Hi everyone, I am still haveing trouble with this. I have p4 pro and tried to open them in materials and have them converted for me, only the convert option never comes up and the files reamain .jpg format. I tried downloading a text converter, even got the html format to change to .bum got all exited, and couldn't figure out how to save it that way so I deleted that converter. Do you know of a good one that will work, or where I can learn how to use them properly? I'm going to keep trying here but any help would sure be appreciated.

aaaaaahhhh... with Propak you don't have to convert them 8 ) ProPak will use the jpg's as bump maps without too many problems, as well as bum's as bumpmaps. as a referance.. the bum's are basically modified bmp's.. so you could in theory convert the jpg in paint or simular 2d programme.. then rename them as bum in the file manager... sounds complicated but it's quite easy 8 ) it's mainly Poser4 and earlier that needs the bum's converted.. I hope this helps some Cheers.

Pro pack doesn't use bum's. It uses the jpg files. If you have any MAT's that call for a non-existing bum, try running Correct Reference and the problem will be fixed. But be aware that Correct Reference most likely will tak a LOT of time the first time you use it. You can get it in Free Stuff I think.

Either that or MAT files are small enough, just open them in notepad or a text editor and change whatever_file.bum to whatever_file.jpg. If you're running Windows, you can get MatPose Edit from freestuff and change the file extentions in the MAT file with it.

I suspect that the problem is loading a downloaded file that has replaced the .bum file with .jpg to save space for the download, but still calls for a .bum even when it's loaded in ProPack or Poser 5. There's two solutions. 1. Use a graphics viewer, like Irfanview (free for personal use), to convert the .jpg file to .bmp and rename the .bmp to .bum (it really is just a BMP file and I don't know why Poser chose to use a .bum extension). This is what I usually do and it works. 2. Hit cancel when it calls for the .bum and tell Poser to stop searching for files. Then apply the textures within Poser. I like this approach less because, if the figure is a complex character with many mapping zones, it can require mapping each zone one-by-one. It would be nice for an upgrade to Poser to allow for a more straightforward means of applying textures. I'd like to see a checkbox list view whenever I apply a texture so that I can check off all the zones that use the texture because Poser 5's method of applying textures takes far too many clicks. 1. Click node icon 2. Mouse through New Node, 2D Textures, Image_Map 3. Click Image Source (a wasted click because the previous step should automatically put me into a browse mode) 4. Click Browse (another wasted click because it should put me into browse mode automatically) 5. Find texture, double click 6. Click OK (again, a wasted step because I've already double-clicked to open the file) A half dozen steps, to apply a single texture to a single zone, becomes a nightmare with a complex figure.

I installed Poser 4 (named it Poser4only)and the upgrade. When I needed to convert Jpeg to Bum, I opened Poser4only, clicked on Render> materials> load(bump map) Search for the texture file you need in the PPP texture files, click on on the .bum.jpg, it will ask if you if you want to convert it to a .bum, click yes. Do it to all the bum.jpg files. when you are done, just go back to PPP, and you're in business. I know , I know PPP is suppose to recognize jpg, but some times it doesn't.

It is sort of a catch 22. PPP is suppose to recognize Jpg, therefore you donot need a JPG to BUM converter. So when it doesn't recognize the JPG as a bum, it has no means to to convert it to one. This method works for me-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------.------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Well, I think it's kind of silly to convert JPG to BUM if you have ProPack. Have you looked at how much harddrive space bums take? (well, mine takes a lot of chair space actually, heh) Either use Correct Reference as mentioned above or load the MAT pose file in Wordpad and change it there.

Okay I was able to get infraview to convert to bmp but am not sure about renaming? Doesnt that just rename the file itself? Because thats what it did for me but the file ext was still bmp and not found. I will try loading poser not pro and see if that works. I tried to use wordpad but didn't know how to save it from there it was all done in html codes :0 Oh I am so lost lol but I do thank you all very much for your help. I will keep trecking away at it I'm sure to catch on sooner or later right? Thank you again I am going to try some more now :)

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?Form.ShowMessage=1087678

However, a BUM is not just an uncompressed and renamed version of the JPG - it's actually been processed by Poser to store the shadow rather than relief information and if you try using a renamed jpg->bum you will probably get the same "hard day down the coal mine" look that P4 users get when a MAT file applies an unconverted jpg as a bump map. _Dodger has posted a technique for modifying a jpg in an image editor (see third post in linked thread) but for simplicity and disk space you really will be better off just changing the references in the MAT file.

If you have Poser ProPack or Poser 5, you do NOT want to convert jpg bump maps to BUM files. You'll be consuming an excessive amount of hard drive space, and defeating one of the benefits of ProPack and Poser 5!!! I do believe CorrectReference will fix your problem. It's easier to run if you choose a folder at a time, rather than trying to run CorrectReference on all your Libraries at once.

There's no HTML involved. If during your text conversion experiment, you changed anything to HTML, go back to the original file. Use Notepad, which will save it in the correct format. If you're editing a MAT file (or a cr2 for that matter) You want to change: bumpMap ":Runtime:textures:!!mintworks:PeppiheadTEXbump.bum" for example, to: bumpMap ":Runtime:textures:!!mintworks:PeppiheadTEXbump.jpg" in all the places where the .bum is referenced in the file. Correct Reference will do it for you, just not as quickly.

Whether Correct Reference is the fastest way of doing it or not depends on how many files you're going to change. Another thing is that Correct Reference also fixes a lot of other bad texture references in your files, making them generally faster to load :o)

Would make life easier if there were a Mac version of Correct Reference.

Attached Link: http://www.soft-rabbit.com/

Wrong technique! That's to convert a bas-relief image (like a photo of a cathedral wall, for instance) INTO a BUM without ever benig a proper bumpmap. I had an explanation of how to use Photoshop to make a bumpmap into a BUM map, but I con't find the thread. It involves channels and the emboss filter. I have an action, Maybe I'll put thaty up in Free Stuff or sell it cheap.

Thanks Martin!

Okay I was sure I had replied to this but it seems to be gone! I finnally did it! yippee lol I used the infraview and did it that way. Works great, from the sounds of it though it will take alot of space huh? Oh well I'll keep on using the tips I've recieved here and eventually I will figure it all out! :) For some reason poser pro does read some of the jpg and use them as bum but not others it seems :0 For now I am just happy to have it working! Thank you all so much for the wonderful advice I have recieved without you all I would never figure this out! I really do appreciate it very much!