I'm trying to create an object with a mapped texture and a mapped transparency mask. The transparency tab doesn't have a tab for transparency images. Where is it? Thanks. -Nando.

Easy way is to look at a leaf texture and see how it's done. it's there but it's hidden a bit. Look at the tutorial for the road sign and see how it's exactly done. Page 264 of the book.

The object I'm planing on using is not an alpha plane, though. Let's say I want to make a hole in a wall....

Oh well than you can't do that with transparency. You have to use Boolean functions to do things like that. There is a tutorial to on how to make something like that. Page 255 of the book. This is the only way to do it with meshes. barring making the mesh in some different progam but even then it will probably use this method unless it can extrude complex shapes. Remember if your making a house say you need two cubes one for the out side and a slightly smaller one for the inside to hallow it out then windows and doors will cut out the solid wall letting the light shine in. It's all done with Boolean functions.

Kurka, what you want (bitmap transparency) can be achieved by:

Under the transparency tab, turn "global transparency" to a value other than 0%. You'll probably want it at 100% transparent. This will make "variable transparency" available (it was greyed out before). After turning variable transparency on, go to edit function (right click on the sphere that appears). Under "kind of layer", change it to "mapped value". Click the button "Picture", and select your bitmap.

Hope that's what you wanted!

I created a dome and planar mapped it. Next, I created an alpha plane in vue and assigned the texture and mask. Then, I copied the material and pasted it into the dome. I just duplicated the dome, and sized the duplicate. Works.