Decaling Help

[thetanman]

Hi! I need help in decaling! the picture below is what i want to decal on Princess Peach's Castle! the question that i have is what can i do to keep the white part surrounding princess peach from showing on the castle

[thetanman]

i will post an example of what i mean

[thetanman]

i don't want this white surrounding her like this i just want the pic of her

[heyvern]

You need an image editor that can save out TGA with an alpha.

 

First in the image editor select the white area, with the "magic wand" or similar tool that selects contiguous pixels of the same "color".

 

Save this selection as an extra alpha channel in the image. It should be "black" where the white background is and "white" where the image "shows through".

 

Save as a TGA (targa) as 32 bit. This actually depends on the application and how they describe it. You want a 24 bit color image (RGB) with an extra 8 bits for the alpha. In photoshop this is described as a 32 bit image when saving a targa with an alpha channel.

 

In addition to the above if you want to avoid "fringies" around the edges of the princess image you should fill the white area with black AFTER creating the alpha channel. You may have to go and paint in the edges to make sure there are no white background pixels around the image. The alpha will mask out the background part and having total black completely around the image will prevent any white or gray pixels from creating a fringe. You will end up with a perfect image completely cut out with no fringies.

 

-vern

[thetanman]

what do you use as an image editor??

[heyvern]

I use Photoshop but look for The Gimp on the internet. It has many of the same features and is a free application.

 

 

This took 5 minutes in photoshop to produce. These are JPGs which don't support alpha but you can see what you need to end up with.

 

The first image would be the color part of the image. The second image would be the grayscale alpha channel that would mask out the background.

 

To work this would be all in one image. 24 bit with an 8 bit alpha... 32 bit targa.

 

 

 

-vern

[noober]

Vern said it right. Photoshop or some other tga editing software. I use Photoshop CS 2. But even Photoshop elements should do what your looking for.

[thetanman]

i still don't understand is there some kind of tutorial anywhere that i can use?

[heyvern]

The tutorial would be specific to the image application. It wouldn't have anything to do with AM at all.

 

If you use The Gimp, you would need a tutorial for that.... Photoshop would be different steps... Paint Shop is different... etc etc.

 

The only concept to understand is that the 3 channel color image (RGB) has an extra channel (alpha) that is used by AM to "hide" the parts of the image that are masked by the black values in the images alpha channel. This is a universal concept used by all kinds of applications, video, 3D decaling, Flash etc.

 

If you open that color JPG image I created, in an image application then created an extra alpha channel in it with what ever application you are using, you would open the second image (the black and white image), select all and copy/paste it into the new alpha of the color image then save as a 32 bit targa.

 

I am only familiar with how to do this in Photoshop.

 

-vern

[DarkLimit]

Try this tut....

 

http://www.am-guide.com/TinCan/AM_&_Alpha.htm

 

I use "THE GIMP" and it's easy in that program....maybe something u might wanna look into..

[youngman]

Here's a quick how to guide using Paint.net (free open source paint program).

http://www.getpaint.net/index2.html

 

 

And just for fun ...

 

Hope this helps?

 

Jay

[thetanman]

hey that seems easy enough i understand completely now and this paint program is free right???

[Rodney]

It should be noted that this technique (that of removing the background from an image) is for images not created in A:M.

If you are creating the images in A:M you can render out with the alpha channel/mask already in place and skip this step entirely.

Obviously this isn't the case here with the princess image.

 

You can *almost* remove the background in these images in A:M via the latest v14 release but depending on the image you'll get some fringe artifacts. I'm not sure if the original image would have masked better. I was using Vern's image to test.

 

If I can figure out how to get the process working a little bit better I'll put together a tutorial.

A:M has some incredible compositing tools and recently it got even better.

 

If you can do it with a free program such as GIMP or Paint.net that might be the quickest route.

[thetanman]

ok i installed the paint.net and am starting to understand but everytime i get to the magic wand and when i click the part that is lime green is only selects a pixel instead of the whole shaded green part

[youngman]

Have you made sure that the tolerance is set to 0% as this is very important,By doing that you are making sure that only that shade of green is selected.

If you are still having problems please post a screen grab.

 

Jay

[thetanman]

yes i have been setting it to 0% tolerance

[frosteternal]

ok i installed the paint.net and am starting to understand but everytime i get to the magic wand and when i click the part that is lime green is only selects a pixel instead of the whole shaded green part

If the image with the lime green background is a JPG file, the background is probably not all one shade of green, due to compression artifacts. You need to bring the magic wand tool tolerance up past 0%...maybe 1 or 2% maybe even 5%.

If that doesnt work post a screenshot.

[thetanman]

ok i will try that later!!! have to read a stupid book first for school To Kill a Mockingbird. Ever read that!!!! i have but i have to read it over again don't remember anything from it!!!

[thetanman]

i have it figured out!!!!!!! thank you for the help!!!