Lighting Effects Filters

I like Photoshops Lighting Effects filters (Filter>Render>Lighting Effects); however, they are limited to 8-bit, and I prefer to work in 16-bit.  I had been looking at this PTC depth map video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxbVU9LD_J0 ), and it occurred to me that perhaps I could bring either a scene or individual layers (16-bit) into the 3D environment, then use the 3D lighting apparatus.  In the video, Jesus Ramirez brings an image of a wall into the 3D environment as a postcard.  The postcard stays true in its representation of the original layer.  However, when I bring my image into 3D, the layer appears as if I had changed the blending mode to color burn.  Very dark.  Very high contrast.  If I convert the image to 8-bit (just to see what happens), the change is much less drastic, but still not true to the original layer.  There are workarounds.  I can, for example, make a duplicate image, convert it to 8-bit, use the lighting effects filter to play with the lighting, then reproduce that effect "manually" in the 16-bit image.  But I'm just wondering if there is a better way.