A tutorial on how to do a "skin" in SLRR.

Well,this is a full, in depth write up of how a "Skin" is done in SLRR. I'm using GIMP but other programs such as Adobe Photoshop are even better. I made this tutorial because I noticed many other paintjob tutorials have a lot of missing details in them. Let's begin-
The car I'm using is the Toyota Altezza FM4 Convert which is here- *LINK*
The wheels are Jaziba's Unfinished wheel pack from here- *LINK*
I'm using the latest version of G.I.M.P which can be found here- *LINK*

Assuming that you all have the basic knowledge of paintjobs for SLRR, we can begin. You can first begin by completely building your car. My game would cash if I apply the paintjob, then finish off the car so I do the opposite which is to complete the car, then load the paintjob. Make sure EVERY paintable part of the car is painted in white:


Then, you can purchase 2-3 packs of the black rectangle in the decals->Misc section in-game. Scale the black rectangle as large as possible and cover every paintable part of the car.



Save the paintjob as whatever name you desire. In my tutorial, I named it "Altezza."


Great, now that's done, you can begin the actual paintjob-making process. Go to your save->skins folder and you'll see the skins saved as multiple files. Each file represents a part of the car that is paintable.


The only way to access these files is to rename their extensions to .jpg so that they can be opened by the photo editing program.
Download this tool here- *LINK*
Basically,you drag your files that need to be converted into the program and convert them to .jpg.


Well, after renaming the files, they show up as images that can be edited. As you can see, there's a white background, then the black body part. The white background is the car's actual paint, and the black body part is the part that was covered by the black rectangle. Paint the car blue, it'll show as blue. Put a green rectangle on the body, it will show up as green and so on. I labelled each image to show you which part it belongs to.


Now, you can open each file and edit them. I repainted my car using the "colorize" tool in G.I.M.P and then added stickers that I took from google images.



Repeat this process until you're finished editing each file so that they match the paintjob that you're making. When I finished up, my files looked like this:


Now that you're satisfied with the files, it's time to rename them back to their original file names so that they can be read by the game. All you have to do is ensure that your .jpg files are in Sparky's Renaming Tool (Just drag them in if they aren't already there)
Hit the "remove extension" button and that's it. Your files are now able to be read by the game.


You can now enter the game now that your files have been renamed to their appropriate names. Load the paintjob and it'll look exactly like how you designed it.



And that's it! You're finished making a paintjob. Some mods are harder to make Paintjobs on because they have mapping issues but after a while of making paintjobs, you learn how to work around the flaws of the mods. I don't intend on releasing this Altezza's paintjob because it was done quickly and you guys are far more capable of doing a better one than this. I do suggest that you use this Altezza to learn how to do paintjobs because it only has 14 actual bodyparts to paint which means that mapping liveries from one part to the other is very easy compared to other cars. PS, if you see any problems in this writeup then PM me or comment and I'll fix it. Big thanks to BB93 for hooking me up with the rename tool. Thanks for reading :D



 
1.   Posted by doge   2015-05-02 20:49    

some cars have fucked up maps, so i'ts not that easy


2.   Posted by gt3076r   2015-05-02 21:05    

"Some mods are harder to make Paintjobs on because they have mapping issues but after a while of making paintjobs, you learn how to work around the flaws of the mods."
I already said that..


3.   Posted by BLiTZ   2015-05-02 22:15    

Ok i have no clue how you could open that in png since my ps can't


4.   Posted by gt3076r   2015-05-02 22:38    

You can always see if there's a .png extension to download for PS btw


5.   Posted by holeecrab   2015-05-03 00:41    

aw yiss, this helps a lot !
thanks shaf :D


6.   Posted by ajaX   2015-05-03 07:35    

Can you tell me how you made the decals?


7.   Posted by MartyTheGamer   2015-05-03 13:09    

ajaX he didn't make them, he just took them from the internet.


8.   Posted by gt3076r   2015-05-03 13:10    

No problem @Holeecrab.
Yup, I took .png files and just pasted them onto the parts. Making the actual liveries will require a bit of skill though.


9.   Posted by ajaX   2015-05-03 15:38    

Well in that case could you tell me how you found them and how much time does it take you to make a paint job like the one above?


10.   Posted by gt3076r   2015-05-03 17:30    

This pink Altezza took a half hour. I just look at D1 cars and take inspiration from their liveries.


11.   Posted by ajaX   2015-05-03 17:59    

Damn that was fast for me it was like 30 just to get the hood and to find 2 stickers for it XD


12.   Posted by RedCarDriver   2015-05-03 18:56    

I think it's kind of annoying when modders re-map the car to use the stock SLRR style mapping, instead of Forza or NFS mapping where the map is consistent across the whole car. It might be more efficient in terms of pixel resolution needed per part, sure, but it makes it WAY harder to make a decal span across multiple parts.

That's why I always use Forza style mapping rather than SLRR style, by the way.

My two cents.

Great tutorial, by the way!


13.   Posted by ItsJoni   2015-05-03 20:49    

Great tutorial! Could you also make one to apply window stickers ?


14.   Posted by gt3076r   2015-05-04 02:43    

@Ajax, the first Paintjob I did (the GS300) took over 2 hours but it was worth it because I learnt a lot and was inspired to make this to help everyone out.
@Harrison I agree, the SLRR stock mapping is beyond horrendous and poor. It's frustrating to work with and I wonder how some people even make paintjobs for these cars that have shitty mapping. This Altezza isn't too bad,it's a decent platform to learn how paintjobs are done. Oh, and thanks :D
@ItsJoni, I can't make a tutorial for that because stickerable windows are made by the author of the mods,not me. It's way too difficult for me to explain.


15.   Posted by FJ   2015-05-04 03:49    

Thank's a lot of the tutorial!


16.   Posted by ZeprarexVII   2015-05-04 14:32    

soooo step one


17.   Posted by ajaX   2015-05-04 17:31    

One more thing how and were do you find the decals?


18.   Posted by Holy Shit Man   2015-05-04 20:25    

@ajaX - Google them? Go to Images and look for some clip art or vector type images.


19.   Posted by gt3076r   2015-05-05 01:21    

Np @FJ.
Btw to everyone, try out the RWB 993 Mod in the DL section. Great mapping :D


20.   Posted by ajaX   2015-05-05 05:47    

Ok thanks!


21.   Posted by austin_gorniak   2015-05-09 04:48    

How could this work if you wanted to paint the car white? Wouldnt you lose the ability to see it in the white background of gimp?


22.   Posted by gt3076r   2015-05-09 14:43    

That's alright. You don't have to pay attention to the actual white- just pay attention to the part highlighted in the black colour.


23.   Posted by kwikcheezewu   2015-05-10 23:35    

Thanks a lot for this tutorial. Really opened the door for more creative paint designs than with in-game stuff.
Spent 2 days trying to paint my Scion FR-S drift car (With my OCD, I kept going back and forth from Photoshop, converting the file, enter in-game, back to Photoshop, and repeat just because a decal's position or rotation was off LOL. Plus I started Thursday night and I work full-time.). After looking online for some inspiration/ideas, here's the final result:







Looking forward to creating more paint designs and improving on them.


24.   Posted by gt3076r   2015-05-11 15:55    

Great job. Keep at it and you'll get even better :D


25.   Posted by ThaGhost   2015-06-01 21:50    

Can you give me a link to the Drift Monkey vector/clip art? (perhaps the flake effect too) I need help with my paintjob.


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