Making custom grass for your terrain
First grab a copy of "detail.vbsp" from "/steamapps/yourprofile/half-life2/hl2"
drop it in your mods main folder.
Next grab a copy of "detailspites.vmf" and "detailsprites.vmt" from the materials.gcf
drop them in your mods "/materials/detail" folder.
the detail.vbsp file reads parts of the the detailspites.vmf and tells the engine which part to draw.
if you open the "detailsprites.vmf" in photoshop (plugin required) you will notice there are 9 boxes with pictures of different grass and bush sprites.
Each one of the boxes has a set of coordinates on it that can be used by the "detail.vbsp"
You can edit the "detailsprites.vmf" in photoshop and change the sprites.
Just remember that it uses an alpha chanel same as transperant textures.
After you create your sprites on the first layer, open the chanels tab and create a new one.
"BLACK = TRANSPERENT, WHITE = OPAQUE"
so you will want to paint white for the parts of your plant that shows, and the rest should remain black
Once you have your custom grass sprites done, and the .vmf is saved, open your "details.vbsp" file (use notepad) and you should see something like this
Heres an explanation of each part of the code.
First and most important is the "group name"
in this instance its called "grass01".
This is what allows your textures to to use sprites on em.
Simply open the .vmt file of your choice and add this line to enable sprites to render on it.(only "blend" textures can use multiple types).
Project Fighter.
I find its beter to use it sparingly to keep fps low and overal asthetics crisp.
First grab a copy of "detail.vbsp" from "/steamapps/yourprofile/half-life2/hl2"
drop it in your mods main folder.
Next grab a copy of "detailspites.vmf" and "detailsprites.vmt" from the materials.gcf
drop them in your mods "/materials/detail" folder.
the detail.vbsp file reads parts of the the detailspites.vmf and tells the engine which part to draw.
if you open the "detailsprites.vmf" in photoshop (plugin required) you will notice there are 9 boxes with pictures of different grass and bush sprites.
Each one of the boxes has a set of coordinates on it that can be used by the "detail.vbsp"
You can edit the "detailsprites.vmf" in photoshop and change the sprites.
Just remember that it uses an alpha chanel same as transperant textures.
After you create your sprites on the first layer, open the chanels tab and create a new one.
"BLACK = TRANSPERENT, WHITE = OPAQUE"
so you will want to paint white for the parts of your plant that shows, and the rest should remain black
Once you have your custom grass sprites done, and the .vmf is saved, open your "details.vbsp" file (use notepad) and you should see something like this
well not exactly like that but thats a custom one Ive made.
Heres an explanation of each part of the code.
First and most important is the "group name"
in this instance its called "grass01".
This is what allows your textures to to use sprites on em.
Simply open the .vmt file of your choice and add this line to enable sprites to render on it.(only "blend" textures can use multiple types).
or for instance, to enable the group "grass01" (the code i posted above), you would type "%detailtype" "grass01" in your vmt, and it would load the sprites listed in the coordinates along with the other variables such as:
Heres an example of some custom grass i made for my mod
Project Fighter.
I find its beter to use it sparingly to keep fps low and overal asthetics crisp.
That reminds me of Super Mario 64
