hello, i’m trying to create a custom decal texture. i’m fairly confident that the shader is working properly, since i just copied and modified one of the working shaders that came in pak0. the problem is that i cant get the background of the image to stay transparent. i have both photoshop and paint shop pro, and it seems that no matter what i do both programs fill in the background with a solid color when i save the image. can anyone help?
custom decals?
Apple
(Apple)
#2
Are you making sure you’re saving it as a .tga? As far as I know, .jpgs aren’t capable of retaining tranceparancy information.
nUllSkillZ
(nUllSkillZ)
#4
Do you save it as 32 Bit tga?
Isn’t there an issue with one of these programs (can’t remember which one of these two) concerning 32 bit alpha TGA’s?
One version couldn’t save this format correct.
Vitriol
(Vitriol)
#5
photoshop will select 32 bit by default, so yes i am (not sure if jasc software gives you the option). the issue you are refering to had something to do with games using a lower texture quality with 16 bit rendering i think.
i’m a total newb at this. =/
Mr_Tickles
(Mr_Tickles)
#6
Yeah, you have to get a download for photoshop 7 because they disabled targa’s saving with alpha channels (unfortunately I don’t have that link with me as i’m in uni, but it should come up with a google or a search of this site)… Also, I know this is a stupid question but, are you putting anything into your alpha channel or just leaving it blank?
Vitriol
(Vitriol)
#7
i might be leaving it blank. how would you put something in the alpha channel using photoshop? with paintshop pro, i can go to masks ->new -> from image.
Mr_Tickles
(Mr_Tickles)
#8
If you look at the channels window, there should be a red channel, a green channel and a blue channel, you have to click the small icon at the bottom of that window which adds another channel, this should automatically add an alpha channel to the list for you. If you don’t have this option then you may need to get the download, but that’s only if you have the latest version of photoshop… 7 I think it is…
Once you have the alpha channel, click one of the other channels and it should select all three, then press Ctrl+A, Ctrl+C, then click on the alpha channel and press Ctrl+V, this should copy your image to the alpha channel, i’m not sure whether black or white is transparent here though, you’ll just have to play around with it.
EDIT: Yep, sorry Wanderer 
The_Wanderer
(The Wanderer)
#9
EDIT: Tickles beat me to it
If you’re using photoshop 7 then you need to update your targa plugin because the default plugin doesn’t save the alpha channel. Easiest way to check for this is to make a new texture, add an alpha channel, save the texture as 32 bit .tga and then re-open it. If the alpha channel is still there your plugin is fine otherwise you need to update it.
By the way…to create a new channel you just switch to the channels window and press the new channel button(little square at the bottom). Then you can draw/copy-paste your mask in it.