My New Ship - Next steps?

Mon Jan 19, 2004 9:38 am by Woodsmeister

This is my 2nd ship I'm building. The first one looked like a pointy brick in Milkshape and was invisible, so I'm trying again. I've textured it in primary colours because every guide to proper texturing requires Paintshop or Photoshop, and anyway primay colours rule, and people will be able to see me coming from miles away

.
Well, now I've got this far, I've reached the problem point with my previous ship - the .mat files and stuff like that. In the big "Create a new ship" guide in this forum (Thankyou Imagine ) it says:

-in the dt_name branch, store a string with the name of your texture file, e.g. mine is "antioch.tga"
-in the type branch, store a string "DcDt"
-flip your texture file upside down
-in the MIP0 (MIP zero) branch, import the upside down texture file
-save this utf file with same name as your cmp file, except with extension .mat

The line in italics is the problem.
I don't have a clue what it means.
Help.

Mon Jan 19, 2004 12:33 pm by Nephilim

Load up Paint- or Photoshop, open your .tga file, flip (NOT rotate or mirror) it, then save and import.

Tue Jan 20, 2004 9:35 am by Woodsmeister

Righto. But, erm, please read what I say next time. I specifically mentioned that I don't have Paintshop or Photoshop. It doesn't matter now, as I discovered a copy of Arcsoft Photostudio and used it to create some lovely .bmps, and then I used PicPerk to convert to .tga. I flipped the files in PicPerk, by the way. I found a big, exhaustive guide which got me through the .mat file, but now I have two problems.
1) When I load Freelancer and go to the ship dealer where I put my ship, it crashes. This question has probaby been asked a million times (literally) but; How do I rectify the situation?
2) When I load the UTF editor and open my .mat file, it is empty. Completely empty save for the first ---\ bit. Why? It's really annoying because these .mat files tkae an age to make.

Tue Jan 20, 2004 3:20 pm by Stinger

I specifically mentioned that I don't have Paintshop or Photoshop

Actually you didn't. You really didn't even infer it, you only mentioned everything wanted to use those programs. You may have thought you mentioned them but you never specifically mentioned you didn't have them.

There I go again, splitting hairs.

BTW, welcome to the family.

Edited by - Stinger on 1/20/2004 3:21:32 PM

Wed Jan 21, 2004 10:37 am by Woodsmeister

Damn you moderator types! Ah well, I can be a bit vague sometimes. You have to read between between the lines with me.

Anyway, cheers for the welcome, so do you know anyone who can answer my questions?

Fri Jan 23, 2004 11:31 am by Woodsmeister

Damn it, will someone help me before my Milkshape trial runs out?

Sun Feb 01, 2004 7:38 am by PantherX

Don't panic! Download a program called Irfanview. It allows you to view many types of image files and manipulate them.

Then do what Nephilim said.

Edited by - Pantherras on 2/1/2004 7:38:58 AM

Sun Feb 01, 2004 7:08 pm by firebase

better yet convert your bmp file into dds files, in this way you don't need to "flip" the texture. If you do so, MIP0 should be written like MIPS - this is where you import dds files. Everything else stays the same.

if you are wondering where to find a converter, look at the nVIdia website they have the dds converter.

---------------- E·N·D O·F M·E·S·S·A·G·E ... ----------------

Sat Feb 14, 2004 1:26 am by illero

ok I have now Idea who invented this whole flipping the textures thing. for certain textures it may be required... but for the majority I think it is a useless... if not hazardous step.. I built my first ship and I fliped the textures like the tutorial told me... crash... every time... I rebuild the .MAT with non fliped textures and gues what... no crash. try useing it with unfliped first... and if you get the white ship error then... try flipping the textures in question..... by all means I am not the Guru on the subject... but this is just the experiance I have had with it.

If A=A then santa doesn't exist

Fri Feb 20, 2004 3:20 pm by Firewing

Ermm...just how can you convert something to dds? I have both Ifranview and Photoshop and haven't found no way to saving/converting to that file type.

Fri Feb 20, 2004 7:15 pm by firebase

go to nvdia's support website and look for their dds converter there is this plugin for photoshop and a dos based program - nvdxtx.exe i think...

---------------- E·N·D O·F M·E·S·S·A·G·E ... ----------------

Important Message

You are browsing the archived Lancers Reactor forums. You cannot register or login.
The content may be outdated and links may not be functional.

To get the latest in Freelancer news, mods, modding and downloads, go to
The-Starport