texture applications

[gadolinite]

How do you apply a single texture to a named selection with several faces?  Such as a single texture for the exterior an aircraft fusalage.  

How do you apply textures that the game engine recongnizes as glass?  How would you create them?  

[ScouseJedi]

1. Do you mean how do I texture a cylinder? There are 2 answers. One is the Gizmo tool which has a tutorial found at this site. The other option is to select a face, then click on look at face and texture it. Then select the next face of the cylinder and do the same.

2. .pac are solid textures, .paa are transparent

.pac's are made from gifs
.paa's are 32 bit .tga's

You need to do a search for 'transparency' and 'alpha channels'

[asmodeus]

.pac are solid textures, .paa are transparent

That's the first I've ever heard of that!

In my experience you can take a .tga and save it as either a .pac or a .paa and they function the same.  I could be wrong though.  (happened on many occasions)       ;D  

But yeah, @ gadolinite:

You need a photo editing program that supports alpha channels.  The ones that most people use that I've heard of are Paint Shop pro 7 and/or Adobe Photoshop  (I use 7.0, I think any somewhat recent version would work fine)

Asmo

[gadolinite]

Do you mean how do I texture a cylinder? There are 2 answers. One is the Gizmo tool which has a tutorial found at this site

 ???What is the gizmo tool? I never heard it.  My cylinder has 1000 segment radei so it is impossible to texture each face individually.  Could you point me to this so called tute.

Thanks

[asmodeus]

Hi!

Meet a new best friend:

http://www.ofpec.com/editors/index.php

Just type in "gizmo" in the quick search (in the top, left hand corner) and you'll see the tutorial ScouseJedi mentioned.  (it will be the only one that the search finds)

It's a great tutorial, good luck!

Asmo

[gadolinite]

Ok gizmoing is in the bag; I figured out how to do it and it works---bingo.  Now I have another problem.  O2 refuses to convert my "ugly" experimental gif texture into a paa.  If I use textviewer to save it is any file type, it crashes.  I did jaypehs with textview.  

I used mspaint to create this primitive test texture (as you know I am a noobie at this stuff).  

[Planck]

Try converting it to a tga, then throw it at Texview.


Planck

[gadolinite]

How do you convert a jaypeg or gif to a tga?  MS paint lets you do bitmaps to jaypegs and gifs.

[asmodeus]

As far as I know, it's the same programs that I recommended to you:

You need a photo editing program that supports alpha channels.  The ones that most people use that I've heard of are Paint Shop pro 7 and/or Adobe Photoshop  (I use 7.0, I think any somewhat recent version would work fine)

Also, I use Microsoft PhotoDraw 2000 as well and it's a good program that can convert to .tga.  (however, it can't do Alpha Channels, so it won't work for glass textures and stuff)

Asmo

[gadolinite]

I created the same texture in photoshop, saved it as a targa.  TexView Converts it to a paa file A ok.  Oxygen, however gives you a file load error if you attempt to load it is gizmo maping.  Whats wrong here?

[gadolinite]

I believe that error message was a could not open error.

[Kaliyuga]

 Is it the proper dimensions?

i.e      256x256, 512x512, etc.......

[gadolinite]

I made a 512 by 512 targa that o2 accepted, but the gizmo mapping feature does not apply the texture, it leaves an ugly white texture instead of my texture

Thanks again

[ScouseJedi]

OFP is a little difficult when it comes to tga's

I can make them in Photoshop without problem in either 24 bit or 32 bit

But I have never been aboe to make a tga in PSP that Oxygen (or texView) can load. This is not unique to me many other people have the same problem.

.pac are 24 bit and .paa can be either 24 bit or 32bit
I use all 24 bit = .pac and 32 bit are .paa

It helps me know which textures are which

You can get transparency with 24 bit textures though as RBG(255,0,255) is transparent. You cannot get any graduated transparency like dirty windows though.

White texture is more likely to be a pathing problem. Its what the engine shows when it cannot find the texture your path points to.

Press ALT + T and you will see a list of tetxures with a path

assuming you have O2 set up correctly it should be

yourproject\texture.paa

yourproject folder should be in the same place as the buldozer.exe - and if you followed the readme in the root

c:yourProject\youraddon.p3d
c:yourProject\yourTexture.paa
c:buldozer.exe

[gadolinite]

Thanks, that took care of it.

  Must Remember : textures need to go into the project folder.

I had mine on the desktop, OOPS my bad.  

[gadolinite]

You can get transparency with 24 bit textures though as RBG(255,0,255) is transparent.

In photoshop, when you set the colors <RBG to 255 0 255> this gives you a yellow color, not a glassie like color.

Which color should I choose for Flashpoint Style glass?

What exactly do I need to do in photoshop to save a texture as a transparent targa and apply it in O2? I have an idea on how to do it, but my current knowledge is not accurate.  

My noob 02 creation is just a plain cylinder with windows at the top you can use as target practice with the M-16 or whatever.  

Thx

[ScouseJedi]

Ok it depends on which version of Photoshop

7.0 or higher and its all automatic. Just start a texture with a transparent background and then when you work over that its transparent nature will be saved.

So if you have a window for instance you can draw the frame with a brush that is 100% Opaque. For the glass just draw over it with a brush that is 10% opaque and the window will look a little dirty.

Then save as .tga 32 bit and you are done

IF you are using <7.0 then you have to use something called an 'alpha channel'

The Layer / Path / Channel window should be open to see this.

When you start a image in photoshop there are 4 channels in that image. A red channel, a blue channel a green channel and a RGB channel with them all mixed together.

What the alpha channel does is store transparency.

Click on the channels and make a new channel. By default it will be called an alpha channel. This channel can only have black or white in it (or grey.. but no colour) White is solid, black is transparent.

Go to your layer part and draw something - say a window frame. When it is finished select it and then go to the alpha channel. Fill the selection with white. Your window frame is the only solid thing in the texture.

Now invert the selection and select a dark grey brush. Cover the glass of the window with this and then go back to the layer.

In the layer you need to cover the window pane with an actual cover. You can make this a sold cover as the alpha channel will force it to become transparent.

Save it as 32 bit .tga and away you go.

There is a much better version of this linked on the www.flashpoint1985.com forums. If you do a search for transparency there you'll find it. It has pictures and everything.

[Maclav]

I`ve got a problem with .tgas : I make a transparent image (512x512) in paintshop pro 8, I save it as .tga , I try to open it in TexView but it shows a little black square (not filled), as with a bad format....