SkinnerUI question....

[Norrin Radd]

i'll take a look at it tonight also, and no prob. for the help, the more skinners the better!
hopefully it was the width issue, which could be it since it was luke cage's, an original from mua.

[Norrin Radd]

do you get your images from texture finder directly? because if so, then i see what you mean. For 15702 I am using a width of 512 and shift of 1593, is that where you have him lined up?
If you use muaskinner it is easy to get the full 512,512 picture,
use this in your .cfg file
15702.igb,-DXT1,512,512,162361.
then
muaskinner -xbmp 15702.igb
Note: i just tried it now and it worked, i got the full 512x512 image

i'm not sure that you can get the full picture from the texture finder program directly since i never use that method

[channel]

those offsets were perfect! thanks for kicking ass. looks like i'm almost there...the only thing i could use some help with is the antenne and belt that are on the character...they apparently aren't a skin thing...maybe a mesh thing. dunno, but hopefully it's not too hard to remove them.  any clue where i go from here?

[iammingy]

If I understand what you said correctly, I don't think you can remove those stuff just by re-skinning. It's not that simple.

If the antennae and the belt aren't part of the "main" skin, then you need find seperate offsets for those, too! Also, they might not be a square BMP...

[channel]

i can see where they are located...almost looks like a blue print. it's pretty tuff trying to get it at a fully legible size though. now seperate offsets, does that mean i need to get the antennae and the characters skin together in one whole image?  i just don't understand how everything would work out with seperate offsets...i'm sure the files would have to stay together at some point i just don't understand  if they need to be exported as a bmp together (even though the characters skin itself is already finished) so that i can remove the anntenae or i just focus on the antennae and such and some how comebine them later.

man i think i know what i mean but it's so confusing to try and explain...

[iammingy]

"does that mean i need to get the antennae and the characters skin together in one whole image?"

Nope, separate offsets means you do things... separately!?! lol This means they are separate pieces of BMPs for you to export, edit, and import!

[Norrin Radd]

those offsets were perfect! thanks for kicking ass.

no problemo

and for the separate pieces, like iammingy says you can make them separately. so you use different lines in your .cfg file. so you get the bmp for the main character skin using the offset i pasted above. color it and replace it. then, you change the line in .cfg to have the offsets for the other pieces, you export the bmp, change it then reimport it. So basically you just change the line in the .cfg file to get only what you want and replace only what you want.

[channel]

alrighty so it looks like all i can do right now is change the color of the belt and antennae, but how exactly would i go about removing them from the character all together?

[Norrin Radd]

i dont think its possible if they are contained in the same igb file as the body. I had this problem for omega red, but i dont think there is anyway to solve it. For your case, since i think the skin and model were made by tommyboy, maybe if you ask him super nicely he can make you the same igb just without the antenna and belt, or you can look for other skins with no belt or antenna.

[thetommyboy2002]

alrighty so it looks like all i can do right now is change the color of the belt and antennae, but how exactly would i go about removing them from the character all together?

Only three ways that I can think of, two of which may not work, and the other may not happen:
1. "alpha" them out in the skin then re-import the texture. May not work because: an alpha'd out skin may be bigger than the original (which I can't remember but strongly suspect had NO alpha channel)
2. All the pieces in my (or anyone elses for that matter) meshes have a "flag" which is set to "visible" or "hidden", set in 3dsMax before export. In theory, one could find and change the value of this flag for any given piece (ie belt or antennae) in a Hex editor. May not work because: nobody knows which value within the mesh contains the flag. But someone could try to find it. I'll devote maybe an hour to looking tonight and post back here if I can find it.
3. Have the original mesh-maker re-export a version without the bits you don't want. Possible, but I don't particularly want to open those particular floodgates at the moment. There are other "male basic" type meshes you could use (I started off reskinning one of the prof x meshes from xml2 for giant man, for instance).

[Norrin Radd]

2. All the pieces in my (or anyone elses for that matter) meshes have a "flag" which is set to "visible" or "hidden", set in 3dsMax before export. In theory, one could find and change the value of this flag for any given piece (ie belt or antennae) in a Hex editor. May not work because: nobody knows which value within the mesh contains the flag. But someone could try to find it. I'll devote maybe an hour to looking tonight and post back here if I can find it.

do you think this flag is present in the original mua and xml2 igbs?
sorry if i misunderstood

[thetommyboy2002]

2. All the pieces in my (or anyone elses for that matter) meshes have a "flag" which is set to "visible" or "hidden", set in 3dsMax before export. In theory, one could find and change the value of this flag for any given piece (ie belt or antennae) in a Hex editor. May not work because: nobody knows which value within the mesh contains the flag. But someone could try to find it. I'll devote maybe an hour to looking tonight and post back here if I can find it.

do you think this flag is present in the original mua and xml2 igbs?
sorry if i misunderstood

As far as I know, it should be present in ALL meshes. There is a flag in the alchemy exporter dialogue for "invisible" in addition to the "ordinary" Max "hidden/unhidden" flag.
But I should add that as far as MUA/XML2 meshes are concerned I AM guessing. I can only be 100% certain of my own meshes.
I've had a quick look in my Giant Man meshes with a hex editor, and found that there are as many as four or five instances of such things as "belt_flat", which about a dozen possible locations of the flag following each one. I'll have to look some more and compare two meshes with slightly different hidden/unhidden bits.
I'll post back when I know more.

[channel]

alrighty, thanks tommy for spending the time to give me a hand here.

[thetommyboy2002]

Hmmm....potentially a problem here.
I exported two versions of my Hulk, one with both ripped trouser legs unhidden, one with only one unhidden.
I then opened them up to compare in a hex editor.
The one with both visible had five instances of the "tube02" (the trouser leg), the one with it hidden had only three instances.
Also the two files differed in size, as well as numerous other differences.
So my theory (based on my experience with Freedom Force meshes) may be either just plain wrong, or may be very difficult to implement.
It may be that MUA/Alchemy meshes have a different structure to FF meshes, and the "simply change one address" method may not work here.

[thetommyboy2002]

There are times when I hate this game.
I did another test, with 2 hulks, one with a belt, one without, and compared in a hex editor.
Again the "visible belt" appears 5 times compared to the "hidden belt"'s 3 times.
Why is this such a big deal? It means that we cannot UNHIDE hidden bits and pieces.
It also probably means that HIDING bits is a no-no too.
I won't rule it out completely, but I just don't have the time to work it out right now.