displacement maps for the Warp transform tool or for the Bump Map filter. With the “turbulence” setting active, the results look quite a bit like real clouds.

14.9.2. Activating the filter

This filter is found in the image window menu under Filters → Render → Noise → Solid noise….

14.9.3. Options

Figure 17.347. “Solid Noise” filter options

Presets, “Input Type”, Clipping, Blending Options, Preview, Split view

	Note
	These options are described in Section 2, “Common Features”.

X size, Y size

These control the size and proportion of the noise shapes in X (horizontal) and Y (vertical) directions (range 0.1 to 16.0).

Detail

This controls the amount of detail in the noise texture. Higher values give a higher level of detail, and the noise seems to be made of spray or small particles, which makes it feel hard. A low value makes it more soft and cloudy.

Tileable

If you check Tileable, you’ll get a noise which can be used as tiles. For example, you can use it as a background in an HTML page, and the tile edges will be joined seamlessly.

Turbulent

If you check this, you’ll get very interesting effects, often something that looks much like oil on water, or clouds of smoke, or living tissue, or a Rorschach blot.

Random seed

This option controls random behaviour of the filter. If the same random seed in the same situation is used, the filter produces exactly the same results. A different random seed produces different results. Random seed can be entered manually or generated randomly by pressing New Seed button.