Texture Question

DFA_Haplo

<div class="IPBDescription">How do you make them?</div> I have done a small search about this topic and it didnt turn up too much info. From what I have gathered people that make textures do them in photoshop.

I am curious <!--emo&???--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='confused.gif'><!--endemo--> Do you do them by hand or do you start with a photo graph of something. I would love to create my own textures but I cant free hand a smiley face let-a-lone a wall surface.

I know and understand 256 colors (8 bit) I can make nice cute little sprays. But I really want to make some cool looking textures. I have ideas I just dont know how to start.

Any tutorial links or help is much appreciated.

amckern

hope these help you in your endever

<a href='http://countermap.counter-strike.net/Tutorials/tutorial.php?id=55' target='_blank'>http://countermap.counter-strike.net/Tutor...orial.php?id=55</a>

<a href='http://countermap.counter-strike.net/Tutorials/tutorial.php?id=37' target='_blank'>http://countermap.counter-strike.net/Tutor...orial.php?id=37</a>

amckern

wrongwaygoback

Here's how i texture:

Firstly, I need to work out what I want to texture. Is this a wall, a door, a grate, a computer, a bunch of blobby flesh piled on top of a corpse...

Then I research examples of whatever it is on the web using the ubertastic <a href='http://images.google.com/' target='_blank'>Google Image Search</a>. This usually yields three of four great shots and about a hundred crappy ones. But you tend to get a good idea on what the end result should be. Alternatively, go outside with a digital camera and start snapping. If you've got access to a warehouse or rail depot or somesuch industrial area, they often come up with so good stuff you can use.

If I'm aiming for photorealism, I might nab something from online or the camera and cut it into either a 256x256 or 512x512 box in photoshop. Otherwise I'll usually lay down a base colour and work from there. Note that if you work in 512x512, you'll have to shrink your image down or cut it in half before putting it in the .wad, as it won't work in Half-life otherwise.

There are a bunch of tutorials out there about what to do next, generally talking about filters, shading, keylines and the such. My suggestion is just to get at it and see what works for you. Practice is the only thing that'll help you get anywhere in this case. Try out ALL the filters to see what they can do. Learn about the layers and masks, and read every tutorial you can online to see what other people have come up with.

One of the most important parts is to get the texture tiling. To do this in photoshop, select Filter -> Other -> Offset, and enter the number of pixels directly half of your image size. So if your images is 256x256 then enter 128x128. Then fix the "seams" you'll notice immediately running from the edges to the center of the image.

Once you've come up with a texture that you like, then it's time to turn it into part of a .wad.

I use <a href='http://www.telefragged.com/wally/' target='_blank'>Wally</a>, which is pretty standard. There are easy to follow tutorials on that site for creating .wads. Note that you shouldn't probably be creating the texture in Wally, just cementing them together in a .wad. Wally's okay for adding rivets, holes and scratches, but not much else.