Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
like Photoshop or GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program). For instance, you could add sparkling
icicles around the windows of your bakery model texture for the winter season look and not have to rebuild
any models.
If you are feeling adventurous and want to try some additional material features, look under the Texture
tab in the Build Editor for the options in Shininess (specular) and Bumpiness (normal). Here is a place to
add in additional textures in the form of specular maps and normal maps which you build with your 3D
modeler to enhance the surface appearance of textures inworld. There is more information about these here:
http://community.secondlife.com/t5/English-Knowledge-Base/Materials-Normal-and-Specular-Mapping/
ta-p/2034625/.
“Tile-ability:” The capacity for a texture to be repeated seamlessly across a surface, is an essential quality
in good textures. To develop a texture that looks great across a terrain and does not have a “quilted” feeling
is a ine art. About 80% of the textures you will use have to be tiled, so it pays to learn a few ways to make
them look good. Depending on the graphics program you use, there are probably some tutorials available
to show you how to match the edges with the native tools like Blur or Copy Stamp in Photoshop. There
are also various texture plug-ins for Photoshop, like Filter Forge, which are useful when you need to make
tile-able textures and are well worth the investment. When you are making textures to be tiled, make sure to
allow extra time in your building phase for the testing of the tile-able texture on a variety of forms inworld.
Sometimes, a texture that looked good on your desktop will look badly matched on the terrain or large wall
structures you are building, and you will need blur/blend the image and modify it further. You may ind that
by working along the diagonal axes of the image you can create better tiling adjustments as it will draw the
eye away from the edges.
Speciicity: This deines a great texture; few of the surfaces in our real world look identical. This starts
with research. As a designer, you should get a good small pocket camera and have it with you during projects.
All around us every day are surfaces with incredible details and visual texture. Get into the habit of looking
at the environment around you and snapping a picture of any wall, loor, or surface that interests you. A good
collection of images like that, which are copyright free for you, is invaluable. As you develop as a designer,
you begin to get picky, and that is a good thing. For instance, you may learn through your research and obser-
vation that brick in Amsterdam looks different from brick in New York. The clays that were ired to make
these bricks were different, and they are exposed to different climates. Eventually, you will immediately see
these differences in various textures and know that even the most subtle changes will evoke a different mood
in the visitor.
There are many good 2D programs that can help you make stunning textures. Adobe Photoshop and
Illustrator are the workhorses of the graphics industry, but if your purse is smaller, GIMP (GNU Image
Manipulation Program) [5] is an excellent freeware program for graphic production.
6.7 UTILIZING THE TEXTURE MENU IN THE BUILD EDITOR
Let us assume you have now created a fantastic texture and would like to show it off on the surface of your
prim built object. There are lots of ways you can make your textures stand out by utilizing the built-in texture
tools. Before you move to the Texture tab in the Build menu, take a few minutes to look at some of the general
options in the top section. Two of them, Select Face and Stretch Textures, are crucial to mastering texture
application on virtual objects. Farther down in Section 6.7, under mapping, you will see the impact of Stretch
Textures, but for now let us focus on Select Face. A prim can have seven faces counting those that appear
when you use the Hollow and Path Cut options on a cube. Sometimes, you may want to apply a special texture
to just one of those faces. If you are zoomed in on the object and have a clear shot at it, you can simply drag
the texture out of your inventory and onto that face. Otherwise, you can turn on the Select Face button in the
