Chrome Texture

[fresnosmokey02]

I am looking to add a shiny, reflective, chrome texture to an item, probably more than one item once I figure out how to do that. Yet, I cannot find anything about that either in the above general modding stuff or in these threads. Does anyone know how to do this and can anyone give me a heads up? Thanx.

[Darkkender]

A good resource would be this thread in the above stickies. http://www.lucasforums.com/showthread.php?t=143264

 

But to directly give something a chrome look you need to adjust the alpha chanel upwards for transparency. Then depending on weather it is a weapon or armor will determine where you need to apply CM_Baremetal to give it the chrome effect.

 

If it is a weapon in the "txi" file you want to replace CM_Default with CM_Baremetal.

There should be a line titled ENV_MAP = "CM_Default". Or close to it.

 

If it is a Armor or Clothing you want to edit the appearance.2da file by finding the plethora of lines for different appearance types and scroll horizontally across untill you find a column labeled envmap texture and change all of the row entries for the appearances to cm_baremetal.

 

Side Note: Many of the available Armor mods out there have already made the changes to appearance.2da for the cm_baremetal texture.

[fresnosmokey02]

Thanx, got it figured out. Who'd've thought it would be so damn simple? I've been trying to figure it out since I started modding months ago.

[Darkkender]

Your welcome I think that is one of the many minor texture editing mod tricks that we don't have covered in the tuts it seems.

[REDJOHNNYMIKE]

Did you have to use a program like photoshop to get it to work, because I still haven't been able to?

[fresnosmokey02]

Sort of. You have to make the texture at least semi transparent to see the metal texture. I use Gimp. It works great and it's free. You can get that and any other tools from

 

Sticky: Getting started with modding + List of Tools + downloads

Darth333

 

under General Tutorials + Tools at the top of the page this thread is on.

 

Once you have your texture prepared you need to get a .txi file. If you put it in your hex editor the only thing it will say is envmaptexture CM_Baremetal. Rename this file itemname.txi (whatever your item name is) and load it with your texture file and you have it. I am not sure about new armors yet, I haven't tried that. But you can change the appearance of characters with a dedicated appearance (like Mandalore or HK) by making their texture semi transparent, like an item, and then changing the envmap field to CM_Baremetal in the appearance.2da file. I hope that helps, I am still exploring this myself.

[fresnosmokey02]

PS I don't know how to make the .txi file from scratch. I got one from a mod I downloaded and renamed it.

[oldflash]

Using .txi files is a good way to use some "custom" crome effect. After all cm_baremetal is a editable texture like any others.

[fresnosmokey02]

Right, but if you edit the cm_baremetal texture doesn't everything that uses it change as well? Or is it possible to rename the texture cm_baremetal01, 02, and so forth and change the .txi file and/or the envmap field in the appearance 2da file to read the same and will the game use these alterations if you do this?

[oldflash]

That's the point to use .txi files

Set in appearance.2da "default", make a copy of cm_baremetal.tga under new name then make a .txi file (with same name as texture where you want a custom effect) and instead cm_batemetal use the name of new file (ex: cm_customChrome). Editing new file you can make new effect without altering game.

[T7nowhere]

 

Once you have your texture prepared you need to get a .txi file. If you put it in your hex editor the only thing it will say is envmaptexture CM_Baremetal. Rename this file itemname.txi (whatever your item name is) and load it with your texture file and you have it. I am not sure about new armors yet, I haven't tried that. But you can change the appearance of characters with a dedicated appearance (like Mandalore or HK) by making their texture semi transparent, like an item, and then changing the envmap field to CM_Baremetal in the appearance.2da file. I hope that helps, I am still exploring this myself.

 

A .txi(texture information) file is a simple text file, you can create own with notepad. So all you need to do to create a new txi is create a new text document and rename the file to texture_name.txi then add what ever texture information you need to.

 

The biggest problem with adding CM_Baremetal( or any other shader) to an appearance.2da row is it forces that paticular shader to be used by everything with an Alpha channel. This mean that if the texture for the npc's head uses an Alpha channel to make certain spots transparent, with the shader forced it will turn those transparent spots into metal.

[REDJOHNNYMIKE]

I actually have been using GIMP, I can only figure out how to adjust the options of the alpha channel, not adjust the transparency of selections?

[T7nowhere]

^^^ In the game the Alpha channel is what makes texture transparent, you just omit the txi with the shader info.

[REDJOHNNYMIKE]

I have got basic changes to the alpha channel to work ingame by adjusting its options, but the thing where your supposed to use greyscales to change the level of transparency never worked, because the alpha isn't editable in the texture?

The program will only let me modify the RGB channels, but the alpha is "locked"?

[T7nowhere]

The program will only let me modify the RGB channels, but the alpha is "locked"?

 

If you can't unlock the the Alpha channel can you delete it and make a new one, or copy the current one and then delete the locked one.

[REDJOHNNYMIKE]

I have tried deleting it and making a new one.

It isn't like a channel is corrupted or anything, I just can't use it the way everyone tells me too?

Does the editor require access of some form to the baremetal texture before allowing alpha channel editing?

[T7nowhere]

What are you using, The Gimp?

[REDJOHNNYMIKE]

Yeah, it would be great if I was rich and had photoshop because everybody seems to say it's easy, but I use the lame gimp (still don't understand why a straight line option was omitted)

[Darkkender]

Yeah, it would be great if I was rich and had photoshop because everybody seems to say it's easy, but I use the lame gimp (still don't understand why a straight line option was omitted)

 

Hey now easy on the GIMP man. I've used various photoshop & paintshop programs & demos since I got GIMP and I keep going back to GIMP and have had few problems.

[REDJOHNNYMIKE]

Hmm, I've had to DL it several times, because it was always glitchy, I'm not saying I don't like using it at all, most of the actual editing works great, it's all the options for channels and some of the other options too, it actually crashed today, i don't hate it, I'm just getting frustrated with not being able to do things the way the it's written in the readme:(