S3TC packer tool

[DieHard SCWS]

Euuh, well, please post here about the S3TC packer and or conversion tool
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[DieHard SCWS]

I never came to make a post about the packer tool, again lack of time...........

For instance I could more easily convert back maybe a package from unreal2 or UT2003/2004 back to unreal.

Damn, i was thinking the same thing weeks ago, why not for now use the UT2004 editor an make a conversiontool to Unreal 1.


And yeah, Kerilk, if you can do that, for the project itself it would be awsome. But in that case it needs work both ways.


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If this is possible it has to have follow options:

- Converting Unreal1 S3TC packages to UT2004 (for excisting packages)
- Converting Unreal1 normal packages to UT2004 (for new packages)

And than the vice versa possiblity:

- Converting UT2004 packages to Unreal1 S3TC textures.

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Extra option: a GUI lol, just pushing my luck

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I do have both UT2003 and UT2004, but i would choose UT2004 because i think its much more widelly spread and better supported than UT2003.


For the current project this would indeed be awsome, though of course in the end it would even be more awsome if there would be a selfsupporting Unreal1 tool.


Damn, i wish i had made that post about the needed features.

Please do so Kerilk, make a conversiontool
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[DieHard SCWS]

I have a technical question regarding the new textures.

For the original texture packages they were able to save somewhat on performance by reutilizing the same palette for multiple different textures in a package.

I know they used the Epic written texture compression program Bright to do all of this.

I am guessing you are not reutilizing the same old palettes? Are we still going to be able to combine texture palettes for the new STC3 textures?

I know what you are talking about, and i have too look into that. But at first glance, i think this only aplies for index colored textures, meaning original Unreal textures.


Those texures only contain max 256 colors and you can use a same palette indeed to speed the game. But S3TC textures have 16 million colors, not sure if that would aply, since it covers all colors in excistence.


In other words S3TC textures cover all palettes. But in some respect you could be right, lets say a texture contains 25000 colors and another 25060 than it may be a good idea to align them, i dunno, it is worth looking into it, can you also do a search on it BOZO, any help is appreciated.................


Btw if true, than i would asume UT2004 will also benefit from that, must be posts around, that cover that subject, if it aplies for UT2004 than it also aplies for Unreal1.


The cool part about this project is:

Regardless what we do, there never can be missmatches, so we can update packages later on, if we want to improove them packagewize or designwize.

The users simply have to latest version or not, that is a big plus on only usersided addons


I will have a look into it BOZO, but if you got time, please do the same............... any help is welcome........
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[Kerilkkorn]

Hey DieHard,

I sent you a new S3TC texture extractor for you to test.

Did you receive it?

Texture created with this version should be usable in the editor, provided you use software rendering.

[DieHard SCWS]

Yes i did receive it, sorry it took a while to respond, unfortunatelly i had a very buzy day when i got it, same for yesterday.

My first Question would be: I thought you were working on the UnrealEngine2 Runtime, since this is a downloadable standalone Ued version, this would mean that mappers that do not have UT2004 stilll can work on the textures, what happened there?


As far as the testing:

I took all textures directly from the UT Cd and converted them all.


- I can load them both in the normal editor as in the UT2004 editor.
- While using the textures i was able to play any map at home or online in any server i tried.

Adding a texture: i want to make note that i have not been working on what settings you need for the DXT textures while saving in Photoshop. Nor what setting to choose in the UT2004 editor, i just don't know at the moment.................................


I did try tons of things, but my major problem there is, theres too much variables i can choose from. Like:

When i add a texture in UT2004 and after saving do i run the tool again or not, the same for loading it into the UnrealEd, well stuff like that.


So i did the most simple test i could do:

- I took a fresh PlayShp.utx from the UT CD.
- I run the tool over it.
- I loaded it into the UT2004 Editor.
- I saved it without any change at all.
- a) I run it into my Unreal, opened Sinfonia.
- b) I run run the tool over it and again i did run it into my Unreal, opened Sinfonia.

In both cases (a and b) some textures are missing completelly, while others are completelly offscale, see the screenshots:

http://www.celticwarriors.net/website/S3TCMedia/DmSinfoniaS3TCext01.jpg

http://www.celticwarriors.net/website/S3TCMedia/DmSinfoniaS3TCext02.jpg

http://www.celticwarriors.net/website/S3TCMedia/DmSinfoniaS3TCext03.jpg

Than i tried to load to load the two test utx file into the Unreal editor, they do load, but in both cases, when want to scroll in the textures, the editor chrashes.


So all together, it does work, but only untill the file is changed in the UT2004 editor, there it does go wrong completelly


But i can delete textures in the UT2004 editor, and i can add them, but after saving it does go wrong somehow.


I also was not sure about your remark: DrawScale is used to scale the texture down. If you mean by that you added a general scale down in the tool, than i am not sure if that is smart, because the drawscale is probably not always the same setting.


I hope this helps you :-/ Let me know if this was what you wanted me to do?
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[DieHard SCWS]

Some extra reamarks and Questions.


I use a 225f patched UnrealEd, which i only use in softwarerendering, OS is Win2000, Aopen FX5900XT Geforce


Than as i said above already, but its important........., when you asked me if i used 2003 or 2004 i initially choose 2004 because its more widelly spread, that was untill Smirftsch told there was a standalone version from UEd2. That standalone makes it possible for any mapper to make S3TC textures and not just the people having UT2004. For that reason i favor the UnrealEngine2 Runtime above the 2004 version.


As far as creating DXT textures, i have to deepen myself into the subject which i havn't done so far. One thing i also realised, i wonder if its neccesarry to use photoshop to begin with, if i am correct and you use a BMP file, UT2004 Ed can convert them for you while adding the BMP file to the packege, I def need to look that all up.


Last remark, thanks for the tool:), completelly forgot
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[Kerilkkorn]

This new extractor is just meant to have package that can be edited. Previous were crashing the edito. And as far as I know this should be its only purpose.

Drawscale is calculated during import based on the size of the low res texture and the size of the S3TC texture. So each texture is scaled correctly.
If you load the imported package directly in ued1 it will display the drawscale parameter for the texture so you can see it.

Unfortunatly UT2004 editor doesn't support the draw scale, so when you save the package this information is lost. => thus the wrong scale. missing textures are less understandable.
I'll try and do some test to try and see why they are missing.
The problem will be to apply the right drawscales after package modification. (would be tedious to do it by hand).

Unreal2 runtime for me is the same as UT2004 except that there is a bug in the damn editor disbling you to export textures from it. Something is screwed in the package format (And as far as I'm concerned this is intentional, they wanted to lock the packages) So this format can be read, but I'd rather not use it, as it would need one more conversion step forth and one more back...

Thanks for the feedback it is greatly appreciated..

[DieHard SCWS]

Just to be on the clear side, if its only the export that is a problem. Well i could care less, because we do have tools to perfectly export the textures if needed.


I have not tested those tools on the UT2003 packages, but the tool should be capable of exporting any package from any game.

[url=http://www.celticwarriors.net/Downloads/S3TCTools/utpt20beta5.zip]utpt20beta5[/url]


So if that is the only reason and issue, than i still would favor the 2003 version, so everybody is able to do its own work and won't depend on others to create their S3TC textures.


And to make it easy we could offer a download that contains all the tools you need.


But you have more insight on the problems on that side, so ill leave it to you.
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[DieHard SCWS]

A general note: i named your extractors:
S3TCextBeta01.exe
S3TCextBeta02.exe

So i can keep track on them better.




For starters this version 02 does do alot better


I was able to load the packages in both editors, and i could play them at home and online.


There are no missing textures anymore, just the DrawScale is a problem. I was able to set new DrawScales into the UnrealEd succesfully, so in effect that works fine.

http://www.celticwarriors.net/website/S3TCMedia/DmSinfoniaS3TCext04.jpg

In this picture you can see the crates that have been set to DrawScale 0.125000, i did the same for the wall on the background, and there it seems the setting should have been 0.500000.


Off course the problem remains, in this way you would have to redo the entire package each time you add something, which at the end is unduable..............




I also added a new texture to the package, within the UT2004 editor it apears fine. But the same thing happened as i tried before, it apears in both the UnrealEd and ingame as a garbled white striped thingy and not a real texture.

http://www.celticwarriors.net/website/S3TCMedia/DmSinfoniaS3TCext05.jpg

Here is that effect.


Than i did follow, i exported 3 textures in UT2004, one being my own imported one and created a new package from them. In UnrealEd, the only one garbled is mine not the other 2. This could mean i am doing something wrong with my textures, though i do not know what. Its a bit weird, i do not really get it ? ? ? (in a second try i also run the extractor over the new package to be sure, same result though)




I was correct btw, you do not need to save them as DXT in Photoshop, you can have UT2004 do that work.




So the follow problems remain:

- The Drawscale
- Solving the added texture problem

The last one can have two reasons, its me doing wrong or its still also a package problem. I hope its mine, because if i find it, it should be solved horribly easelly. On the other hand, they apear fine in UT2004, and Photoshop is pretty straight forward, so i am afraid it is a package setting , somehow.........




But if its on my part than we are almost there, only the Drawscale problem, if i solve the garbling problem than in effect mappers who create new textures from scratch, they already could have a go with this beta 02 version
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[DieHard SCWS]

Its friggen 7.04 in the morning, so ill test it further tomorrow.


But i tried some stuff again, and it looks like i found the problem

- I took two new textures, i deleted the Alpha channel.
- I saved them as 24 bits pictures in the TGA format, uncompressed.
- I created a new package in UT2004, using DTX compression DTX1
- I run the extractor over it.
- I loaded the package in UnrealEd.

And there they were

So it looks like i found the problem

But ill test it tomorrow, if so, i will build a map with some new textures this week, just to let everyone try.


Because if this works, than mappers can go use this version already


Interesting note is, if i am correct Photoshop has an error in saving TGA format using Alpha channels, i did install the patch for that, maybe the patch didnt work ?

Anyway, it seems to work:) But i need to redo the thing from scratch, build a small test cubemap using the textures and see if i can run it online without any problems, if so, than it works


In that case, than the only problem left as far as the URProject itself, is the DrawScale Setting..........
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[Smirftsch]

it should be possible without big problems to display dxt3 and dxt5 textures in opengl- ill make some testings, maybe i need to rewrite 1 or 2 lines if that is the problem- i still think dxt3 or 5 would be better because dxt1 iirc doesnt support transparency- which sux.

[DieHard SCWS]

Ill agree on that Smirftsch, and not just that, the quality from DXT3 and DXT5 is higher, because there is less compression.


But i didn't try DTX3 and 5, though i asume they will work just as fine, i think its just adding the Alpha channel that causes the problem. I just tried an as simple as possible test to eliminate too much variations.


But it still means 95% of what a mapper wants  is doable, actually 100% but with lesser quality in transparencies


But if it could be solved would be great.
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[Kerilkkorn]

I must disagree here DXT1 is the same quality as DXT3 or 5 as long as you have no transparency. Differences between those is only due to the alpha coding. Color coding is (basicly) the same. So if a texture has no alpha it is pointless saving it in DXT3 and DXT5.

So this method is good to do new packages, but for modifying existing packages I fear it is no solution, as UT2004 editor discards animated textures, detail textures and drawscale alltogether becaus it doesn't use them.....

For that we'll have to find a better solution.

For technical documentation concerning DXT formats :
http://msdn.microsoft.com/archive/default.asp?url=/archive/en-us/dx8_vb/directx_vb/graphics_using_0soj.asp

[mcfarrel]

Have somebody Howto on this issue.
How could I create S3TC ?

[DieHard SCWS]

Here is a page that explains it a bit:

http://www.celticwarriors.net/website/S3TC/S3TCandMapping/S3TCandMapping.htm

It is far from complete, but it offers a good startpoint.




For now:

Start creating your textures in a size from 2048 x 2048 pixels x 2048 DPI This size is regardless what size it has to be when its done, in effect this should ALWAYS be your startsize for your work !!!

If its not square ALWAYS make the longest side at least 2048.

For example 512 x 2048 x 2048 DPI or 1024 x 2048 x 2048 DPI

You can start higher like 4098 but never go lower than 2048.



Always save PSD files carefully in case you need to alter thing afterwards !!!




If you are going to make a set, than a good tip is, make a bunch of cool backrounds first, like metal, wood, granite, than add other details on top of that.




A more difficult part is to make your textures tileable, but there is a great Photoshop filter for that, which you can find here:

http://www.celticwarriors.net/website/S3TC/S3TCToolsDownloads/S3TCToolsDownloads.htm

Scroll down to HalfWrap.zip, download that file and install it in Photoshop.




All above should give you a good first start, if you got to the point that you want to add them to a package, than ask here again. You can find it on the page i gave you already, but that part is still incomplete, lack of time on my part .............. as usual.


But when i have finished the package i am working on, ill will go redo all those pages and make them complete and more workable.


I hope this helps you a bit
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[mcfarrel]

Thanks. But I need some detailed info about importing those textures to Unreal/UT (unreal engine 1). I know pretty well how to create textures. But today I have this problem. How to Import DXT
Need some info. Unreal Architect wrote something about ucc mergedxt, but this seems not work.

On the other hand I tested Your packages on OldskoolUT. And encountered problem.
This was size of textures. Some textures (half of them aprox.) was bigger and thus bad tiled. I am using OpenGL bundled with SevenBullets and have S3TC enabled.

Q: which version of Photoshop do I need. It could be helpfull if those tools works under 7.0 otherwise I must downgrade.

[DieHard SCWS]

All tools work with Photoshop 7.


You should install the [url=http://www.celticwarriors.net/Downloads/S3TCTools/DXT_TOOLS.zip]DXT_TOOLS[/url] and the [url=http://www.celticwarriors.net/Downloads/S3TCTools/Targa.zip]Targa patch[/url], and the [url=http://www.celticwarriors.net/Downloads/S3TCTools/HalfWrap.zip]Tile filter[/url] into Photoshop. Than you should be set completelly as far as Photoshop.


The S3TC textures, i for now save them as Targa file, than i use UT2004 to create the S3TC packages, UT2004 alows you to compress them as DXT 1, 3 or 5

If you don't have UT2004 than you could download and install the [url=http://www.celticwarriors.net/Downloads/S3TCTools/UED2_Runtime22262001.zip]UE2Runtime-22262001.zip[/url] (i did not test it recently, not sure if it works........)


After creating the S3TC package you need to run [url=http://www.celticwarriors.net/Downloads/S3TCTools/S3TCext_Version_03.zip]Cext_Version_03.zip[/url] over it.


After that you can load them either into UnrealEd or UnrealTournamentEd, i use UnrealTournamentEd because it gives me less problems.


In those editors you need to change the DrawScale settings and other settings like that since all editors above UT do not support those settings.


After that you can save the package again.


Than of course you have to create the excact same package but with index colored (and scaled down) bmp or pcx files using the Unreal Editor, or if you use them for UT you have to use the UT editor. And acually you need to make the normal package first so you can calculate the DrawScale settings for the S3TC package.


As of yet we still have problems with adding Masked textures, were in progress to try to solve that.......


Than the packages need to be made network compatible again, again this is in progress to find a solution for that..........


In any case you can already create the packages, its just we need to deal with the last two problems, but once solved you can finish your packages in no-time.


About the packages on my site, they are incompatible with UT, though i wonder now, if i use the latest [url=http://www.celticwarriors.net/Downloads/S3TCTools/S3TCext_Version_03.zip]Cext_Version_03.zip[/url] over them, they probably will.


I could try that, but i can't offer them for download though, because i am very close to the website bandwitdh limit if UT peep go download, the site will go down, it is a problem i still need to solve too somehow......


But yeah running the latest [url=http://www.celticwarriors.net/Downloads/S3TCTools/S3TCext_Version_03.zip]Cext_Version_03.zip[/url] over it could do the trick for both Unreal and UT Two games for the same price
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[mcfarrel]

"In those editors you need to change the DrawScale settings and other settings like that since all editors above UT do not support those settings. "

This means that S3TC textures are in fact bigger than original and needs to be rescaled, am I right?
So if I decide to move to S3TC textures, I need to rebuidl map with rescaling (lowering drawscale) the map, and thus this newly rescaled map is incompatible with original textures anymore.

[Kerilkkorn]

No in fact a texture in unreal has a drawscale property. so setting the drawscale for each texture in order to have it appear the same size than the original is enough.

[DieHard SCWS]

No in fact a texture in unreal has a drawscale property. so setting the drawscale for each texture in order to have it appear the same size than the original is enough.

Correct


What you saw wrong is; you just build map as you normally would do, there absolutelly no change there, same as usual.


You just need to create two exact the same texture packages.

- One normal package, which you use for building your map. (and that eventually WILL run on the server)

- One S3TC package that will be used for the S3TC users. (and that NEVER will see any server)


The S3TC textures usually are (much) bigger in size and in true color, and because they are bigger you have to change the DrawScale setting for each S3TC texture in your S3TC texture package, so Unreal will automatically rescale them to the same size what the normal textures are when playing in that map. But with much Higher quallity


The S3TC textures are never added to the server packages, its all clientsided !!!!

This means if a player enters a server running your map, without S3TC active he will see your map with normal textures.


The player having S3TC active will also see normal textures. But the player having also installed your S3TC texture package will see the S3TC textures.



This in effect means, if there are two players in the server, one normal player and one S3TC user

- normal player sees normal textures
- S3TC player sees S3TC textures

At the same time two different views:)
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[SirFRagalot_HLK]

I have a map in progress thats using some textures from langs.utx, which is an unreal gold texture. I have a seperate custom utx file with just the textures I wanted from langs.utx (the steel panels on the ship.)

My question is, is langs.utx (an unreal gold only texture)planned to be converted into 3stc by the retexturing projoct, or should I try to make my own 3stc texture package? im thinking the answer is obvious (no its not planned) but I'd rather use a professional looking 3stc than some crappy looking textures attempted by me

[Turboman.]

well eventually i hope to get to the unreal gold textures, although this might still take a long time since we are still working on the first packages  :P

oh and its s3tc not 3stc, afaik it stands for s3 texture compression.

[DieHard SCWS]

There are also differences with the UT packages, but lol, i didn't realize theres also extra UnrealGold textures.


The answer would be; yes, and they also should be added to the Database.

I just never realized that lol

But still, why not do an attempt, seeing above, Turboman may go work on them, but you could give it a try too. Remember its all clientsided, so if you create the S3TC version ''even if its crappy" you still could use them yourself.


And we also could add them to the database, its up for people themselve if they want to install......


Its clientsided
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[DieHard SCWS]

I just took a fast look into that package, and i have two remarks.

First of course, if you use a stripped down version, for got sakes, give a different name and don't go name it Langs.utx But such thing should be obviously.......


Another thing is, theres a bunch of textures inthere that i already have finished lol, that is, they are variations on the textures i am currently working on.


Some textures relate obviously to PlayrShip package, and to another package i cannot think of so fast.


All together its an interesting package, but yeah some textures basically are done already.


What specific textures did you use ??
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[SirFRagalot_HLK]

its a work in progress so i dont know whats all the textures ill use but just using some textures that deal with the ums promethius, under "ship". I copied lang.utx and i named the new textue package as steelpanl.utx, then deletd the other textures...so far i am only using 3 or 4 textures, but plan to use a few more

anyway i havnt done much with graphics (a complete noob), other than i made a few skins for unreal, and i created them with paint lol and few techniques with gimpII (yeah i dont have photoshop but i like gimp2)

im a slow going perfectionist yet the map wont be close to perfect :-/ by the time i finish id bet you'd be finished with any tutorials so maybe id have more of an idea what to do with s3tc (hah i typed it right )