I've seen many mods that add glowing stuff to the game (blades, even eyes!). how do they do that?
Tsk, tsk, search holds all the answers you seek young Padawan.
Hint - envmaptexture CM_Bright
but, master, there is no tutorial. and search returns many misleading answers that, paired with questions never answered, lead to the dark side...
Lol :lol: Just erase the part that you want to glow on your skin. Then, make a file in notepad called "envmaptexture CM_Bright" and save it as "yourskinname.txi". See how that works for you.
thanks :D but 2 more questions:
erase texture?
is it possible to change the color of the glow?
erase texture?
Yes, open up your .tga and literally erase the part that you want to glow. The higher the opacity, the brighter it will glow. Look at the screens here (
http://www.lucasforums.com/showthread.php?t=207546). The two glowy swords are all 100% transparent (in the glowy areas, obviously).
is it possible to change the color of the glow?
Yes and no. You can change the color by making your own .txi but I've never tried. So if you don't do that you're stuck with the blue glow.
Oooo, gives me good Ideas.
Yes, open up your .tga and literally erase the part that you want to glow. The higher the opacity, the brighter it will glow. Look at the screens here (
http://www.lucasforums.com/showthread.php?t=207546). The two glowy swords are all 100% transparent (in the glowy areas, obviously).
Yes and no. You can change the color by making your own .txi but I've never tried. So if you don't do that you're stuck with the blue glow.
that is the sword mod I meant, you got it :P thanks!
in making our own .txi how limited are we? I mean in the choice of colours/defining brightness etc.
that is the sword mod I meant, you got it :P thanks!
in making our own .txi how limited are we? I mean in the choice of colours/defining brightness etc.
I just finished that mod, glad you like it :)
I have NO idea about new .txi's, but I wish I did. I have those same questions so if anyone knows it'd be appreciated.
Refer to this for some info on valid TXI arguments:
http://www.lucasforums.com/showthread.php?t=175937)
By the way, you don't want to "erase" areas you want to glow (or be otherwise affected by environment maps), you need to set up an alpha channel that dictates transparency in the appropriate areas. You'll need to experiment to find the most appropriate level of transparency for the particular effect you are trying to achieve.
Refer to this for some info on valid TXI arguments:
http://www.lucasforums.com/showthread.php?t=175937)
By the way, you don't want to "erase" areas you want to glow (or be otherwise affected by environment maps), you need to set up an alpha channel that dictates transparency in the appropriate areas. You'll need to experiment to find the most appropriate level of transparency for the particular effect you are trying to achieve.
that thread is VERY useful! it also shows us how to add a Normal Map (bump map) to everything! and since I know how to make them from a diffuse texture... they're the blueish ones, right? too bad there can be no Specular / Diffuse Map. something like this but in TGA (sorry for the off-topic :'( )
http://img715.imageshack.us/img715/8249/perdr04spec.jpg) (
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/715/perdr04spec.jpg/)
http://img703.imageshack.us/img703/7348/perdr04norm.jpg) (
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/703/perdr04norm.jpg/)
By the way, you don't want to "erase" areas you want to glow (or be otherwise affected by environment maps), you need to set up an alpha channel that dictates transparency in the appropriate areas. You'll need to experiment to find the most appropriate level of transparency for the particular effect you are trying to achieve.
Meh, I just erase it. Works fine for me.
I take it you don't simply erase it in paint :P
I take it you don't simply erase it in paint :P
No, it has to be a program like Photoshop, Gimp, or any other that supports transparency(i.e a "blank" area of an image).
I have GIMP, even if it's very user-unfriendly
I have GIMP, even if it's very user-unfriendly
Why do you speak lies??? :lol:
Why do you speak lies???
He dosen't, I don't much dig it either. :)
i use old-ass Photoshop 7
so I'd have to set tranparent/alpha channel the part I want to be glowing?
any insight then on how to change the color of the glow?
EDIT: if adding an alpha channel means seeing the texture vanish under a multitude of grey squares I did it.
any insight then on how to change the color of the glow?
EDIT: if adding an alpha channel means seeing the texture vanish under a multitude of grey squares I did it.
Depends on exactly what your going for. If it is eyes, you could isolate that part of the texture on a separate layer, color it as you want, and try the "Color to Alpha" tool(in Gimp), which will make the eyes transparent, but keeping some of the color you want them to be
I have GIMP, even if it's very user-unfriendly
Lies! All lies!!!
Oh, GIMP! How great thou art! :worship:
Hmm. Looks like everyone just about covered everything. So I'm just gonna go lurk around somewhere...
Someone (Possibly Jai'galaar Bralor (
http://lucasforums.com/member.php?u=161621))------>) :loco: :drool2: <-------Me.
it still is necessary to know how to change the color of the glow in the txi. not everything has been covered.
You don't determine colour via the TXI. The envmap just adds a glow to the areas of your texture with transparency. You don't make those areas completely transparent - you just add a tiny little bit of transparency via the alpha channel. Thus the texture itself dictates the colour. If you make the transparency value too high, you'll bleed too much of the envmap through and end up with white. I'd probably start with an RGB value of around 200,200,200 and experiment. You probably need to oversaturate the colour of the affected areas of the texture as well to compensate for the washout effect of the envmap blending.
oh. so let me see if I understand: the brighter the color made transparent, the more evident the glow will be of said colour?
Well... To get a new envmap, you would have to make a new tga.
For example: you could open up 'cm_bright.tga' and make it a new color (It's originally a very light blue). Then save the new---I wanna say 'texture'---with a new name. For example, you could save it as, say, 'cm_yellow.tga'. Stick that in your override, then open/create the txi file for the texture you're trying to add a glow to, and type in:
envmaptexture cm_yellow
Or whatever it was you named it. Save the txi appropriately, then stuff it into your override along with the aforementioned texture.
Now go test it out in-game and tell me if it worked.
Oh, and I require a contract for my services.
So sign here, here, here, and here. :sign2:
Well... To get a new envmap, you would have to make a new tga.
For example: you could open up 'cm_bright.tga' and make it a new color (It's originally a very light blue). Then save the new---I wanna say 'texture'---with a new name. For example, you could save it as, say, 'cm_yellow.tga'. Stick that in your override, then open/create the txi file for the texture you're trying to add a glow to, and type in:
envmaptexture cm_yellow
Or whatever it was you named it. Save the txi appropriately, then stuff it into your override along with the aforementioned texture.
Now go test it out in-game and tell me if it worked.
Oh, and I require a contract for my services.
So sign here, here, here, and here. :sign2:
shall I sign with my blood?
shall I sign with my blood?
Well, you don't have to, but I would appreciate it. :D
that thread is VERY useful! it also shows us how to add a Normal Map (bump map) to everything! and since I know how to make them from a diffuse texture... they're the blueish ones, right? too bad there can be no Specular / Diffuse Map. something like this but in TGA (sorry for the off-topic :'( )
http://img715.imageshack.us/img715/8249/perdr04spec.jpg) (
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/715/perdr04spec.jpg/)
http://img703.imageshack.us/img703/7348/perdr04norm.jpg) (
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/703/perdr04norm.jpg/)
This intrigues me. Would that actually show up in the game?
I'm not sure, but possibly. there's a mod already that restores mandalorian shininess to armor.
there's a mod already that restores mandalorian shininess to armor.
I'm pretty sure that's just a .2da fix.
In the original TSL appearance.2da file, the mandalorians did not have an entry for "envmaptexture". This means that anything transparent would just be see-through in-game. By putting "CM_Baremetal" in that "envmaptexture" column, the transparent stuff would then show up as shiny in-game.
Now that's just if I remember correctly; I could be wrong of course :p
You'd also have to add alpha channels to the Mandalorians' textures. Darth_Shan (from kotorfiles. the Darth_Shan here is a different person, I think) just took the original KotOR's mando textures and put them into TSL. But if he/she did happen to add the alpha channels him/herself, then he/she was IMPOSSIBLY accurate. If you put the KotOR tga's next to his/her tga's, then you see that they are EXACTLY the same. And I'm getting off topic... BACK TO IT!!!!
It was a necessary diversion. useful if anything, and very instructive.
bump/help: for those who like GIMP and know how to use it, I figured how to add an alpha channel to the whole image and change the treshold (in fact, much simpler than I expected, just click to add alpha channel without selecting anything, right?).
I'm having difficulties with the bump map function: is it possible to use, for the bump map, an actual bump map (the blueish ones not supported in-game) in order to improve the texture?
Most of the functionality for the "fancy" Aurora stuff was ripped out of Odyssey as it wasn't usable on an Xbox. What you are see are just the remnants that you won't be able to do anything with.
I know I can't. what I am asking for is if I can use the actual normal map in gimp in order to give illusion of bumpiness to the diffuse texture of the game.
Highly unlikely. I doubt you could even do it in Photoshop - at least not in the exact manner you seem to be after. You can fake depth and height with certain techniques and PS filters certainly, but that only works with static images with a fixed light source. It isn't going to hold up to scrutiny when applied to a 3D object moving about in 3D space.
so if I wish to improve how a texture looks, even a glowing one, I have to upscale it, right?
Bigger is usually better in the case of textures, yes. Body textures and the like should be 1024x1024. You can get away with 512x512 textures for smaller models like weapons. The vanilla textures are usually pretty bad though, so you'll have your work cut out in a lot of cases if you want to use them as a basis.
yeah, I was thinking of sharpening/bumping for ambients.