Traction Map

[Jack 984]

I need a traction map for my upcoming track. I read dj's explanation, and know what I want my values and stuff to be. But I need just a few points in the right direction to make one. I think the concept, is an image? A ppm? And you put your codes in your texture list? If someone could confirm this, and enlighten me to the method of creating the actual traction map in photoshop, I would be very much pleased. I hoped to release tonight, but if I can't figure this out, its not looking good. Thanks guys.

[Pumaxcs]

Talk to me over msn, ill get ya going.

[Jack 984]

Check your pm's puma.

[Garasaki]

You use the old tile texturing system to make a traction map.

It may totally screw up your decals. I don't know.

I've done the traction map but never got around to doing decals on any of my tracks yet I would think doing the "tiles" after the decals would place the tiles on top of the decals, but I dunno for sure.

Don't rush too much trying to get that track out. The traction values are pretty sensitive to small changes and not all the values really do what you first think they might.

[Jack 984]

Okay thanks! Thanks for the help.

[Garasaki]

To expand a little bit, you edit your texturelist (with notepad ++) to look something like this

1.05 18 50 dirt.ppm
1 20 50 grass.ppm
0.9 15 45 YOURTRACKNAME/dirt2.ppm
1.05 18 50 YOURTRACKNAME/dirt3.ppm
1.1 22 55 YOURTRACKNAME/dirt4.ppm
dirt-grass-0001.ppm
dirt-grass-0010.ppm
dirt-grass-0011.ppm
dirt-grass-0100.ppm
dirt-grass-0101.ppm
dirt-grass-0110.ppm
dirt-grass-0111.ppm
dirt-grass-1000.ppm
dirt-grass-1001.ppm
dirt-grass-1010.ppm
dirt-grass-1011.ppm
dirt-grass-1100.ppm
dirt-grass-1101.ppm
dirt-grass-1110.ppm
dirt-grass-1111.ppm
dirt-alt1.ppm
grass-alt1.ppm

In this example, dirt2 is sorta slippery, dirt3 is "normal" and dirt4 is like heavy tacky stuff.

You then make a .ppm file called, in this case "dirt2.ppm" dirt3.ppm dirt4.ppm (search to find out more specifics about this file)

Now, what I did, which made sense in my head but may not to you, was take a single dirt texture, and color it - I had a yellow one, a purple one, and a green one. These very obviously different colors made it easy for me to distinguish what dirt was where - and I think the decals will eventually cover it up Oh heres a tip - write it down on a piece of paper, what dirt is what IE yellow is slippery, cause lord knows I was unable to keep it straight in my head without seeing it in front of me somehow.

Then in the editor, you click on the tile option, then your 3 dirts should appear on the bottom. Select the appropriate dirt, and paint away.

[Jack 984]

Oh okay that really clears it up. I think im just gonna release, because I have bigger and better plans in the making, and wanna get this one over with.