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Tutorial: Skin Texturing


Jimbob
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Perhaps it's do with your copies being 16-bit - they should be 8-bit from what I've heard.

 

That's the weird thing - I made another texture previously at 16-bit, and it works fine to this day. You mentioned Windows 7 - I'm running on Windows 8, but it hasn't caused any problems before and my previous texture, Racers HD and Rock Racers (both of which are brilliant so far) work fine. Thanks for checking, though.

 

I think some textures work fine at other resolutions, there's a thread somewhere where it's been mentioned, but I'd assume that all skin textures should be 8-bit :)

 

What image editor do you use to create/modify textures?

 

I use Paint.NET for all my modding, mainly as I do it on an old laptop that not only doesn't support the latest Photoshop, but also because it's free. And I find some features on it easier/more obvious than Photoshop.

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I also got a problem: I changed a texture and the color is really changed ingame (i simply made RR's clothes and helmet black) but only in the main menu, builing mode and not in the races! Why doesn't it work for me? I use the rerelease of LR by Dice Mutimedia (http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51NS0SRVMXL._AA300_.jpg) where the exe file is from 2001.

 

Edit: Okay, I fixed this! You have to put the changed textures (for example: chest, leg and helmet bmp'1s) also into GAMEDATACOMMON to make your own character look like in build mode in the races!

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...8-bit...Paint.NET...

 

Thanks a lot, Paint.NET makes it work fine! I've hated having to use GIMP since Windows 8 kicked out my Photoshop license...

 

Finally got to correct something I've meant to correct for a while:

 

correc10.png

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I also got a problem: I changed a texture and the color is really changed ingame (i simply made RR's clothes and helmet black) but only in the main menu, builing mode and not in the races! Why doesn't it work for me? I use the rerelease of LR by Dice Mutimedia (http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51NS0SRVMXL._AA300_.jpg) where the exe file is from 2001.

 

Edit: Okay, I fixed this! You have to put the changed textures (for example: chest, leg and helmet bmp'1s) also into GAMEDATACOMMON to make your own character look like in build mode in the races!

 

I did mention this several times in the tutorial ;) But yes, menu textures are separate from in-game ones, which can actually be quite helpful.

 

...8-bit...Paint.NET...

 

Thanks a lot, Paint.NET makes it work fine! I've hated having to use GIMP since Windows 8 kicked out my Photoshop license...

 

Finally got to correct something I've meant to correct for a while:

correc10.png

 

Nice job!

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I did mention this several times in the tutorial But yes, menu textures are separate from in-game ones, which can actually be quite helpful.

 

I thought that you just mean the mat.bmp's which have to be in the common folder. So I didn't know that the normal (player's) textures have to be changed as well. But thank you though!

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Finally got to correct something I've meant to correct for a while:

 

Olivius, think you could upload your Commander Cold torso to our Custom Textures section, maybe? I'd love having that!

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Olivius, think you could upload your Commander Cold torso to our Custom Textures section, maybe? I'd love having that!

 

Certainly, in fact, I'm putting together an "add-on kit" which includes this correction and reskins of the more mundane body parts (e.g. the town racers outfits and the Majisto body) to make more classic 90s figures available (So far I've made Senor Palomar, a Western Deputy and a Launch Command astronaut). I'll put it up once I'm done!

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Thought I'd add a note on Commander Cold's MAP texture - he doesn't need one. I assume he uses the player textures instead, since my retexturing of his chest affects his CPU model.

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Fluffy Cupcake

Heya, you seemed to have missed HELMET2.BMP in your template rip (good job ripping everything else though!)

So here ya go!

helmet2.png

Yeah... it got converted to .png and decaptialized on upload... oh well, easy fix!


 

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Thank you, I wondered what that was! I just disregarded the file as an unused one, the I forgot about the texture...

 

I'll add it this afternoon :)

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Looking at it, I think it's Joan of Kart's tall helmet. I remember seeing it changed when I first started ripping skin textures, and think I said it was Black Knight's initially as I forgot his distinct helmet. Unless I made it Basil's, I'll have another look through the rips.

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  • 4 weeks later...

The Images aren't showing anymore D:

 

I'm not sure why it's doing that. They're embedded using the link provided in the image.

 

EDIT: Just updated all the BBCodes, should be working now. Thank you for pointing it out for me.

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It's 404'd.

 

Not for me...

 

As I said in the previous post, I just updated it :) Although I wasn't getting a 404 error beforehand either, I just had to click on the link as you said.

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  • 2 months later...
MrElephant

Hey Jimbob it looks like you have done a lot of work here while I was gone.  I see now you can even edit commander colds uniform that I wasnt able to do before for some reason. ( I forget the reason now).  Anyways I am going to review this tutorial. It seems more informative than it was before.

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Nitegeist

Quick question- do we know how the alpha channel works?

I mean, how do i know what pixels are transparent while i edit the texture?

For example: i took this texture

5fkvnl.jpg

This is what it looks like in-game

6sg909.png

I simply blew up the size to 1024x1024, and got this

30a8h85.png

Now, there are holes all over, but i frankly was expecting the alpha channel to disappear completely, and i was pleasantly surprised to see it still there and properly scaled.

Again, how does the alpha channel work? Knowing that, a lot of textures could be greatly improved (for example, the red horse helmet-thing on Basil's car and the fence in the background that look like crap now. Also notice how simply scaling up the helmet texture makes the alpha edges smoother)

Also, i guess we can't get varying degrees of transparency, right?

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Good question Nitegeist!

 

To get the bad news out of the way, you can't have semi-transparency. Pixels are either clear or filled. This is because the game defines transparency by assigning each individual texture with a certain RGB colour code to use for transparency. For instance, Basil the Batlord's hat above uses a certain shade of black as its transparency colour. When the game loads the texture, it searches for the specific RGB colour used for transparency and displays them as clear pixels instead in-game.

 

However, the good news is this does mean that you can choose what colour is used for transparency, and thus what parts of the texture are transparent. The RGB colour code required for a pixel to be transparent is defined in the relevant binary file - I can't remember which ones, having a quick look through now I can't find them, but I'm sure they're there somewhere. You can obviously just use the default colour though if it's easier than editing the binary files. This means you can easily create HD versions (like you have) with the transparency still working correctly, just make sure you don't anti-alias the image but instead use hard edges.

 

On a side note, Basil's helmet splits the texture into squares rather than accurate shapes, meaning that you can give him twin flags instead of dragon wings :D Most helmets do this, although I'm not sure about Achu's.

 

I hope that's helped!

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RobExplorien

However, the good news is this does mean that you can choose what colour is used for transparency, and thus what parts of the texture are transparent. The RGB colour code required for a pixel to be transparent is defined in the relevant binary file - I can't remember which ones, having a quick look through now I can't find them, but I'm sure they're there somewhere.

 

Maybe I found something relevant to the transparency subject:

 

k_27   // Texture
 "rk_hat"
{
   k_2A   // Bitmap (remove this to denote a TGA texture)
   k_28
   k_2C   // Transparent Color   // CONFIRM THIS ONE
   217
   252
   252
}



 

Found in the BODYPART.TDB file in the PARTDB archive (in MENUDATA). Not all entries have k_2C though, but this can be added in every entry if desired. I suppose that the RGB or HSB is listed under k_2C, taking it that 217 would be red/hue, 252 green/saturation and 252 blue/brightness in this case.

 

EDIT: Darn code won't list correctly.

EDIT2: It works! (using RGB color codes)

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