I am trying to figure out the process of making textures for clothing. I've been snooping around my Textures folder and seeing what other artists do with the templates, in the hopes that I can learn from what they've done. I'm confused..... I sometimes see: name.jpg nameTrans.jpg (black and white version of name.jpg) and .bmp files Can someone explain what each of those are exactly? I want to make textures for my own use, but I also want to be able to offer them as freebies if I make something nice enough.

The ones with the name are the actual texture, the one with trans in the name are transparency maps, some clothes have lace effects or certain parts made transparent using the transparency map. The .bmp filetype is not a good one to use with poser because of the large file size, but some templates are made using the .bmp format.

Also, sometimes (more likely on character than on clothes, but still possible) you'll see something like nameBum or nameBump, which are other grayscale images used as bump maps.

Not all people self-document their clothing textures with names like "longhairTRAN.jpg" but it is usually possible to figure out what is used where by opening the image in an image editor. Of course, you can also open the item in Poser and look in the Materials editor to see what is going on. Most Poser textures, these days, consist of some number of images stored somewhere in the "textures" folder of your Runtime, and one or more "MAT" poses installed in the "poses" folder of your Runtime. The MAT pose is a third-party hack that changes materials. (These days, Poser6 gives even more options for saving materials....but MAT poses still lead in popularity.) Clothing and props packaged for Poser will usually (though not always), include a a core file in .cr2 or .pp2 format, which refers to geometry in an .obj file and image textures in JPEG format. They also, often, will make templates available for the ease of a user who wants to apply their own textures to the item.

To make your own textures, all that is needed is to create an image where all the colors are lined up on the parts you are trying to color. Most people will use a template, and when their painting software permits, will place the template on one layer in such a way as they can see it as they paint on other layers. This makes it much easier to "stay within the lines." When they are done painting they delete the template layer, collapse the file, then apply the new image in Poser. If a template wasn't provided, the freeware program UVmapper can extract one quickly and simply from the geometry (you drop the .obj file on UVmapper, then save the template as an image.) The trick that eludes many people is that the template itself does not figure in the texture. It is merely a map, a map that says "if you put red paint on the upper left corner of an image map, it will land on the right big toe of the figure this template is for." All that is important is the spacial relationship. Neither size nor proportion of the image is fixed. (However, if you make a rectangular texture map for an item that had a square template, everything will be in the proper place but it will be all stretched out.) Applying the final texture in Poser may be done in several ways. Best, I think, is to get used to doing it in the Material room -- because you may want to try it several times as you tweak and edit the new texture.

The ".bmp" extension stands for "bitmap". It is the "standard" windows graphics format, totally uncompressed. So large file. Sometimes the ".bmp" extension is used to indicate a "bump-map" file (probably through a mis-understanding on the part of the creator). Any file graphics file can be translated and re-saved via a program such as PaintShopPro (and many others) to .tif or .png format (which both offer file-compression without loss of detail). Please note that the "large file size" ONLY applies to the room that they take up on disk. By the time they are loaded into Poser, they'll be totally uncompressed in memory, thus taking up the full amount they need. AND they'll have been expanded (in memory) so that each dimension is a power of 2.. (because that's the way that the underlying Windoze operating-system functions deal with bitmap operations..) Cheers, Diolma

You may also wish to think about naming conventions. As you work, you'll probably create several versions of a texture, but only want to release the final one. Sequential numbering helps, or using both numbers and letters, so that you can keep track of the variations of each step. Your final released texture ought to be uniquely named, and it helps if it is relevant to the garment or figure. Black.jpg could cover anything from a talking boar with silver runes woven in his fur to a basic little black dress. If your trans and bump maps have similar names, they'll stay together in a list and be easy to find: brocade_purse-tex.jpg brocade_purse-tr.jpg brocade_purse-bump.jpg That works fine for internal files. If the texture is going to be separately available from the object, it helps to also put your initials and some identifier on the file... that way if a person uses it next year, they'll know to whom to give credit. "BrocadePurse.zip" doesn't tell me that it is a texture alone, nor who made it. Textures for characters or remapped objects need good specific names, too! "blackhawktex4eagle2exp-acadia.zip" or "damion-tex-D3-acadia.zip" or "wintermoon_tex_4isokimono-acadia.zip" all are recognizable, and findable, and usable. If you are going to put all that work into creating a texture (and it is a lot of work), you'll want people to be able to find it. :) Carolly

Do I always need to have a trans.jpg and a bump.jpg ? That's what is confusing me. How do you make a trans and bump .jpg image? What exactly are they for?

A lot of the time you wont need a transparency map, as I said earlier they are usually used for making a part or parts of a cloth item invisible or for making lace type effects.

The bump map will depend on whatever you are texturing.
Something like a standard shirt doesnt really need a bump map. A lot of stuff doesnt have any bump map. The bump map adds bumpiness or roughness to the surface.

Message edited on: 07/22/2005 04:10

A "trans" map, as stated above is a "transparency" map. It is (usually) a grey-scale image. In Poser, the whiter the pixel, the less the transparency. It needs to be applied to the transparency node (in P5, I don't know what the equivalent is called in P4). This allows varying degrees of transparency oon the material, so you can make holes, or "thin-looking" bits in the material. A "bump" map (as also stated above), gives the impression of the material being displaced from the mesh. Again, it needs to be applied the the bump channel (or the displacement channel in P5 - but that's getting complicated so I won't go there). Bump maps are also mainly grey-scale images, with bloack providing no displacement, and white displacing to the maximum. Bump maps can be used to make shadows appear on cloth that has bits that project from the main material (as in brocade; it can also be used for buttons.) Bump maps are by no means essential, especially if the cloth is to be used for background figures (the anti-aliasing will probably lose any distinctions). Both of these are useful in varying degrees for various scenes, but it's up to you as to whether you want to go to the trouble of creating them. Many items I've seen have bump/trans maps created simply by taking the original texture and creating a grey-scale image from it. Occasionally (but not usually), this approach works. Especially for close-ups... I'd advise you, for now, to ignore both, and just go about creating straight-forward textures. Once you're happy with that, then play around with bump/trans as you find the inclination. The best way to learn is to do it, and try it:-)) Cheers, Diolma