Step 3:
This is the MOST important after step 1; before saving the picture you
must convert it to the GP2 Palette or you will have an error when converting
the file to jam or at least a very bad looking car. To do this, don't decrease
colors to 256, but use :
" Color " " Load palette " and load the palette saved
in Step 1. ( don't modify color order in the options of this box !)
You could here first decrease color number to 256 colors with "optimized
" method and then load Color Palette; in some case the result could
be better, but in most of cases there is no visible difference. I really
never use this.
The result is often not as good as you hoped, because of the limit of
GP2 Palette, but you must accept this , there is no way to modify the game
palette. (In the last version 1.7 of GP2Edit from Steven Young it's now
possible to patch the game with a modified palette , my carset use this
modified palette for some cars, but take care it's possible that these
files doesn't work with the normal "jam converter".)
These 3 steps are the basis, now to have good results, you must try
all the tools, you must all time have in mind this famous palette and even
when you are under 16 million colors , start painting with colors that
are similar to colors from palette or your splendid gradient from blue
to red will be bad at final
Writing Text on Cars - To have a less pixelated text in Paint
Shop Pro you must use the 16 millions color mode and use the anti alias
from the text box. Some fonts give better results than others, but i can't
say use this one rather than an other, i have a big collection of fonts
and i try to use the more realistic on each car. In addition to this basic
technique you will sometime have to sharpen or soften some text , because
text will stay a little problem with little characters. If the available
size or space of characters doesn't mach your desires, a good technique
is to write the text on a new image with same background color as future
location, then select this text with rectangle selecting tool and paste
into the area you want. This is very easy to use on rear wing, you can
select the wing with rectangle or magic wand.
Pasting a Logo or Text - On many Real F1 sites, you can find
a sponsors page, these pages are very good sources for the logos on racing
cars. These files mostly are gifs and are to big to be paste directly on
a car. If you only reduce size and try to paste such a logo on your 256
colors car , you will generally have a completely disfigured area instead
of a logo.
To use pasting technique for this logos you must use 16 Mio color mode
on both car and logo. If logo is small, you must then look carefully at
this pict, to see how PSP has increase color number, make a big zoom on
it and remove all the undesired pixels. The best tool for this is "
replace color tool " so you can chose exactly the color you want to
replace. In some case you can use the " filling tool " by placing
color tolerance to the appropriate value ( begin for example with value
of 20 if you want to "clean" a white part ); use " Undo
tool " if result does mach what you expected and try again.
When the logo has a "good look" , good contrast and color similar
to GP2 Palette, Select exactly the area you want top paste, click on "
Copy ", then click on you car. You must now select on your car the
area where you want to paste the logo. In most of case you must select
this area with rectangle selecting tool, take care to select an area with
approx. the same proportions (H & W) as original logo or you will have
unacceptable distortions.
When this is done, go to Menu " Edit " , " Paste "
" Paste into Selection ". In some case you can use the same technique
as for simple text, by using " Magic wang " to select an area.
If you don't find a particular logo, you will have to paint it yourself.
To do this open a new image with same background color as car area where
you want to paste the logo . If logo is simple ( 2 or 3 colors) and not
to big ( on car ) use a size approx. 2 or 3 time larger than area on car.
Paint the logo with paint tool as good you can... don't be afraid by pixelated
aspect of your logo.., then select your masterpiece and go to menu "
Image ", " effects ", " Normal filter " and choose
smooth.
You can also use smooth tool to adjust the result.
Now you can paste this to car. For some difficult subject like the West
logo, a good technique is to paint first a big one,( The first one i make,
before we could find good photos on the web, was as big as the whole GP2
car) and then to select this big picture with rectangle selecting tool
and with "copy " and " paste " pasting the pict in
the area you have select on the car.
In most of case PSP auto size reduction with this technique is as good
as if you had paint in exact size.
Remember this only really works right , in 16 Mio color mode.( it's possible
in 256 color mode in a car , but result is only acceptable if size variation
is not important) When you are familiar with this technique, you can try
some more exotic transformations by using ellipse or circle selecting tools
on both source and destination area. Result will depend of your creativity...:-).
Shading or lightening Colors - To shade a color, i don't use
the gradient fill , but " Special effect " , " Cutout "
. To do this you must first select the area you want to shade , then "
Special effect ", " Cutout ", set the shade color to black,
Opacity between 50-100 ( you must try), blur to 3-6, Vertical and Horizontal
depends of what you have selected. To have a symmetrical effect , use this
an second time Without changing your selection and with negatives values
in Vertical and/or Horizontal.
For this tool also keep in mind the famous Palette or you will be disappointed.
Palettes tricks - In basic steps, i said it's not possible to
change palette, this is not completely right, if you want, you can use
for a car the "Cockpit palette" ( from svga.pcx file) or the
modified Palette from Steven Jung GP2Edit V1.6 . With these palettes you
can use some of the "reserved" colors like the green and orange.
These colors are located at the bottom of palette. Because shading of these
colors doesn't seem to work properly in game, this should be reserved to
small area or logos.(The NRG logo on my Tyrrell is made with that green.)
With GP2Edit special palette, the colors from new green range can be used
as all others colors.
If for some reason you need to have a less shading black part on your car,
you can also replace the black color with the background color (first color
in upper left corner of palette).
©1998 Pat Painter
Old articles of the month.
Painting
Car Setup
