Creating Skins with GIMP

Seven Nation Army

Seven Nation Army

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I'd like to join in the new pack skinning party, but as a beginner with only GIMP, I got stuck following the official documentation where you are supposed to change the grey layer to black.:confused:

I'd like to ask if someone would care to make a clear, step-by-step basic instruction to share with all to help us newbies get started with this. I thought about gifting a $50 gift card on Steam to the skilled person willing to put in some effort plus possibly taking a little time to clarify any issues I have with the instructions (as a beginner), but their may be better ways to compensate someone for their efforts.

One of the 1st cars I want to make a skin for is the Callaway Corvette sales model, just as a simple starter, but I'm the kind of person who hates to waste hours trying to figure out something when with good instructions/knowledge it could be done much quicker. Wasting time = not good. Also, I don't want to go through a whole manual and have to learn every feature of GIMP o_O - for this purpose I solely want to make skins which I'll publish on RD if I can make some good ones.

Anyone care to do it? Anyone? Bue-ller? :)

Here's the Callaway Corvette sales model if you're interested in that (I'm not interested in the carbon body finish, an easy paint job works for me) , although converting the official guide to GIMP steps with more detail may be enough:
https://www.callawaycars.com/homepa...ccess/press-kits/callaway-c7-gt3-r-press-kit/
 
AMillward said:
I did one on my YouTube channel, but it’s using the old method, pre-GT3 pack.

Click to expand...
I had watched your video and appreciate that - but as you said that method is now "old" and I would much rather have a step-by-step instruction rather than having to try to find points in a video. Videos don't work well as a "reference" that you "refer back" to. Of course this procedure may be simple enough you don't need to refer back....
 
Yeah - I'm reasonably comfortable creating 'old' skins in GIMP using FuNK!s tutorial - but I've just spent over an hour trying to translate the official 'new' workflow. And failed.

I've got gmotor2 errors such as 'error getting stats for texture Alt_xyz.bmpError loading texture alt_xyz for material WCCARBODY' and a glowing white vehicle...

I can understand why S397 have written a tutorial using Photoshop - as I'm sure that's their day-to-day tool - but for those of us trying to use freeware (i.e. GIMP), it would be rather useful if 'they' could take the time to map the steps through to that tool (especially as they suggest it as an alternative to PS).
 
I tried Gimp first time two days ago to do my first skin on rfactor 2. If you know Photoshop (that I used months ago) Gimp is very similar. The things that I understand are that you must export the first skin as DDS "BC3/DXT5" and "Generate mipmaps" and the second skin (alt_region) where are save the metallic/chrome/vinyl/etc.. parts as DDS "BC1/DXT1" and "Generate mipmaps". For now that I have not too much time I did a skin without the chrome/vinyl/etc. regions so I save the 'second skin' (BC1/DXT1) all empty. I saw my skin on rfactor 2 and there are no errors.
 
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MileSeven said:
Yeah - I'm reasonably comfortable creating 'old' skins in GIMP using FuNK!s tutorial - but I've just spent over an hour trying to translate the official 'new' workflow. And failed.

I've got gmotor2 errors such as 'error getting stats for texture Alt_xyz.bmpError loading texture alt_xyz for material WCCARBODY' and a glowing white vehicle...

I can understand why S397 have written a tutorial using Photoshop - as I'm sure that's their day-to-day tool - but for those of us trying to use freeware (i.e. GIMP), it would be rather useful if 'they' could take the time to map the steps through to that tool (especially as they suggest it as an alternative to PS).
Click to expand...
You have to be very careful in the process whole process because there are so many things that can go wrong and most of it has nothing to do with GIMP (or PS). Make sure to save in the right format (DXT5 with alpha or DXT1 when no alpha required), make sure you have selected the right layer to export (flattened image of your skin with alpha as layer mask applied or not applied, region also flattened but without layer mask or alpha), make also sure to not use more than 12 characters in the file name, and make sure you use ALT as the first three characters. These are some basic things to consider.
 
Thank you FuNK! for your advices. I did my Porsche skin with Gimp and I'm glad... there is an error on Gimp when I try to export the Aston Martin skin with the same procedure but I think that I just need some practice... It's only the beginning :-)
 
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Excellent! Thanks all for all the helpful information. I will try FuNK!s tutorial today and see how it goes. It would suck to spend hundreds of dollars on software to find you can't work it out to a publishable/semi-professional level. o_O
 
I did follow @AMillward's video (thanks for making it) one time and imported a skin but when it came up in rF2 some of the layers were somehow shifted on to the wrong space. All in all it doesn't seem a terribly complex operation with all the template help normally, but the written procedures @FuNK! wrote up works a lot better for me. These days it seems everybody wants a video but I don't find that works as well for me. I'm sure it has nothing to do with age. :D Mucho gracias to FuNK! for writing up the instructions.

Anyway, I made it all the way to Part 4 pretty easily but I don't seem to have a way to edit the "ALT.DDS" file. My version of GIMP 2.10.8, doesn't seem to have the plugin available for DDS files, so I downloaded Paint.Net, which opens it but it only shows 1 layer in the DDS file. So stuck for now, but seems very near the end...
 
Seven Nation Army said:
I did follow @AMillward's video (thanks for making it) one time and imported a skin but when it came up in rF2 some of the layers were somehow shifted on to the wrong space. All in all it doesn't seem a terribly complex operation with all the template help normally, but the written procedures @FuNK! wrote up works a lot better for me. These days it seems everybody wants a video but I don't find that works as well for me. I'm sure it has nothing to do with age. :D Mucho gracias to FuNK! for writing up the instructions.

Anyway, I made it all the way to Part 4 pretty easily but I don't seem to have a way to edit the "ALT.DDS" file. My version of GIMP 2.10.8, doesn't seem to have the plugin available for DDS files, so I downloaded Paint.Net, which opens it but it only shows 1 layer in the DDS file. So stuck for now, but seems very near the end...
Click to expand...
Download and install the GIMP DDS plugin, then follow my tutorial again.
 
Decided to buy PS and found out they only do subscription these days....... Gave that up instantly, lol. :D Bought Intous Wacom Pro and wanted to get back into it but not going to pay monthly.
AMillward said:
I did one on my YouTube channel, but it’s using the old method, pre-GT3 pack.

Click to expand...
When you were changing the color of the vector logo by filling it with white, not really good since it often make ugly edges with pixels of the old color at the edges, but can GIMP go into the layer and change the color through that instead of filling it with color? In PS you can edit the layer and change colors without actually filling it. You change the existing color by changing values through sliders. This is one reason i always want PS when doing these things, but just as i was about to buy PS i noticed they switched to subscription model, lol... Not going to pay monthly. :D
 
Seven Nation Army said:
I did follow @AMillward's video (thanks for making it) one time and imported a skin but when it came up in rF2 some of the layers were somehow shifted on to the wrong space. All in all it doesn't seem a terribly complex operation with all the template help normally, but the written procedures @FuNK! wrote up works a lot better for me. These days it seems everybody wants a video but I don't find that works as well for me. I'm sure it has nothing to do with age. :D Mucho gracias to FuNK! for writing up the instructions.

Anyway, I made it all the way to Part 4 pretty easily but I don't seem to have a way to edit the "ALT.DDS" file. My version of GIMP 2.10.8, doesn't seem to have the plugin available for DDS files, so I downloaded Paint.Net, which opens it but it only shows 1 layer in the DDS file. So stuck for now, but seems very near the end...
Click to expand...

I used to be a teacher, and some people learn better following a video than just reading instructions. With a video, you can do it along with the video and learn by doing.

I learned the new shaders by reading, but it was hard for me.
 
Alex72 said:
Decided to buy PS and found out they only do subscription these days....... Gave that up instantly, lol. :D Bought Intous Wacom Pro and wanted to get back into it but not going to pay monthly.

When you were changing the color of the vector logo by filling it with white, not really good since it often make ugly edges with pixels of the old color at the edges, but can GIMP go into the layer and change the color through that instead of filling it with color? In PS you can edit the layer and change colors without actually filling it. You change the existing color by changing values through sliders. This is one reason i always want PS when doing these things, but just as i was about to buy PS i noticed they switched to subscription model, lol... Not going to pay monthly. :D
Click to expand...

Yeah, it was bare minimum stuff in that video. Just a get started tutorial.
 
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