How do you make a portrait?

[Kell Swiftsword]

I have A LOT of portraits I would like to use in NWN. How do I convert from .bmp to .tga (I think that's correct)?

[Micah Foehammer]

You can either use Adobe Photoshop or JASC Paint Shop. The JASC software is a lot cheaper, and they offer a trial package. If money is an issue, I would suggest doing this: do all the simple cropping that you can in .bmp format (you can even use MS Paint for this) and then download the trial version of JASC software to do the conversion, any serious editing and the canvas resizing. Although the JASC software can usually be purchased for about 100$ with a 30$ rebate. [img]smile.gif[/img]

Make sure that you save the portraits as UNCOMPRESSED .tga files, otherwise NWN will choke on them. [img]smile.gif[/img]

There are a number of tutorials available on this site, and at the Bioware forums that will explain exactly how the portraits should sized, named, etc.

The portraits have a blank section on the bottom of each one: the portraits themselves will fill a space that is a multiple of 16 x 25, while the entire file with the dead space at the bottom is a multiple of 16 x 32. [img]smile.gif[/img] The Large H size portrait file, for example, is 256 x 512 but the picture itself is only 256 x 400. The bottom 112 samples are all "dead" space but MUST be included.

[ 07-07-2003, 02:58 PM: Message edited by: Micah Foehammer ]

[Kell Swiftsword]

Thanks for the info. I'll give it a shot and post them if they work out.

[Micah Foehammer]

If you have any trouble getting them to work let me know.

Be VERY careful with the naming convention - it's very easy to create conflicts with the in-game portraits. If you are NOT going to use them in a module of your own design as an npc, then it might be better to simply label them something like this:

g_rr##_z.tga

when g is the gender, rr is the race designation, z is the size descriptor

The official naming convention is as follows:

po_rr_g_xxxxxx_z.tga

Where "po" designates a portrait, rr, g and z are as defined above, and xxxxxx is the file descriptor. Try to keep the "x" string short if possible, 5 or 6 characters should be good enough. If it's too long you will trouble with the files when making a hakpak. [img]smile.gif[/img]

Can I use the freeware Irfanview?

[Micah Foehammer]

I've heard of problems arising with Ifranview. Not everyone has the problem but a LOT of people have.

An alternative solution is to go to this site:

http://www.jasc.com

and download the demo version of paint shop pro 7+. It's free and usable for 60 days (the text says 30 but my version worked for 60). [img]smile.gif[/img] It will convert to .tga format without any problems as long as you follow the format restrictions and make sure you save as UNCOMPRESSED .tga files. [img]smile.gif[/img]