I decided to take a looksie at the Dutchie texture sheet in FireAlpaca, just to see what I have to work with. And wow, it’s harder than I thought it would be. Take a look;
Now, take a look at the default BBP texture sheet as a comparison;
Yes, there are certain similarities (such as the face). But what’s throwing me off, is the default Dutchie texture has three main colors (instead of orange and black, of the default Best Boi).
The orange and black, clearly mark a Best Boi’s body parts. The Dutchie however, its colors are all over the place! ARGH!
Though the above would not even be a problem, if both texture sheets were similar in placement. I would had saved so much time and effort by simply copy/pasting my texture over.. but noooo.
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*sigh* …Oh well. There’s no point in bitching about it. And since Flowburn (the one that made the original BTDB texture) clearly isn’t going to help me (by not even responding to my simple request), I’m going to have to do the ole ‘mark things with different colored lines to see where I need to texture’ tactic, in order to see what parts I need to add the scaled chest.
But that’s not the only parts I need to focus on. The eyes and the lower jaw are also important. Including removing the ears. I’m also going to make three additional layers in the sheet’s .psd file for toggling the ears, wings, and the chest floof.
And this is what I initially have, using a mixture of GIMP and FireAlpaca to do specific things.
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Update 1: Lower jaw has been textured (not fully), snout holes have been added, and the nose’s bridge has four black dots on the sides (as my scalesona has). I plan to have the jaw texture go into the upper jaw in a circle, around the mouth.
Update 2: Ears have been removed. Noticing bits of where the ears are (even though I made sure to delete everything around the ear area of the sheet). Currently trying to fix them.
Update 3: MAJOR bug with the back and top of the head. I don’t know what the hell happened, but I’m seeing this now…
It’s like I’m actually performing surgery on a Dutchie.
Two hours later, I was no closer to fixing the problem. Ending up giving in and going back to VRChat, and try to get someone to help with it tomorrow.
Showed it to someone, who said “that’s where the head fluff used to be, you’ll need to use Blender to remove it and it should fix the problem”. Ugh. Having to use Blender. Ugh.
Thankfully someone else came to my rescue, using Photoshop and managing to seal up the ‘cut’.
Discovered the cause of the issue. Those floating bits and pieces I chopped out of the alpha channel (thinking they weren’t being used for anything important)? …They were actually important to the texture! Huh. Never would had known.
Also, the floating bits, I still feel I’ll need Blender experience (which I lack) to get them out. Likely going to need help with that. So, I’ll continue to texture the model.
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Thursday, January 31st 2019
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Update 4: …I am officially clueless on what the fuck happened with the sheet. Thinking I could simply take the working .psd I got help with, and paste it over the broken one (to fix it).. it doesn’t want to be fixed. The FUCK DID I DO to it?!
Well, this just goes to show, that backups are extremely important in cases like
this (which, I’ll admit.. I haven’t been doing). But that’s going to change.
Thankfully I was able to move the claws over to the working copy, and now Future BTD has claws again!
Now, I was planning to work on the pain in the ass(the scaled chest) today, but luck is on my side as the guy that helped me yesterday, is willing to help again with that. Infact he’s going to do the rest of the texturing work for me, mainly because of this very scaled chest, he has to make two texture sheets for the left and the right.
This also makes the blue pokadots more randomized. At this same time, I asked Erodac if he could do the whole Blender part (to physically remove the Dutchie body parts I removed via editing the texture), and he’s doing that as well.
Several hours later…
The texturing IS DONE!! 😀 I also got the custom designed Dutchie mesh! And it removes the floating bits! WOOT!
It looks absolutely handsome, just like my sona. Can’t thank that guy enough. And with this done, the rest is up to me. And copy/pasting BTDB’s horns, wings and fake tail, should be easy enough.
However, all is not good (at this time). I mean, I can still add the attachments and call it a day, but I’ll have to still use the original Dutchie mesh. Because this new mesh, doesn’t have the original’s Visemes. And trying to cheat by saying “here they are, use the original!”… sadly it doesn’t work like that. It’s just like an animation. If it’s not set to the avatar you’re currently using, it won’t work. But at least making animations isn’t anything like trying to mess with Blender.
Erodac will try to take care of this, but not right now. So for the time being, I’ll do the attachments and use the default Dutchie mesh. Because it’s better than nothing. 🙂 And when I get the fix, I can simply transfer the attachments over.
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Friday, February 1st 2019
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New month, new update.
It looks absolutely adorable, like something you could hug…
Changes;
-All attachments are on. All I need to do is set up the eye beams and get the proper firebreath going, then finally the Dynamic Bones for the wings, and the avatar will be DONE!! 😀
-Used Naito’s scale texture. Didn’t cover the chest this time, since the red tint kind of ruins the realism.
-Made the eyes brighter, to be closer to my sona.
Everything should be done in the afternoon. Hopefully by then, I’ll have the fixed mesh. Going to test him out ingame.
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So, it’s the afternoon. I’ve had, well.. not the best results from last night (a half an hour before I went to bed). One friend looked at me and said “benie your ears are gone”. Another started laughing, but it wasn’t about the model (just my lack of awareness).
Meh, whatever. I’m not going to let them deter me. The fact I like it, that’s all it
matters, right? …Right!
Also, I might not get that fixed Dutchie mesh from Erodac anytime soon. Told me he’ll try to get it done today, as he’s dealing with other things. But, no rush. Let the guy take his time.
Most of today, I’ve been taking a break from it (since it’s nearly done). But I’ll be doing the finishing touches this evening.
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Update: Animations are nearly done. All there’s left to do is set the dynamic bones for the wings, and the avatar will be completed.
Though, I decided to say “no” to the eye beams, and this is due to WMR not giving me the option to toggle an emote on/off (you can only do this in Desktop mode). Really getting tired of this BS.
However I have another issue that needs addressing ASAP. Unlike copying Inspector settings from one scene to another, copying animation files doesn’t work as you expect it to. An animator controller will continue to use its assigned animation file, nomatter where it is. The only way to preserve it, is to recreate the animation.
And… I completely fucking forgot about it when I overwrote BTDB’s wing animation with the Dutchie one. On top of that, I also have to re-add the firebreath particle (because I stupidly overwrote that as well).. another reason why I was putting off with adding the Dutchie tail to the BBP model.
I’m just glad I was able to (barely) recreate the firebreath, without getting on my hands and knees begging for help of the one that managed to (a long time ago) get the particle working. It’s not perfect, but it’ll do.
You probably notice the flame is no longer purple in areas. I swapped the broken Dutchie flame textures with ones I got from various prop packs I have (that have fire textures). And it works!
So after I undo these user fuckups with BTDB, the thing I’m working on now should be completed.
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Saturday, February 2nd 2019
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This will likely be the final update, in the longest blog post I have ever made since starting blogs.
But… it. is. DONE! 😀 The avatar is ready! And like I said, when I get the fixed mesh, I’m pretty sure I can simply transfer the attachments over without any issue.
I also (finally) fixed the two fuckups with BTDB. Getting the wings to use the correct animation file, I was having that issue where the settings kept defaulting to their previous state. Ended up deleting and re-adding the wings.
So I can only assume they were still using the old animation, which could had been the reason it was preventing me from setting them.