From .bmp to .dds, Toshop and Nvidia Plugin

[FrankD]

Hello modders,

 

OK, I know taht there's a KB entry about converting texture to dds, but it's about tga files and I read that DXTBmp may generate artefacts when it converts large files, what the high res skins exactly are, so I picked my poison and gone with Nvidia's plugin.

 

I got to work in PSP9 (don't laugh, it took me ages to find the way to point at the plugin folder!) but now that I want to save file, I'm facing a menu that I have no clue of what the options are for.

 

 

 

 

 

Would you, experienced people, have some advices for me?

Edited March 10, 2011 by FrankD

[+Soulfreak]

Mark: No Mip Maps

esewise nothing from me, cause i use a plugin for Photoshop wich looks different.

[FrankD]

Thank you Soulfreak, that is already one thing less to bother with.

 

What is that plugin you are using by the way?

 

 

 

[FastCargo]

The NVIDIA plugin for PS looks the same.

 

For standard textures I've been using DXT5, no mip maps.

 

For TGAs I've used DXT3, no mip maps.

 

For Normals, I've had to tweak a bit, though I think xNormal does a better job.

 

Also, be aware there is a DX plugin for Gimp that I think does a pretty good job for TGAs.

 

FC

[FrankD]

Ouch, sorry Gents, it's Photoshop CS2 (version 9.0.1) that I'm using. I've also PaintShopPro on my drive and I mixed the two names.

 

Thank you FastCargo for the complement of information, it helps a lot.

 

I'm not yet very involved with tga but I'll be soon so it's good to keep in mind, thanks again.

[+Julhelm]

I use two levels of mipmaps. If you don't use mipmaps, textures will appear to "crawl" and look ugly in the distance.

Edited March 10, 2011 by Julhelm

[FrankD]

Interesting.

Does it also apply for aicrafts' textures Julhelm?

 

If so, what exactly have to do to "use two level of mipmaps"? ("I'm with a noob" T for free on the table right behind you )

 

Edited March 10, 2011 by FrankD

[+Julhelm]

It's in the exporter where it says "mipmap levels". I usually set it to 2 so if I'm exporting a 2048 texture it then gets 1024 and 512, etc.

[FrankD]

I mean, can one simply set the option to "Use existing MIP maps: 2" anytime or does the MIPMAPS have to be generated first? If so, how to set it for two levels? (I'm crawling in the options and on Google while I read the answers but there are tons of booby traps that I would like to avoid)

[+Julhelm]

I think it autogenerates mipmaps the first time you save the .dds file. Regenerating the mipmaps is in case you have a set of mipmaps already, say 6 and want to reduce it to only 2 levels or if you want to apply some filter to the mipmaps or change them in any way in an existing .dds file. A great tool for compressing .dds is ATI Compressonator which gives you a few more options on optimizing quality vs size.

[FrankD]

Thanks for the extra details Julhelm, I'm gonna check that Compressonator and test the mipmaps levels.

[ndicki]

I've been using DXTBmp for nearly ten years now for CFS3 and I can assure you it works very well. What it doesn't do however is let you use shades of grey in alpha channels, but I suspect that's academic in SF owing to the use of TGA files instead. I find it easier to use than the Nvidia plug-in - where you run the slight but dangerous risk of saving your psd file as a psd file after fusing the layers. I find that is easier to avoid using DXTBmp!