[article] Creating transparent textures

This is a discussion topic for the article "Creating transparent textures" by XenNetwork which can be found here

Article description:

a pretty simple tutorial on making transparent textures

You don't need $nocull in the .vmt file. it's used to show a texture on the normally discarded back face of a model poly. handy for leaves on trees etc.

Really handy, I tried this once and failed and your guide + .gif images is a blessing.

Could you please optimize your screenshots? 300+kb images are way too big.

There are some people who visit the SnarkPit who don't have blazing fast connections or unlimited bandwidth.

Every image could be, and should be 100k or less. Thanks in advance.

K happy? most images are 50k or around there... now go upgrade to DSL! :P

Thanks, I appreciate it.

I'm in China right now and my connection isn't the best.

I'm a gimp user, and even though this tut was written for Photoshop, I think I could easily emulate what I saw in this into Gimp -- it's really not that hard, now that I've seen it done

Hey.

This is quite a simple tutorial, which is good in a way; however, I think you could add to it by explaining things a bit more. For example, you could explain how levels of gray in the alpha channel have varying transparency instead of just "gray will show up as transparent". You should probably also include information as far as how to save/compile the material (you just say "compile like you normally do"), as well as material restrictions (about how dimensions have to be a power of 2 instead of just "i'm using 512x512"), and maybe about how you need to add $translucent "1" to the .VMT instead of saying "make it like this" (that is, explain what to do and why instead of just saying "do it like this because this is how it's done").

Most or all of the above suggestions are based around the concept that people shouldn't have to refer to other tutorials to accomplish what your tutorial tells them how to do; it should have all the information necessary for "creating transparent textures" instead of "making your custom textures transparent by adding an alpha mask", understand what I mean? Some basic material creation information would supplement this tutorial well.

It's good so far, regardless - I just suggest that you add on to it, and if you do, I'd be glad to reread and rerate it.

I appreicate your comment midk yours was probubly the most helpfull in feedback wise, I will evaluate your statments and change what I can. As of right now i can't do that scince im on some one elses computer and got to get off soon.

Also, turn anti-aliasing off so you don't get that white halo around the shape.