Help me with GIMP, DDS and RGB channels?

[GrOuNd_ZeRo]

In order for me to make my own 3D textures for S3O's I need to edit channels for the DDS textures but I can't figure out how to do it with GIMP and can't find anything online that will help me out much.

Is there anyone here that can help me? or should I get an old version of Paintshop Pro or Photoshop?

[rattle]

Snipa or PressureLine have more experience with GIMP.

I could help you with Photoshop, working with PS7 and DDS myself. The DDS plugin is very easy to work with and saves a couple of steps.

[Peet]

I suggest you simply do the RGB in gimp, then add an alpha layer separately using dxtbmp.

[Forboding Angel]

Maek png.. Flatten > alpha mask rgb 1, 1, 1, better quality and assuming that you aren't wasting uvspace right an left, performance is pretty much the same as dds, give or take.

Remember that dds quality is really bad comparitively.

[Pressure Line]

I suggest you simply do the RGB in gimp, then add an alpha layer separately using dxtbmp.

i second this, theres a writeup on using dxtbmp here, head to step 9. gimp is a real pain to use alpha channels in

[Snipawolf]

Easiest way to learn gimp is tutorials. If you are a moderate user of Gimp, you can also, more or less, use PS tutorials to increase your Gimp skills. In some ways they are exactly like mirror images, in others, not so.

[rattle]

[quote=]Maek png.. Flatten > alpha mask rgb 1, 1, 1, better quality and assuming that you aren't wasting uvspace right an left, performance is pretty much the same as dds, give or take.[/quote]
That tints the texture!

The problem is that Photoshop does not store color information for 0 layer transparency, hence use DXTbmp to add an alpha channel instead of using layer transparency. That's one of the reasons I use DDS as the plugin for PS stores actual alpha channels as well as layer transparency, but the latter breaks them again.

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Remember that dds quality is really bad comparitively.

If you use DXT1, 3 or 5, but the textures can be in uncompressed RGBA8888 as well and then it greatly speeds things up.
No flipping, no DXTbmp, no nothing. They compress well too, naturally.

[Argh]

the textures can be in uncompressed RGBA8888 as well and then it greatly speeds things up

Hmm, really? Then we could have our cake and eat it, too. I wouldn't have thought that would work. Cool.

<tested>

Looks great, doesn't seem to impact performance much! Good deal, thanks for sharing, Rattle!

[kiki]

BTW, im not great at the gimp, but I figured out that its designed to be intuitive. So when I got out of my ps habits and just started doing what felt right, it worked really well. Thats all i have to say about gimp.