Adding custom textures to a new map

Overview

• This Tutorial is divided into small chapters.
• This will explain how to add simple textures to your sandbox creation.

CHAPTER ONE: Creating Your Own Texture(s)

• First, we're going to create our own textures for personal use in PASandbox.
• I make my textures at the size of 512x512.

http://i31.tinypic.com/2dtyc2f.png

• Now, save the textures you created with the names you want.
• I named mine: texture_1.png and texture_2.png.

CHAPTER TWO: Creating a Folder

• Now we're going to make our texture folder.
• Open your Sandbox folder, and open "packages"
• Inside "packages" create a folder, you can name it anything, but for this tutorial I used "mytextures"
• Here is my path: C:\Documents and Settings\Jim\Desktop\Sandbox\packages\mytextures
• Once created, drag your textures into the folder.

http://i32.tinypic.com/2mxrb8.png

• We're done with this chapter for now.

CHAPTER THREE: Creating Your Packages.cfg

• Alright, now I'm going to show you how to create your own packages.cfg, and some little tips.
• This part is VERY simple. First, open notepad. Inside notepad we want some brief text at the top, so what you're going to do is add this:

   // Tutorial Textures By Chaze007

• The reason we add the "//" is to make it where the following text in that line, has no use. Basically anything that comes after "//" is not used. This is useful for removing a certain piece of code from your packages.cfg.
• It doesn't delete the line of code, so you can come back and remove the "//" later when you want to use that line, or edit. The use of "//" is called commenting, and is sometimes referred to as "Commenting Out" something.
• Now, we're going to add our shader within the packages.cfg.
• This part is also very simple.

   // Tutorial Textures By Chaze007
   setshader stdworld

• We're done with this step.
• Now we get to add our textures within the packages.cfg.
• This is usually the final step within your packages.cfg.

   // Tutorial Textures By Chaze007
   setshader stdworld
   texture 0 "mytextures/texture_1.png"

• That's it. Now, I'm going to explain the parts of this.
  • texture 0 can have different values, like texture s or texture n.
    • These are used for different types of maps, like glow maps and such.
  • "mytextures/ is the folder your textures are in.
  • texture_1.png" is your texture's name.
• Now lets finish this packages.cfg up!

   // Tutorial Textures By Chaze007
   setshader stdworld
   texture 0 "mytextures/texture_1.png"
   texture 0 "mytextures/texture_2.png"

• That's all of my used textures. Now, say we want more, but we don't want to use them. We would comment them out, like this.

   // Tutorial Textures By Chaze007
   setshader stdworld
   texture 0 "mytextures/texture_1.png"
   texture 0 "mytextures/texture_2.png"
   //texture 0 "mytextures/texture_3.png"
   //texture 0 "mytextures/texture_4.png"
   //texture 0 "mytextures/texture_5.png"

• We're basically done with this chapter, save your file as "packages.cfg" and drop it in your texture (mytextures) folder.

CHAPTER FOUR: Executing Your Packages.cfg

• This part is extremely easy.
• We're going to execute our packages.cfg from the main file.
• Open your sandbox folder, then open "data"
• When you're done with that for new maps open "default_map_settings" in notepad.
• For existing maps open its -art.cfg located in my_stuff/packages/base or packages/base depending how you launch Sandbox (without the extra numbers, those are backups)
• You should get an extremely long list of code.
• Scroll all the way down to the bottom.
• You want to execute your packages.cfg so now we're going to add in this:

   exec packages/mytextures/packages.cfg

• It's that simple!
• This line basically tells Sandbox to add your packages.cfg (your textures) into sandbox.

CHAPTER FIVE: Testing Your Textures In Sandbox

• Now you want to see if it works.
• Open sandbox, Create a new map, and look at the last texture tab.
• Obviously from the following image, it works*\

http://i26.tinypic.com/2ec29sj.png

CHAPTER SIX: Adding Extras

• Now that our textures work in Sandbox, we might want to add a little something extra within our textures folder.
• You can add your own README.TXT with credits and such, or you can also add them in the packages.cfg with commenting.
• You can add the TextureDocument.PSD (if you work in photoshop) for others to look at or to adapt your work.
• You can add glow maps, and all of those things, and you can add your license if you have one.