Transparency, AlphaMaps and other greek words

#1 If GameSpace supports exporting translucent materials (Supposedly it does), then you'll need to use a PNG file with an alpha channel to use this feature. Photoshop's defaul PNG implementation is screwed up and does not correctly export PNG alphas, you have to instead use the SuperPNG plugin.

I am not sure what special action you have to take in order to implement transparency within GS. Presumably there is some sort of transparency texture channel or option that can be activated.

#2 Thanks for the reply. I decided to try it in 3dsmax 4 and it worked fine and exported fine, just like GameSpace did. I didn't do anything special in GameSpace, just what I heard to do. I have been using SuperPNG for some time now, and I created an alpha channel in PS and pretty muched followed what all the forum posts and docs said to do. Since it works in 3dsmax and GameSpace, I have just come to the conclusion that there is something wrong with my MilkShape install.

#3 If I remember right, with milkshape there are two places for textures. The first slot is generally what you use for textures. The box directly underneath that one is for alpha maps. Try putting your png image in both and see if that helps.

#4 Check your exporter for Milkshape also; there are at least 4 from 4 separate authors...:). Freedom of choice is cool. I've produced transparent DTS shapes thru the Milkfarm, so it should work. Early versions of it [ms3d] don't take png textures very well, and I've had to load up the second texture slot with the same image to get the transparency to work in Ms3d. Alter the Emissive Material to anything but black and you'll get double sided images[only in Ms3d's viewports...]working, if your PNG has an appropriate Alpha channel setting embedded, Ms3d overrides it with the slider. Move the slider just a smidge to less than full and you'll get close to what it should look like, and in fact when you open the file, it should be preset, but transparency doesn't render the best in Milkshape and I often take it to full to lose some of the bad sorting order...or perhaps uncheck drawbackfaces...that should help. With version 1.7.1, I believe Mete has put the second slider back into the interface[took it out for 1.7.xx, but I'm not sure if it will load up a detail or bump, or whatever folks are using it for...but it is back on the UI. Try popping the second slider just till the image goes transparent, then try exporting...I think it lets the Material Editor know it's a special material.

#5 In gamespace under the colour section of your material settings there is a little icon menu to pull out for transparency (by the x etc, its a bluey green icon)

Change it so you have a second place in the colour section to drag a transparency map, simply drag the same image there as you have in the main image section...

Does that make sense? If not i'll stick a picture up.

#6 Thanks Craig.