Matrix Games Forums

Mainly for Mobius, who has done his excellent Jagdpanther, and converted my King Tiger into AWESOME. Would you mind describing the techniques you use to UVW map the vehicles and then texturing them?

Stridor did the Jagdpanther but I don't think its finished.

It all starts with good line drawing plans. You need these to get you model right as well as helping with the textures. If the plans are in a book I scan them and separate them into panels that I will need for detailing the various panels. I also make a blank 1024 x 1024 png texture for the skin. This is a neutral yellow that I took parts from Kiois's early T34s. I also make a 1024 x 1024 bmp of neutral light blue for the Normal file.

I use Paint Shop Pro as I am much better at it than PhotoShop which is too complicated. I use PSP masking feature to create overlays and alpha channel masks instead of the hot pink key color method of PS.

I build a large part of the model before I start texturing.

For the main texture you need to establish an alpha channel mask. Make a mask and save to disk. I edit the mask file by adding a number of circles which will later be wheels or round bits like the ends of guns. At the start this just reserves this area for these things. The black area will be transparent. For your main texture load this mask from disk and save to the alpha channel.

For each large panel like roofs or side or rear plates make a copy from your plans and scale it so it will fit somewhere on your texture image. Make the white part true white. Make the lines a light gray. In the above example I made a section of the rear of the Hetzer. I take a copy of the yellow texture the same size as this rear panel is going to be. Save a mask of this to disk. (This just will be white but gets a mask made the same size as the image.) Copy the b/w image of the rear panel to this mask file and save. Go back to blank texture panel and load the mask from disk.

There should be transparent lines or spots where the mask detail line or bolts are. Change the color to negative color and save and close. This saves the masked image as white. Open the saved file and negative color again. Now you are back to the correct color and your masked lines have turn black (or if half toned to a gray.) Now you see the detail of the back panel. Paste this somewhere on you main texture. You will eventually have to Unwrap the rear panel of your model on this.

Don't save the mask to the alpha channel. You are just making a temporary image of the mask on texture.

I use Paint Shop Pro as I am much better at it than PhotoShop which is too complicated. I use PSP masking feature to create overlays and alpha channel masks instead of the hot pink key color method of PS.

I also use PSP as well; it's cheaper than Photoshop and works nearly as well.

Please do continue with your tutorial!

ORIGINAL: RyanCrierie
I also use PSP as well; it's cheaper than Photoshop and works nearly as well.

That makes it easier to explain. If you become familar with the masking of PSP you can make transparencies that I feel are a lot cleaner than the hot pink method. And you can use it to imprint line and other detail on your textures.

ORIGINAL: Mobius

ORIGINAL: RyanCrierie
I also use PSP as well; it's cheaper than Photoshop and works nearly as well.

That makes it easier to explain. If you become familar with the masking of PSP you can make transparencies that I feel are a lot cleaner than the hot pink method. And you can use it to imprint line and other detail on your textures.

The hot pink method has *nothing to do* with photoshop. It was a stark color which was chosen as one of the bmp index colors so the textures could be distributed without compression (as bmps) for users to mod at a later date. By indexing the bitmaps K saved a lot of space on the install. Hot pink is not an alpha (indexed bitmaps don't support alpha).

The problem was that the artists left anti-aliasing ON when they presumably flood filled the trans-holes! so they didn't get a pure stark pink. This of course is a cluster F... when it comes time to remaking the alpha.

Photoshop is the industry leader for a very good reason.It is superior to PSP in every single way.

Unless PSP natively handles dds I think an even better and cheaper alternative is Paint.net as it has native dds support, all the power you need for PCK and costs $0!

Regards

S.

So now that you imprinted the detail of the back panel on your texture do the same for the blue Normal file. Paste it exactly on the Normal bmp to match where you pasted the back panel on the texture file.

Note the Normal file will eventually be reduced to 512 x 512 when copying the files to your model folder. But keeping it at 1024 x 1024 while you are working on the texture keeps the Normal matching the texture image.

Each tank plate that has a lot of detail should be worked the same way. In this example several sections of the Jagdpanzer is placed on the texture and Normal images. The only real masked area is at the bottom for the wheels.

Once you get the panels all mapped you now have to become artistic to finish these off. Your basic model should have highlights from the front for horizontal panels and from above for vertical panels.

What I do is go find existing textures and copy things that you need and paste them on your texture. Bolts are one thing that you need plenty of. You may have to resize them to match the bolts on your textures. Face the lighted side to the top and forward.

There's lot of pasting to be done.

For the Normal file I have a key that shows which direction the colors should face. For Horizontal panels the color wheel is rotated 90 degrees from the Vertical wheel. Again go searching through all the Normal files of other models for existing bits. There are all kinds of bolts and these can be resized for your Normal file.

ORIGINAL: Stridor
Unless PSP natively handles dds I think an even better and cheaper alternative is Paint.net as it has native dds support, all the power you need for PCK and costs $0!

I use the free DDS Converter 2.
I have PS and found it too difficult to work with.

So how do you UVW it? Or do you put the textures onto your bitmap first, and THEN unwrap?

Testing things out; I think I accidentally hit on a good method to make panel lines stand out...

I've finished UVWing it mostly; and am texturing it now...

ORIGINAL: RyanCrierie
So how do you UVW it? Or do you put the textures onto your bitmap first, and THEN unwrap?

Yes, I make the bitmap/texture first then unwrap the model. Then edit by moving the different maps around to match their corresponding panels on the bitmap. Then when these are all set do a collapse all to set them. That way you can lock the wrap in place.

Then you can go back to adding more things to your model and it won't affect any wrapping and positioning you've already done.

You can do the model in stages. Do the large shapes first. UVW them to the texture. Then work on smaller detail things.

BTW, I like your machinegun texture. I'm making a MG34 now for the Hetzer and need a MG wrap like that.

The "blending" options in Photoshop are great tools when used in conjunction with layers. They allow for drop shadows, inner shadows, textures etc. A little use of these makes the texture look 3d.

I want begin to work on textures and this discussion is very interesting and useful.
[:)]

I completely tore out my previous work; and started all over again.

Why?

I highly suggest you do camouflage schemes on your vehicles, etc FIRST, because they will show you any errors you have made in your UVW Mapping; while a flat paint scheme (all panzergrey) hides that.

What is the nationality? Romanian?

Spanish in the Spanish Civil War. It's an interesting scheme AND helps me test my UVWing; once I plate and detail this; converting it to a 1939 Polish Campaign Pz IA will be a snap.