Since there were a lot of people asking for more mods to be made and complaints that this place is "dead" followed by the bottom line that more people need to start modding and not waiting for others to do the work, I decided to do this tutorial for those who were just starting out.This tutorial will show you how to make impressive-looking mods using graphics from the game.

There are a few reasons why this is a good way to start modding:

1 - It is very easy to master.

2 - You don't need expensive programmes.

3 - You can use the graphics from any isometric game with
isometric graphics similar to SWGB.

4 - Some very good mods have been done in paint

5 - Producing good mods this way will get you respected as a modder and will develop your modding skills, letting you move on to more advanced 3D programmes.

For you beginners (I hate to use the word newbies ), I (and many others) recommend starting off in paint, or another paint program such as GIMP (a free graphics tool) or photoshop.

There are a few concepts that I will fill you in on:

Grading and Shading (or simply grading)

This is a really important concept. Basically to make an object look solid and 3D you need the colour to change gradually from light to dark. Using a light grey a darker grey and then a black to shade an object won't make it look real - you will have to use several different greys to make it look real.

In addition look at anything in real life - do you see black at any point in the shadow? No, it's going to be the same with our modding in paint - NEVER, EVER USE BLACK. it doesnt' look real. Instead use a little bit of very dark green, red etc. as well as some slightly lighter tone. This will make your image look real and also make it look more alive.

Pixel Editing

Okay - if you hit the zoom in button on your paint programme what do you see? Very small squares. These are known as pixels and your entire computer screen is made up oth millions of these little dots.

In pixel editing you zoom in to the image (usually 6x or 8x depending on the size of the area you are editing), and using the pencil tool or whatever, you change colour of the desired pixel one at a time. There are ways of speeding this process up such as using the line tool (set at 1 pixel wide). But usually you are editing on pixel at a time.

It may be time consuming but it's worthwhile.

Isometric View

This is the viewing angle used in the game. It isn't as important in paint editing as it is in 3D modelling but you should still bear it in mind, especialy when doing buildings.

The Mask, Shadow and Player Colours

remember that the default mask colour is magenta (not white) and the default shadow colour is red (not black). The player colour is are variants of blue.

If you are, say, doing something that requires the colour blue you can set the player colour as, say green, and change the player colour areas to green. Alternately you can turn the player colour off if there is no need for player colour in the mod.

Tutorial Part 1 - Cutting Graphics

In this part of the tutorial I'm going to show you how to cut graphics from the game and edit them to make new graphics for your mod.

We're going to start simple and do a building or an object (why? because they are easy and there are few frames). I've decided we will be modding a small spire from the Jedi Temple.

So open the drs viewer, open the graphics.drs and find the graphics for the Tech Level 4 Jedi Temple. You should see this:

Go to image menu and select the "save as Bitmap" option.

Save this in a folder where you can find it again and then close the drs viewer.

Now go and open the bitmap you just saved, it should show the same picture as before. Go to the "fill area" tool (or whatever your program calls it) and change the black areas to magenta so you get the following:

Now, see that small spire at the front? We're going to cut and paste that into a new document:

Now by whatever means (I suggest using select area and then deleting that area) cut away some of the image you won't be using and fill with magenta:

Then cut away a little buit more giving a rough impression of the image like so:

Remember the pixel editing we talked about? Well it's time do some of that. Using magenta you can get rid of the rest of the unneeded area without chopping off bits you need. (Remember not to paint in too close until you are sure you need to and you won't be cutting off part of the final graphic - and remember there is an undo button):

Now widen the bitmap and then move the spire across to the right and fill in the white area with magenta. This i to make room for a shadow:

Now draw in the shadow in red (using the "line draw" tool here helps) Remember the shadows go up and left from the building/object and often there may be shadows already on the object that may act as guidelines. The shadow is usually slightly shorter than the object as well and has some edge detail:

Et voila! The graphic is finished.

Part 2: Finishing Touches

So now you've got your basic graphic but you mods is not finished yet. One thing that will make this a better mod is an icon. A lot of people have been asking for help with this recently so I'll cover it in this tutorial.

First of all we need a good image to take the icon from. I'll use the following:

Now what I did was cut a square-ish section of the image - the top of the jedi temple - and I resized it to 36x36 pixels. This is the size of the icons ingame. You should have something the following size:

Now open the icon slp listings by James Martingo and find the slp for the sentry post (there is no civ specific icon slp). Also find in the units listing the graphics for the Republic sentry post and the Republic sentry post shadow (important).

Now open the drs viewer and view the graphicsx1.drs and extract the slps for the sentry post and it's shadow.

Once that is done open mod editor and create a new project. There are 2 things to do:

1. Go to add and add the slp's for the sentry post and shadow graphics and convert them to slx.

2. Go to add and add the icon - remember to select the building option (you don' want it replacing a unit icon) and check off the box for the Republic. This means that the icon for the Republic sentry post will be changed (and only that icon.)

Now go to wherever you saved the slp/slx files to. First, copy and paste your newly created graphic over the old graphic of the sentry post. Make sure you fill in and white areas that have appeared magenta (or whatever mask colour you are using) and peint out any of the old graphic that hasn't been pasted over. Save and close the image.

Now, open the graphics for the shadow and make it all the mask colour. Save and close.

While you are in that folder make a text file and call it "readme" and write an overview of your mod (you can also edit the readme in mod editor but it is easy to forget to do it).

Now add the readme to your mod project.

Highlight the slp for the sentry post graphics and click the display graphic option. Make sure the mask and shadow colours are set correctly and as this mod has some player colour in, leave player colour ON. Click the "generate data bitmap" button and let the programme do it's stuff.

Now if there is player colour set in the data bitmap in unwanted areas you can change the 100% of player colour in an area needed to make it player colour appear or dissappear appropriately ( the default setting should have worked fine as this graphic is taken from tha game). If that does work well enough you can aslo edit any unwanted pixels of player colour from the data bitmap.

Remember to set the center of the graphic in the right place (this is known as anchoring). it should be set somewhere like this:

Now generate a data bitmap for the shadow. Don't panic if the graphic turns into a little purple pixel - that is fine and should happen. If you've not got rid of all the shadow from the original shadow graphic just go and edit it out and repeat the process.

Now give your mod a name and check you have the icon and graphics replacing the right thing and that you have not forgotten the readme (a common mistake - the mod won't work without it). Now compile as an .mpi file and install using mod installer.

Now go into SGWB and place a Republic Sentry Post in the scenario editor - now there should be the graphic of the spire with a prefect shadow and a new icon.

And that is how you can start of modding.

As you progress in ability you will also learn to cut different areas from different graphics to make new units as well. These mods are also very effective and do impress if done well.

Apendix: "Hybrid Theory"

It is also possible to take "parts" from two or more graphics, or areas of a large graphic and combine them to make a new graphic. When doing this I'd avise cutting out all the graphics beforehand so you have all the individuals to lay together in paint. Remember that you have to make sure that where they join they join coherently - that means there's no rough edges and it looks like the graphics game from the game itself. To get to happen might take some pixel editing but the results are worthwhile.

Here of some great examples of this by two talented modders ():

Stairs by The Punk Guy (Now Sumo)

Tusken Sentry Post by Rossk

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Hope this has been helpful to you newer guys (and anyone else that may have read this).

Remember: Don't give up! If it's not working out well try again or try something else - you won't get any mods finished if you give up!

Also don't get over ambitious - you'll gain no respect if you don't deliver the goods - do one mod at a time to start with.

Happy Modding,

Omri

[This message has been edited by Omri Khan (edited 08-01-2006 @ 06:26 PM).]