Posted by David Owen on April 17, 2003 at 13:17:47:In Reply to: Creating Textures posted by Lora on April 14, 2003 at 09:17:06:
Overview
More than 150 architectural materials come built in to DesignWorkshop, giving good overall coverage for most architectural 3D projects. But if you build many models, work with unusual materials, or use very specific materials, at some point it's likely you'll want to create your own custom materials for DesignWorkshop.
With a simple two-step process, you can easily create your own custom texture materials for DesignWorkshop Lite, Classic, and Professional for Windows 95/98/NT.
To add a new texture material to DesignWorkshop for Windows, first place the texture image file in the Textures folder that is within your active DesignWorkshop folder. Then add a definition line for the new material in the DW Material Prefs file, also found in your Textures folder.
Process
1. Add the Texture Image File to the Textures folder.
To add a new custom texture to DesignWorkshop, first place the texture image file in the Textures folder that is within your active DesignWorkshop folder.
For tips on how to create your own custom tiling textures, see Making Your Own Tiling Textures in the online DesignWorkshop User Guide.
The current version of DesignWorkshop for Windows supports texture image files in .pct format, only. Many pixel editor programs, like Photoshop, CorelDraw and PaintShop Pro can convert common image formats into the PICT (.pct) file format. If you don't already own one of these programs, we recommend the PictureViewer program that's included with Apple's QuickTime Pro.
For the next step, you will need to know the exact full filename of the texture image file for the material you are adding.
This simple issue of the exact filename can be a little tricky, really for no good reason, because Windows by default hides the end of file names, the three letter filename extensions. (Microsoft seems to think this makes Windows easier to work with.)
A result of working with file extensions hidden is confusing situations like having four different files in the same folder all named Setup. The problem for this texture defining process is that with filename extensions hidden, you can't actually see the full name of the file.
This Windows option should be turned off, as follows.
To turn off the hiding of filename extensions, in Windows choose the View menu, Options command. Then click the View tab in the dialog that appears. You will see a check box that says "Hide MS-DOS file extensions for file types that are registered". If this box is checked, then uncheck it. Click OK to close the dialog.
When you turn off hiding of filename extensions, a file that previously appeared to be named "My_Texture" may now show its true name to be "My_Texture.pct", for example.
These actual names are the values that must appear in the filename field of the material definition line in the DW Material Prefs file. If there is any difference between the actual filename, and the filename that is given in the DW Material Prefs file, you will get a 'file not found' error, and the texture image will not render.
2. Edit the DW Material Prefs file.
Now you need to define the new material in the DW Material Prefs file, which also lives in your Textures folder.
A reference version of the DW Material Prefs file, with additional notes, is provided in the online DesignWorkshop User Guide.
To begin, open the DW Material Prefs file in any simple text editor, such as WordPad. (A full word processor is not recommended for editing the DW Materials Prefs file, because it is more likely to change the format of the file.)
At the top of the file you will see a series of comment line, giving instructions for adding materials. Below the comments section, you will see definition lines for all of the current DesignWorkshop Materials in your DesignWorkshop installation.
Scroll down to the end of the DW Material Prefs file. This is where you will add the definition line for your new texture material.
Material definitions have the following format:
Material_Name Tiled_Texture File_Name 0.000 1 2 2 Feet As shown, there are eight fields in a texture definition line. Each field is separated from the next by a single space or tab character.
The first field is the name of the material. The next defines the material type, in this case Tiled_Texture. If you want the image to map once across the entire face of an object enter Full_Face_Texture instead of Tiled_Texture. The third field is the name of the texture image file to use for this material.
The name of the material (first field) and the name of the texture image file (third field) will often be the same, for simplicity, but they don't have to be.
It is recommended that texture image file names and material names not have any spaces in them. If there is a space in the name of the material or the file name, that name must be placed in quotes.
The next field (fourth field) defines the specularity of the material, related to how shiny it seems to be. See the page on specularity in the online DesignWorkshop User Guide for a detailed explanation of how this field works.
The next field (fifth field) defines the opacity of the material, again on a scale from 0 to 1, with 0 being completely transparent and 1 being completely opaque.
Note: Transparency effects are only visible when rendering with a plug-in renderer that supports transparency, such as the LightWorks PictureMaker plug-in included with DesignWorkshop Professional, or the Quesa Open-GL renderer (currently available to developers only).
The final three fields are related. These fields define the dimensions of the texture (the size at which it will be repeated, for tiling textures). The first of these three is the horizontal dimension, the next is the vertical dimension, and the final field defines the units of the given dimensions, either Feet or Meters.
It should be noted that for the standard material definitions there is no file extension in the file name field. The reason for this is the default DesignWorkshop material files do not have any file extensions. When you save an image file it will have a file extension which must be included in the material definition.
After defining your material, hit the Enter key so there is a line break at the end of your new definition. Then save the DW Material Prefs file (in plain text format, but with no filename extension).
3. Use the new custom texture material in DesignWorkshop.
Now open DesignWorkshop. If you already had DesignWorkshop running while doing the above, close any open models and choose the File menu, New model command. Files that are open when you make changes to your material prefs will not reflect the changes until you close and open the file.
Open a DesignWorkshop model, and select a solid object. The new texture should appear in the Materials pop-up menu list in the Object Info floating window.
Use the Materials pop-up menu to apply the new material to any selected solid object or object group in the model, and then choose the View menu, Lights and Textures command. A new window should open, and display your new material mapped on the objects.
Troubleshooting
If you get an error when creating a new DesignWorkshop model, this indicates an error in the changes made to the DW Material Prefs file. You should open this file again and double check your work.
With a new empty model create a simple solid block using the Block Tool. Select the block, and choose the Material menu in the Object Info window. Scroll to the end of the list of materials and you should see your new material listed. Choose this material to apply it to the block.
If your new texture does not appear in the list, make sure that you saved the DW Material Prefs file in the Textures folder of the active version of DesignWorkshop. Also make sure a file extension, such as .txt was not added to the file.
Now choose the View menu, Lights and Textures command. A new window should open and display your new material mapped on the block.
When you choose the View menu, Lights and Textures command, if you receive an error that the file is not found, then review the following:
- Check that the image file is in the Textures folder of the active version of DesignWorkshop.
- Check that Windows is set to displaying the full file names including extensions.
- Check that the full and correct file name of the texture is in the DW Material Prefs file.
- Check that the image file is in one of the supported formats.
- Make sure you closed and reopened your DesignWorkshop model after making any changes to material definitions.
- Make sure you have a current version of DesignWorkshop.
Support for textures in multiple formats was not available in some of the older versions of DesignWorkshop for Windows. If you are a Professional or Classic owner you should contact support@artifice.com and request access to the owner's area so you can download the latest version.
DesignWorkshop Lite users can download the latest version free at http://www.artifice.com/free/dw_lite.html.