Guide To Making a Specular Model aka Shiny model

[SleepKiller]

Things you will need,
Common Sense
XVi32
Gimp
The MSH you want to make Shiny.

Okay so now let us open XVi32 and load up the MSH we want to make nice and shiny.  Run a search for .tga, on the same line or on a line up you should see ATRB. Now look over into Hex View. After ATRB you will see 04 00 00 00 00 00. Change that to 04 00 00 00 00 04. Save the MSH.

This bit isn;t required but it stops the image from being waaaaaaay to shiny.
Now Open Up Gimp, load up the texture of the model. Go to the drop down menu Colors, then into Components press Decompose. For Color Mode do RGB, and make the sure Decompose to Layers is checked. Let Gimp do it's magic. Now you will get a new image with three layers.  Right click on the layer that is marked as Red and hit Duplicate Layer. (If you don't have the layer window up press Ctrl+L to get it up.) Rename the new Layer to alpha. (Right Click on it and press Edit Layer Attributes.)

Now select alpha. Then go into the drop down menu Colors again and go into Curves. Drag the curve down a bit till you get a nice dark and in most cases shiny image. Press okay. Now go back into Colors>Components>Compose Change the color Model to RGBA. Now you see the little drop down selection boxes, one for Red, Green, Blue and Alpha? Select those and select the correct layer for them. For instance rep_inf_trooper-RGB.TGA-17/Red-35 Ensure they all line up, then press compose.

In the new image that appears press Ctrl+C. Then in the original image, press Delete. Before pressing Ctrl+V to paste in the new image. Go into Colors again and press Color To Alpha, leave it as the default values and press okay. Now paste in the new image via Ctrl+V. Save without RLE Compression and you are now done! Munge and admire the shiny model.

[jdee-barc]

Thank you so much for this!.

[Sereja]

Actualy, for making models realy "shiny" the code "04 00 00 00 00 04" is far not enough. Here the the code, I am using, for my models:

Code Select Expand

33 33 33 3F 33 33 33 3F 33 33 33 3F CC CC CC 4C 00 00 80 3F 00 00 80 3F 00 00 80 3F 00 00 80 3F 9A 99 99 3E 9A 99 99 3E 9A 99 99 3E 00 00 80 3F 00 00 80 40 41 54 52 42 04 00 00 00 00 04 00 00
You must tipe it, before TX0D....some_pic.tga

[SleepKiller]

Actualy, for making models realy "shiny" the code "04 00 00 00 00 04" is far not enough. Here the the code, I am using, for my models:

Code Select Expand

33 33 33 3F 33 33 33 3F 33 33 33 3F CC CC CC 4C 00 00 80 3F 00 00 80 3F 00 00 80 3F 00 00 80 3F 9A 99 99 3E 9A 99 99 3E 9A 99 99 3E 00 00 80 3F 00 00 80 40 41 54 52 42 04 00 00 00 00 04 00 00
You must tipe it, before TX0D....some_pic.tga

I don't mean to sound rude but that sounds like it would completely be ignored by the munger and just looks like a bunch of useless bytes. Your welcome to show a a picture of a model with the usual method described by me and then one with your extremely unusual method.

[Sereja]

Yes, you may be right, I am modding by very intuitive way, and actualy, I do not know, what all of those bites cud be mean. Probably some of them no need at all. PC programs it is a sad barrier, between me and arts. But I just feel, how the things may set right, and follow this way...
Well, here the pic:
http://www.freeimagehosting.net/mtu22

Trust me, I know, what I am doing...

[tirpider]

Asside from the diffuse alpha, it makes sense.
well, as much as using floats to represent a 256 value can But that was Pandemic's choice.

33 33 33 3F = Diffuse Red (.7)
33 33 33 3F = Diffuse Blue (.7)
33 33 33 3F = Diffuse Green (.7)
CC CC CC 4C = Diffuse Alpha (107374176)(?!?)
00 00 80 3F = Ambient Red (0)
00 00 80 3F = Ambient Blue (0)
00 00 80 3F = Ambient Green (0)
00 00 80 3F = Ambient Alpha (0)
9A 99 99 3E = Specular Red (.3)
9A 99 99 3E = Specular Blue (.3)
9A 99 99 3E = Specular Green (.3)
00 00 80 3F = Alpha (0)
00 00 80 40 = Specular Intensity (4)
41 54 52 42 = ATRB
04 00 00 00 = 4 bytes long (should always be 4)
00 04 00 00 = Render Specular (GT Link)

It's the DATA part of the MATD chunk. It's just missing the DATA and size part.
All the numbers before ATRB are 32bit floating point.

[SleepKiller]

Stay on topic please, this isn't sereja's tutorial thread it is mine. I see sereja's method is clearly better than mine and I apologize for how quick I was to judge the byte array he posted. I was in a bad space of mind then. But still please take your questions else where to a different topic so this one doesn't get cluttered.

As you can see I split the topic. You can find it in Mod Factory. Have a nice day.

[RepComm]

Actualy, for making models realy "shiny" the code "04 00 00 00 00 04" is far not enough. Here the the code, I am using, for my models:

Code Select Expand

33 33 33 3F 33 33 33 3F 33 33 33 3F CC CC CC 4C 00 00 80 3F 00 00 80 3F 00 00 80 3F 00 00 80 3F 9A 99 99 3E 9A 99 99 3E 9A 99 99 3E 00 00 80 3F 00 00 80 40 41 54 52 42 04 00 00 00 00 04 00 00
You must tipe it, before TX0D....some_pic.tga

When I did this, SWBF viewer (on load) said "An exception of this class OutOfBounds was not handled, the application must shut down."  What I did in Hex editor was InsertString, Hex String "The code you said" and saved it as "DarkTrooperTest.MSH"   opened it in SWBFViewer, and that happend...  Did I do something wrong?
Edit: I did what SK said, and the whole thing crashes O.o

[Are§]

When I did this, SWBF viewer (on load) said "An exception of this class OutOfBounds was not handled, the application must shut down."  What I did in Hex editor was InsertString, Hex String "The code you said" and saved it as "DarkTrooperTest.MSH"   opened it in SWBFViewer, and that happend...  Did I do something wrong?
Edit: I did what SK said, and the whole thing crashes O.o

simple mistake, you cannot rename an msh like that. If you ever want to change an msh name you can only change one letter of it, you cannot just name it what you want (I believe). Ex. imp_inf_darktroope3.msh (this is what works for me at least)

[Led]

The important thing about hex editing strings is that the length of string must stay the same.

[Are§]

The important thing about hex editing strings is that the length of string must stay the same.

yeah that's what i meant 

[Are§]

Oh and Sleepkiller, I just tried your method for keeping a skin from getting "waaaayy to shiny" and at the end all i got was a blank alpha screen. I followed your instructions step for step. Any ideas on what i might have done wrong?

[SleepKiller]

Hm I can't think of what is going wrong. I will try it myself later on to make sure my directions are correct. I will report back once I have tested it. It may take a few days for em to get around to it.

Oh and in the future try to make an effort to not double post in such quick succession. Next time if you could edit it and wait a few days. And if no response is made try PMing the person. That would be grand 

[Are§]

aight, my bad.

[SleepKiller]

Sha-Zam pulled to my attention something that was easy to get stuck on, if you were having problems with the tutorial you could try it again now.