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Beginners Guide

The Beginner’s Guide will walk those new to the concept of modding, and those simply new to modding Moviestorm, through the various technical steps involved in the Modder’s Workshop.

Sections below include:

  1. Getting A License

  2. Setting Up Shop

  3. Getting to Know the Modshop

  4. Setting Up a Texture as a Wall Floor or Ceiling

  5. Importing Sketchup Models

  6. Importing Other Models

  7. Introduction to Retexturing

  8. Retexturing a Prop

  9. Retexturing a Puppet

1 – Getting a Modders Licence to use the Modders Workshop

First you need to have an active Moviestorm account, with a paid for subscription – Modder’s Licences are not available for trial users.

Moviestorm 1.6 and later allows you to create your modder’s licence in the launcher –

In 1.6: click the ‘Modder’s Licence’ button, and type in a username (or use your existing username) and password.

In 1.7+: On the ‘My Moviestorm’ menu, select ‘Create Modder’s Licence’

Once we create your modders licence, an email will be sent to your email address associated with your Moviestorm account with the details – don’t lose your password

2 – Setting Up Shop

  1. Create a desktop shortcut to your Moviestorm directory. You’ll be in and out of these files quite often so this will lessen your steps.
    1. For Windows, the directory is in ‘C:\Program Files\’.
    2. For Apple’s OS X (pre-High Sierra support only), the program files are usually invisible. To open them, go to Applications>Moviestorm. Right click (or control-click using the keyboard) on Moviestorm and select Show Package Contents. Browse through Contents to Resources. This folder contains the main Moviestorm installation, including the Addon folder with all the Addons.

  2. Create a custom Addon folder – In the Moviestorm directory, open the Addon folder. Create a new folder. For starters, something like Custom 01 is probably best. You can always move items into another, more aptly named, Addon later. The reason for setting this up now is that any files or folders added to the directory while Moviestorm is running will not be seen by Moviestorm until it is restarted. So, always create your new files and folders before starting Moviestorm.

  3. Familiarize yourself with the Addon folder structure – In the Moviestorm directory, open the Addonfolder. Every Addon that you have installed is listed there. Take the time to go through them and notice the folder structure. Example: Moviestorm\Addon\Custom\Data\Props\Primitives\Textures. When adding new content such as models or textures you’ll have to mimic these structures to be successful.

  4. Once you’ve received your license (check your email junk folder), start Moviestorm and go to the Settings menu. You now have a new Advanced Features Tab. Go there and click the Go To Modder’s Workshopbutton. Remember, check the forums often and please leave feedback, questions, and stories of success.

3 – Getting to know the Modshop

The Toolbar (Top)

  • Master Browser button – In case you close the Master Browser, pressing this will re-open it. It can take a very long time so be patient. Pressing it a second time while Moviestorm is still loading the first will bring the Modshop to a screeching halt.
  • Publisher Login button – To publish the Addons that you create, which makes them usable within Moviestorm, you must be logged in with the publisher name and password from your Modder’s Licence confirmation email.
  • Current Addon selector – This determines where the Modshop will place your content, and its associated files, when you save it. If you followed step #2 in the “Setting Up Shop” post, your Addon is already listed here. Note: The current Addon will change as you select items that are already in an Addon. Make sure to check that your intended Addon is selected before saving anything.
  • Tile Editor selector – This isn’t really the “Tile Editor”. It seems that no one came up with a name for this device so its dialog is just the same as your first option when pulling down its menu. Choosing Tile Editor in the menu will bring up the actual Tile Editor which is for using textures and images to create materials for Floors (i.e. carpet, grass, etc.), Walls (i.e. wallpapers, bricks, etc.), and Ceilings. The Sketchup Importer also resides here. As for the other options in the pull down menu, they are related to animations.
  • Icon – Later, when you have a prop on the screen, hit this icon to bring up the “Props Shown” menu. At the bottom right, choose “Add Current”. Your prop is now listed above. You can untick the “Shown” box of the prop which makes it invisible. Along the bottom left, choosing the options “Floor” through “Table” will change the height of your prop’s placement. Once the “Props Shown” menu is opened, every prop you choose is placed upon the the exact same spot and you cannot delete a prop from the set in the same way you would traditionally. When you only have one prop in the list, it is the “Current” prop. Browsing to and choosing another prop will place it on the Floor Grid on the previous prop. Hitting “Add Current” again will add the second prop to the bottom of the list and make it the “Current” prop. You cannot delete the current prop but highlighting the props above it on the list and hitting “Remove Selected” will take them off both the screen and the list. Hitting “Remove All” will take the current prop off the list but it will remain on the screen.

The Floor Grid (Background)

Movement and rotation work the same way in the Modshop as it does normally within Moviestorm and are the only functions of the Floor Grid. Its purpose is solely for viewing the content which you are creating or modifying.

The Master Browser (Left)

This is where the majority of your work will take place.

  • Show Addon selector – Affecting only the “Models” folder below, this helps speed up the search for particular items. With its default “<All>”, every model in every Addon will be listed. Set to “Sci-Fi01”, the only models listed will be those from that Addon.
  • Addons folder – A more descriptive name would be “Addon- Publishing”. Once you have content in your Addon you can choose it in the drop down menu, “Publish” it for use in Moviestorm and “Pack” it for distributing it to others or to Short Fuze for approval once the Publisher’s Marketplace is in operation. Note: You must be logged in as a Publisher (see above- Publisher Login button) before opening the Addons folder in order to publish an Addon. Untick the “Requires a license” box when publishing as the system for distributing End User Licenses for user created content isn’t currently in place.
  • Models folder – The heart of the Master Browser, here you can browse to and modify content such as props or costumes or set up new content to be used within Moviestorm.
  • Verbs, Animation States, Animation Transitions, and Animations without Transitions folders – These are all related to animations.
  • Files folder – In this folder you can browse to every file within the Moviestorm directory.

4 – Setting Up a Texture as a Wall Floor or Ceiling

Setting Up a Texture As a Wall, Floor, or Ceiling Material

  1. Use the Tile/Texture wizard on the Wizards menu.
  2. It prompts you to create a new addon, and choose what sort of texture you are making on the first screen. It lets you browse for some textures (anywhere on your hard drive) on the second screen. The diffuse texture is the important one. You can then name your new texture and the defaults on the last two pages are fine.
  3. Then you would just need to log on as a publisher, select your new addon from the ‘Current Addon’ drop down, and publish your addon.

After that you can start moviestorm normally, and try out your new floor/ceiling/wall texture.

Making your wall/floor/ceiling textures tintable

Once you have imported a material with the wizard, you might want to tweak it further, such as making it tintable.

  1. Open the Tile Editor (from the Tools menu)
  2. Find your materials; select one of Wall, Floor or Ceiling, depending on what your materials were set as.
  3. Find your addon in the left hand scrolling panel, and click it.Note, you may need to restart the modders workshop after the original wizard was run for this to appear here.
  4. The different materials should then be listed in the right hand panel; click the one you want to edit, then you can change the options as you would for a prop; to make a material tintable, tick the ‘Tintable’ check box, and then click the Diffuse button to select the default tint colour.
  5. Once you have made your changes, you can click ‘save current material’.

In depth version

Materials are the textures that Moviestorm uses for walls, floors and ceilings. Within Moviestorm, when painting a wall, floor, or ceiling the files in each Addon’s “Materials” folders are all called upon, then grouped together and presented to you as choices of wallpapers, grass types, concrete, tintable surfaces, etc.

In order to have your texture show up as one of those choices it must first be placed in the correct folder, registered by type (wall, floor, or ceiling), and then logged into a kind of texture directory called a Materials.materials file. It’s these directories which Moviestorm calls upon in order to build your list of options when painting a wall, floor, or ceiling.

Creating Textures for materials can be difficult as they should be tilable. Consult your image editor’s documentation.

Creating a Material

The following steps apply to wall, floor, and ceiling materials but as an example we’ll start with a floor.

  1. Create the appropriate folder structure – If you haven’t already, create an Addon folder as described above in “Setting Up Shop”. In this folder, mimicking the structure of the Base01 Addon, create each folder within the next until you have YOUR_ADDON_NAME\Data\Materials\Floor\Ground.
  2. Add a texture to your Addon – Following the guidelines in Texture Sizes and Performance, create and save any image in YOUR_ADDON_NAME\Data\Materials\Floor\Ground and name it something like “TestTexture_Diff” (diffuse). If you’re using a .dds image, also save a smaller 200×200 .jpg of the image with exactly the same name in exactly the same location.
  3. Create a Materials.materials file – This file uses XML and keeps track of Materials registered within it. To create this file use a text editor such as Notepad. Avoid using Wordpad as it sometimes adds additional characters and will break the XML. Open your editor and, if otherwise, create a blank document. Save this as “Materials.materials” (case sensitive) in YOUR_ADDON_NAME\Data\Materials\Floor\Ground. Note: If running Microsoft Visa, with User Account Control activated, you will most likely be unable to create this file. If so, disable User Account Control following Method #4 from this page. Note: The necessary act of creating a blank Materials.materials file will temporarily break Moviestorm. When you try to paint a floor and the Materials.materials files are called upon, the blank file stops Moviestorm from compiling your list of options. This is visibly noticeable as the floor options menu comes up blank. Once you’ve registered a texture as a material, the Modder’s Workshop writes its XML into the new Materials.materials and everything works correctly once again.
  4. Register your texture as a Material – In the Modshop, along the top tool bar, pull down the “Tile Editor” menu and choose “Tile Editor”. The dialog box in the top left is confusing as it incorrectly states where the folders below actually are. Ignore it. To the right of that are your choices of “Floor”, “Wall”, and “Ceiling”. The default is “Floor”. Below this and to the left is a list of all of the Moviestorm folders which contain a Materials.materials file. Highlight the first Addon\Base01. It lists a Material and displays it on the floor grid. Now, locate and highlight YOUR_ADDON_NAME\Data\Materials\Floor\Ground. An empty folder will list the Materials from the last folder you selected. They’re not actually in your Addon folder.
    1. Moving down, “sounds like” and “tile size”
    2. Next, we have 2 places titled “Name”. Only the first one works. Fill in a name for your Material.
    3. Of the 4 buttons down the side and the 3 ticker boxes across the top, “Tintable” is the only one which works in the “Tile Editor”. “Tintable”, allows you to tint the texture in the Set Workshop of Moviestorm.
    4. Below the ticker boxes we have 4 dialog boxes; Diffuse, Specular, Emissive, and Normal. These are for different types of textures. The one you prepared and saved will be the Diffuse.
    5. Press the browse button on the right side of the Diffuse dialog box. Browse to and choose Floor>Ground>YOUR_TEXTURE. The texture’s file path is now written in the dialog box. Note: The Workshop’s browsing function will, in specific situations, incorrectly write this path as C:\Program Files\Moviestorm\Data\Materials\etc. When this happens, the texture will appear as light grey. Check the path to insure that it starts at Data\Materials\etc. and if not, delete everything before “Data”.
    6. Press the “Preview” button in the bottom left corner. Your texture should now appear, tiled across the floor grid. Going back up to “Shininess”, play with this but “0” will many times just turn a texture black. The remaining ticker boxes are generally used for textures applied to props. Down again, to the right corner, press “Save current material”.
  5. Login as a Publisher. In the Master Browser’s Addon folder, locate the Addon, untick “Requires a License” and publish it for use. Now in Moviestorm, when you paint a floor, you can choose this Material.

Note: There can be a problem with thumbnails that are created for materials. For all types of materials (walls, floors, and ceilings), the diffuse texture is used as the thumbnail, however, .dds images do not work correctly at this time. If you used a .dds, and followed the instructions above, Moviestorm will read the small .jpg that you created as the material’s thumbnail instead.

5 – Importing Sketchup Models

Getting a Model into Moviestorm

  1. Prepare – Download and install SketchUp.
    1. The PC version of Moviestorm supports Sketchup 6; if you are using a later version, you will need to save your model in the Sketchup 6 format.
    2. The Mac version of Moviestorm supports up to Sketchup 8.Tips
      When setting up SketchUp consider setting its measurements to “metres” as one Moviestorm floor tile is one metre. For SketchUp 7, you can easily choose a template upon each startup. For version 6, you must edit the settings.
      As of 12/08, the “Recent Files” browse function of the SketchUp Importer doesn’t work, causing additional steps each and every time you import a model. A workaround would be to create a SketchUp Models folder right inside the Moviestorm Directory. Fire up SketchUp, go to Window>Preferences>Files and, for Models, browse to your newly created folder. When you open or save a model, SketchUp will now default to this location and when using the Importer’s browser, you’ll only need to go up a couple of levels.
  2. Create your Addon’s folder – In your Moviestorm directory, open the Addon folder. In this folder, create a new folder with the name of your Addon. This Addon can have multiple items in it. You do not, for organization’s sake, need to have a separate Addon for each item.
  3. Build or get a SketchUp model – Within SketchUp, you can access the official help files to get you started. Additionally, even a casual Internet search will bring up tons of user made tutorials. You can grab a Google Warehouse model by going to File>3D Warehouse>Get Models. Be aware that the Google 3D Warehouse’s Terms of Service states that the creator of a Warehouse model owns that model and that you are not allowed to distribute groups of models in one package (content pack or addon).
    See the Moviestorm SketchUp Importer page for performance issues for SketchUp models, the Importer, and Moviestorm.
  4. Save your model – For SketchUp 7, once you hit Save, locate the Save as type pull down menu and choose Sketchup 6.
  5. Read on or watch the video – davidwww’s Importing a SketchUp Model video tutorial can walk you through the remaining main points. It’s based on an old version of MS, so, if you have any problems, come on back.
  6. Import your model – Start Moviestorm and load up the Modder’s Workshop. First (and very important), along the top, under Current Addon, choose the Addon that this model will be placed in. Next, click the Import button in the top left corner and choose Import SketchUp Model. Browse to the location of your model and, under Moviestorm name, give it a unique name (ex. Television_AB_01). You could now hit Convert and get a working model or see the SketchUp Importer page for a full description of the selectable options.
  7. Publish your Addon – Login as a Publisher and, making sure to untick Requires a License, publish this model’s Addon in the Master Browser.
  8. Restart the Modder’s Workshop – The ModShop must now be restarted in order for your model to appear in the prop list of the Master Browser.

     

  9. Apply settings to your prop – When a prop is scalable, can be walked on, or can stack on top of other props, it’s because of the settings applied to it.

    1. In the list of props locate your prop and, above the Textures and Templates folders, left-click on its name. This menu doesn’t have a name at the moment, so, we’ll call it the “Descriptor” as that is the name of the file that it writes once you save it (DESCRIPTOR). Some of its options do not function.

    2. Choose your settings, the most common of which is Scalable and choose or create at least one tag for categorization.

  10. Save the Descriptor – Scroll down to the bottom right (you might have to expand the window) and hit Save. There will not be a dialogue box but, yes, it did save.

Your model is now ready to use in Moviestorm. Shutdown the Modshop, restart Moviestorm, load up a movie, and locate it in props list.

Note: The textures applied to the model are the ones from Sketchup. They are used as the Diffuse texture and your model is lacking Specular, Normal, and/or Emissive textures. Because of this, your model will seem cartoonish and lacking in detail compared to the Moviestorm assets. To learn how to create these detail enhancing textures, go to Textures. To apply these textures to your model, continue on.

Applying New or Additional Textures to a Sketchup Model

This section assumes that you’ve gone to Textures, created your new textures, and saved them in the appropriate location.

  1. Find your prop – Once the Modder’s Workshop has been restarted, go to the Master Browser and open the Props folder. Browse through, locate, and click the “+” next to your prop. The Textures folder only lists the textures that are in your prop’s folder. You cannot interact with those files. The Templates folder will have the template that the SketchUp Importer created for this prop. A Template is basically a blueprint which tells Moviestorm how to show a model and what characteristics its textures have. You can make variations of a single model by creating new Templates. Then, when you customize an item in Moviestorm, you’ll be able to pick from the different variations. Click the template.
  2. Add textures to the materials – When dealing with models, Materials are all of the surfaces of a model that shared the same texture when the model was imported. Two surfaces can be on opposite sides of a model, however, if they were both given the same texture in the modelling program, when selecting a Material and applying a texture, it will be applied to both of the surfaces. Right now the materials only have Diffuse textures. You need to designate which textures are used, which ones the materials “point to”.

    Note: Steps A and B will be expanded as the Textures category is expanded.

    1. Scroll down and in the list of Materials, click the first one. It is now the “active” material and any textures (and their settings) you designate will be applied to it. In the space below, that has Ambient, Diffuse, Specular, and Emissive buttons, the textures applied to this material are listed. The only way to tell which surface this material is, is to have, for .png or .jpg images, a browser window open to your Moviestorm directory Addon\YOUR_ADDON\Data\Props\YOUR_PROP\Textures, or for .dds, and image editor browsed to that same location. So, if the first Material’s Diffuse texture is “Textures\texture00.png” you can look at your browser, see texture00, and then locate where it is on the model. You can have one of each type of textures applied to a material and the steps are the same for Diffuse, Specular, Normal Map, and Emissive.

    2. Click the “Browse” button to the right of the Diffuse texture type. This opens the Modshop file manager. Its default is the Textures folder of the prop that you’re currently in. If you have a texture in that folder and you choose it, it will be applied to the material. However, if you browse up to use a texture outside of your prop’s Textures folder, the material will turn light grey when you apply the texture. This is a Modshop bug. The file path for the texture is incorrectly written and the Modshop cannot locate it. To fix this, simply click in and scroll to the left of the file path and delete everything to the left of “Data” and hit “enter”. If the texture remains light grey, check to make sure that there are no spaces in the file path. Sometimes the Modshop will add them and the toughest to spot are the ones hiding after a ” _ “. Repeat this step for the Specular, Normal Map, and Emissive (if needed).

    3. Apply settings (shininess, invisible to camera, etc.), as needed, for the textures on this material.

    4. Repeat all of these steps for each of the materials that your model contains.

    5. Scroll down to the bottom right (you may have to expand the window) and hit save.

  3. Publish your Addon – Login as a Publisher and, making sure to untick “Requires a License”, publish this model’s Addon in the Master Browser.

Once again, your model is ready for use in Moviestorm.

6 - Importing Other Models

Even if you’re not familiar with the general modding process, davidwww‘s How to get a 3D model into Moviestorm tutorial will show you the basics in just a few minutes.

He is using nb99‘s 3D model converter, nbconv. Currently this is our sole means of converting models other than Sketchup’s into the Cal3D format which Moviestorm uses. Although it supports .obj, .3ds, .dae (including Sketchup), our resident technical guru, equinoxx, is the only one I know of who has tested any .obj files and had this to say-

Note: nbconv does support .obj, though not always uniformly successful as with .3ds and Sketchup .dae files.

Getting a Model into Moviestorm

  1. Prepare - You will need to download and install nb99’s nbconv to convert your 3D model.  It appears that version 7 no longer exports to nbconv’s required “Google Earth 4 (kmz)” format.
  2. Step 1
    1. For Mac Users Importing SketchUp Models

      Build or get a Sketchup model - Within Sketchup, you can access the official help files to get you started. Additionally, even a casual Internet search will bring up tons of user made tutorials. You can grab a Google Warehouse model by going to File>3D Warehouse>Get Models. Be aware that the Google 3D Warehouse’s Terms of Service states that the creator of a Warehouse model owns that model and that you are not allowed to distribute groups of models in one package (Content Pack or Addon). Short Fuze has stated that you will not be able to sell models pulled from the Warehouse in the Modder’s Marketplace but there might be the potential of making an agreement with the model’s creator.

      Export your Sketchup model - In the top, left-hand corner, go to File>Export>3D Model. On the bottom, for Export Type, choose “Google Earth 4 (.kmz)”. Name the file, browse to the location you wish to save it, and hit “Export”. Note: If, during the building of your model, you created “components”, or if the creator of the model did, you will want to “explode” each of them before exporting. Not doing so can cause pieces of your model to be placed in random locations as well as a “smearing” of the model’s textures.

      Unzipping your Sketchup model - Browse to the location that you exported your model to then Right-click>7zip>Open Archive. Extract both the “images” (if you intend on using any textures that you applied in Sketchup) and “models” folders to the default location. Close 7zip.

      Convert the Sketchup model for use in Moviestorm - Open nbconv. Setting nbconv’s resize factor to 100 results in a model’s longest dimension scaled to exactly one meter. If you adjust the “Set size for resize” number to match an object’s longest dimension in centimeters, and have “Auto Resize” ticked, it should come in right to scale. Next, go to File>Open and Convert, browse to of the exported model and open the new “model” folder. Double-click on the .dae file.

    2. Step 1- For Importing Other Models

      Convert the model for use in Moviestorm - Open nbconv. Setting nbconv’s resize factor to 100 results in a model’s longest dimension scaled to exactly one meter. If you adjust the “Set size for resize” number to match an object’s longest dimension in centimeters, and have “Auto Resize” ticked, it should come in right to scale. Next, go to File>Open and Convert, browse to your model’s file and double-click.

  3. Remaining Steps For ALL Models

    1. Add the model to your Addon folder - In your Moviestorm directory (C:\Program Files\Moviestorm for PC, (???) for Mac) open the “Addon” folder. In this folder, create a new folder with the name of your Addon. This Addon can have multiple items in it. You do not (for organization’s sake) need to have a separate Addon for each item. Add each of these next folders. “Data”, then inside that “Props”, then inside that, a folder named after your prop, and finally, inside that, “Textures”. Keep this window open and in a new window, browse to the location of your model. From this location, copy the files from inside the “Textures” folder into your Addon’s newly created prop’s “Textures” folder. Now, in the location of your model, open the “model” folder and copy the .cmf, .csf, and all of the .crf files into your new prop’s folder. So, in your Addon’s folder you should have a folder named “Data”, in that a folder named “Props”, inside that a folder named after your new prop, and in there all the .cmf, .csf, .crf files and a folder named “Textures”. nbconv also creates a .CFG file which apparently isn’t needed by the Modshop and neither is the .dae that is created when converting Sketchup models.

    2. Find your prop - Fire up the ModShop, go to the Master Browser and open the Props folder. Browse through, locate, and click the “+” next to your prop. The “Textures” folder only lists the textures that are in your prop’s folder. You cannot interact with those files. The “Template” folder will list the template that you or the Sketchup Importer creates for this prop. A Template is basically a blueprint which tells Moviestorm how to build a model and what characteristics it’s textures have. You can make variations of a single model by creating new Templates. Then, when you customize an item in Moviestorm, you’ll be able to pick from the different variations.

    3. Create a Template - Right-click the “Templates” folder, choose “New Template”, and give it a name that leaves the option for variations later. If your prop’s name is “Book”, name the Template something like “Book_Thick_Red” or “Book_Thin_Red_Worn”.

    4. Read this and then save the Template - Saving in the Modshop can cause terribly confusing issues if you’re not paying close attention. In the Toolbar (NOT the Master Browser), the Current Addon will continuously change as you browse to different models. You may have set it to your Addon but it may not be set to it when you save. Right now the new Template doesn’t exist in an Addon so if you navigate to another model and back again, the Current Addon will remain the same as the one of the last model you viewed. Before going any further, switch the Current Addon (in the Toolbar, NOT the Master Browser) to your Addon and then scroll to the bottom right of the model’s template and save. Now, even if you navigate to another model and the Current Addon changes, when you navigate back to your model the Current Addon will switch to your Addon. In the event that you save your template to the wrong Addon, right-click the template’s name (not the prop name) in the Master Browser, choose “Move to Addon”, and select your Addon.

      Note: If you save your model in the wrong Addon, it won’t be registered when you publish your Addon, it will not appear in Moviestorm, and you’ll have to close/restart Moviestorm, reload the Modshop, “Move” the template to your Addon, re-publish the Addon, close/restart Moviestorm, and reload your movie. Other instances of “Saving” issues involve even more steps to fix so get in the habit of checking that the Current Addon is set correctly before saving.

    5. Add a mesh and materials - Click “Add a mesh” and choose the one listed. You have basically just added the model’s wire frame. Click “Add material” and choose each of the ones listed once. You have just added the surfaces to that wire frame.

    6. Add textures to the materials - Right now the materials have no textures. You need to designate which textures are used, which ones the materials “point to”.

      1. In the list of materials that you created, click the first one. It is now the “active” material and any textures (and their settings) you designate will be applied to it. The only way to tell which surface this material is, is to have, for .png or .jpg images, a browse window open to your Moviestorm directory Addon\YOUR_ADDON\Data\Props\YOUR_PROP\Textures, or for .dds, and image editor browsed to that same location. So, if the first Material’s Diffuse texture is “Textures\texture00.png” you can look at your browser, see texture00, and see where it is on the model. You can have one of each type of textures applied to a material and the steps are the same for Diffuse, Specular, and Normal Map (I’m not certain if Emissive works correctly at this time).

      2. Click the “Browse” button to the right of the Diffuse texture type. This opens the Modshop file manager. It’s default is the Textures folder of the prop that you’re currently in. If you have a texture in that folder and you choose it, it will be applied to the material. However, if you browse up to use a texture outside of your prop’s Textures folder, the material will turn light grey when you apply the texture. This is a Modshop bug. The file path for the texture is incorrectly written and the Modshop cannot locate it. To fix this, simply click in and scroll to the left of the file path and delete everything to the left of “Data” and hit “enter”. If the texture remains light grey, check to make sure that there are no spaces in the file path. Sometimes the Modshop will add them and the toughest to spot are the ones hiding after a ” _ “. Repeat this step for the other types of textures Specular, Normal, and Emissive (if needed).

      3. Apply settings (shininess, invisible to camera, etc.) for the textures on this material.

      4. Repeat all of step #5 for each of the materials that you added to your model.
        Read step #3 again and then save - Including the “Note”. I mean it. I didn’t write all 257 words of it because I like the clickity-clack of my keyboard. Re-read it and then save the template.

    7. Apply settings to your prop - In the Template you can apply settings to groups of textures on the materials of your prop. These dictate the “look” of the prop. Now, we’ll apply settings to the prop which dictate how it behaves and is categorized.

      1. In the list of props locate your prop and, above the Textures and Templates folders, left-click on it’s name. This menu doesn’t have a name at the moment so we’ll call it the “Descriptor” as that is the name of the file that it writes once you save it (DESCRIPTOR). Most of it’s options either do not function or are pretty specifically labeled. So being, I’ll leave it up to you to explore for now.

      2. Choose your settings, the most common of which is “scalable” and choose or create at least one tag for categorization.

    8. Read this and then save the Descriptor - As with the Template, the Current Addon, in the Toolbar (NOT the Master Browser), must be set to the Addon of the prop that you’re currently working on BEFORE saving the DESCRIPTOR. Unlike the Template, however, you can’t move it to the correct Addon with a few mouse clicks if you save it incorrectly. Also, you can’t just switch to the correct Addon and save the DESCRIPTOR again as it will continue to write to the DESCRIPTOR’s current location regardless of what the Current Addon is set to. This means that if when you place this prop onto a set in Moviestorm, and the prop’s folder is called upon, there will be no DESCRIPTOR found. None of your settings will be applied. The only way to fix this is to hunt through your C:\Program Files\Moviestorm folders, then find and move it.
      It’ll be in a folder with the name of your prop and can be located in any of the prop folders in your Moviestorm directory. It all depends on where you saved it to. “Moviestorm\Data\Props\” is the most likely place as it will be saved here if the Current Addon is set to “ROOT”. Check there first and then search through-

      Moviestorm\Addon\Core\Data\Props\YOUR_PROP

      Moviestorm\Addon\Base01\Data\Props\YOUR_PROP

      Moviestorm\Addon\Coffeshop01\Data\Props\YOUR_PROP

      - and so on until you find it. Then move (NOT copy) the DESCRIPTOR it to the correct Addon which is-

      Moviestorm\Addon\YOUR_ADDON\Data\Props\YOUR_PROP

    9. Publish your Addon - Login as a Publisher and, making sure to untick “Requires a License”, publish this model’s Addon in the Master Browser.

As long as everything is saved in the correct location, your model is ready for use in Moviestorm.

7 - Introduction to Retexturing

The goal of the following guides on retexturing Moviestorm models is to explain how to create an Addon with custom variants of MS assets without having to overwrite MS texture files or include the MS meshes (.csf, .crf, and .cmf files) in a user-made Addon. They assume that you’ve gone through the previous Modshop Beginners Guides, and are familiar with both the Modshop and the file structure of Moviestorm’s directory.

Textures

  • General - Although Moviestorm can use images in the format of .jpg, .png, and .dds, Short Fuze has decided to switch to the .dds format to increase performance. Most of their textures are already in this format, and, to modify an existing Moviestorm texture, you’ll need to have an image editor that can at least read .dds files. Some image editors do not support the .dds format out of the box, however, most do have plug-ins available that do so. For texture performance guidelines and tutorials on creating specific types of textures, see Creating a texture

  • Modifying a Moviestorm Texture - When creating a 3D model, a texture template can be generated. This template is basically a texture with blank areas that, when filling them in, will apply the correct image to the correct place on the model. When retexturing a Moviestorm model, we don’t have access to these templates, so, we typically have to modify the Short Fuze created texture that was supplied with the model. For personal use, you can make any type of modification that you wish, without restriction. However, since Short Fuze owns the originals, if your intention is to distribute these textures, whether as a single file or in an Addon, there are restrictions that must be followed.

Note: We have no problem with you distributing edited versions of the Moviestorm textures provided that they are a significant change to the original. We reserve the right to ask you to cease distribution on any texture that we feel is too close to the original. You may not distribute the original mesh or the original texture. In the future, we may have to restrict this further on, for example, licensed content that we distribute. “Significant change” would be whether a viewer can tell the difference between the original and the modded one. My rule of thumb is more or less this: if the modded item would be considered a different item in a store, that’s sufficient.

Retexturing Methods

Regardless of the format type (Sketchup, .3ds, .obj, or an original Moviestorm asset), retexturing a model will always be done in one of two ways, as a Puppet (Costumes, Heads, Accessories, etc.) or as a Prop (any other object). Both methods are similar, with the biggest exception being for how variants are handled.

With any type of model, a file is created, a template, that tells MS which Mesh to use, which Materials to show, and which textures and settings to apply to each Material.

  • Prop Variants - For a Prop, this template file is called a TEMPLATE. It is stored in the Prop’s folder. To create a variant of a prop, a new TEMPLATE must be created and saved within your Addon. For each variant, you’d create an additional TEMPLATE. In MS, in Set mode, clicking on a Prop will bring up the Customization window which allows you to choose its variations, its TEMPLATES. Your variations will be added to the existing Prop’s customization list.

  • Puppet Variants - For a Puppet, this template file is called a BODYPART. It is stored in the Puppet’s folder. Variations of a Puppet all exist in one BODYPART. To create a variation of a MS Puppet, you must create a new BODYPART in your Addon. In MS, in the Character Customization screen, this variation will not be applied to a MS Puppet’s customization options. It will create an entirely new Head, Hairstyle, Costume, etc., which you can then add variations to.

8 - Retexturing a Prop

Note: If you haven’t done so, read Introduction to Retexturing before proceeding.

Make a copy of the TEMPLATE

  1. With Moviestorm NOT running, browse to the MS Addon containing the Prop you wish to retexture, locate that Prop’s folder, and the TEMPLATE with the correct Prop name. As an example, the Prim_Backdrop_01 TEMPLATE is the flat backdrop and the Prim_BackdropPan_01 TEMPLATE is the curved backdrop.

  2. Whatever your method, PC or Mac, copy and paste the file in this location. You will now have a new TEMPLATE file with the same name along with - Copy.

  3. Rename this copy. You can name it whatever you like, however, it needs to be a name that SF will not choose in the future.

  4. Open the renamed file with Notepad or the Mac equivalent.

  5. In the first line, between <name> and </name>, change the text to whatever you named the TEMPLATE, and save the file.

Move the TEMPLATE to your Addon

  1. With Moviestorm NOT running, make sure that you have an existing Addon to use or create one by browsing to Moviestorm/Addon and creating a new folder.

  2. Fire up Moviestorm and go to the Modshop.

  3. In the Master Browser, go to Models>Props and locate the TEMPLATE that you just created.

  4. Right-click it and choose Addons>Move to>Your Addon.

  5. Go to the left corner of the screen and change the Current Addon to Your Addon.

  6. Go back to the Master Browser, left-click the TEMPLATE, and, at the bottom of the window, hit Save. This just ensured that, when you save again later, you don’t accidentally save the TEMPLATE in the wrong Addon.

  7. Browse to the Moviestorm directory, locate, and open Your Addon. Notice that, when moving the TEMPLATE, the proper folder structure was built.

  8. Within the Prop’s last folder, create a Textures folder.

Add the New or Modified Texture(s) to your Addon

  1. Copy, move, or save the new texture(s) into the Prop’s newly created Textures folder. Note: If, instead of using a pre-made texture, you’re creating or editing one yourself, see the Texture Editing tip at the bottom of this page.

Setting Up the New TEMPLATE

  1. Back in the Modshop, with the new TEMPLATE still highlighted, go to the lower window of the Master Browser and scroll down to the list of Materials. Note: When dealing with models, Materials are all of the surfaces of a model that shared the same texture when the model was imported. Two surfaces can be on opposite sides of a model, however, if they were both given the same texture in the modelling program, when selecting a Material and applying a texture, it will be applied to both of the surfaces.

  2. At a glance, which Material is the one you wish to retexture may not be easy to determine. Click on any Material and the Body Part Material Editor (BPME) window will open. At the end of the file path for the Diffuse texture there will be a .jpg, .png, or .dds. Delete the last letter and hit Enter. On the model, the corresponding Material will turn black or grey. You now know if this is the Material you want to change or not. Add the last letter back into the path and hit Enter. Continue until you’ve found the correct Material.

  3. Once the correct Material has been located, fill in the appropriate file path to your textures (Diffuse, Specular, Normal, Emissive) and hit enter. You should first try using the Browse button. If that doesn’t work, start with Textures/ and then the texture name and file type (.jpg, .png, or .dds). You may have to expand the path to Data/Props/Prop Name/Textures/texture name. Note: Sometimes the Modshop’s Browse feature doesn’t notice a Texture folder or its texture files, even after you’ve published an Addon and restarted. Also, if you have the correct file path and the texture appears solid black or grey, see Texture Sizes and Performance.

  4. At the bottom of the Master Browser, hit Save.

  5. To create additional variations, you’ll need to restart this entire process, including shutting down MS.

    Note: You can alleviate the need to restart MS by right-clicking the name of the Prop in the Master Browser and creating a new TEMPLATE. However, although this new TEMPLATE retains the meshes, Materials, and file paths of the original, it does not carrying over the ticked boxes and Shininess of any of the Materials. You’ll have to either continuously flip back and forth between the TEMPLATES to mimic its settings or take note of ALL the settings for ALL of the Materials, including those that you have no intention of retexturing. It may simply take less time to restart MS, and, you could be doing something more useful.

  6. Login as a Publisher and, remembering to untick the Requires a License box, publish your Addon.

  7. Close Moviestorm, restart it, go into a movie, and check out the Prop in Set mode. Place the MS model on set and, in the Customization window, you’ll find your variant side-by-side with SF’s.

Tip: Texture Editing - If you’re going to create your own texture (or edit one), for a model, it’s helpful to set up the new template first. Once you’ve done so, leave the Modshop running, open your image editor, edit the image, and save it into Your Addon, in the model’s Textures folder with a name ending in 01. Fill in the appropriate file path and see how the texture looks. If you need to make changes to the texture, do not save it with the same name. The Modshop will not re-read the texture and will continue to display its first iteration until its been restarted. Instead, save the new texture with the same name but change the 01 to 02. Then, in the file path, change the 01 to 02 also. Do this as many times as you like (03, 04, 05, etc.) but remember to delete any unused textures before you do a final publish and pack of the Addon.

9 - Retexturing a Puppet

Note: If you haven’t done so, read Introduction to Retexturing before proceeding.

The following is a walk-through for retexturing a Head using textures made by roguevirus. The same steps apply for retexturing a Costume, Hairstlye, Hat, an Accessory, or anything else considered to be in the Puppet category

Make a copy of the BODYPART

Before you make a copy of the bodypart file, make sure file extensions are showing: in Windows, open a file browser and browse to any folder. In the browser’s menu bar, click on “Tools” and select “Folder Options”. Click on the “View” tab. Locate “Hide extensions for known file types” (you may have to scroll down a little way) and remove the tick. Click on “OK”. File extensions (also known as “file types”) will now show in the file browser.

  1. With Moviestorm NOT running, browse to Moviestorm/Addon/Core/Data/Puppets/Male01 and locate the BODYPART file named Head Euro Young.bodypart. We are choosing this one because the textures we will be using are designed for the mesh used for Head Euro Young.

  2. Whatever your method, PC or Mac, copy and paste the file in this location. You will now have a new BODYPART named Copy of Head Euro Young.bodypart.

  3. Rename this copy as Head Euro Young_Bruised_Mod.bodypart. You can actually name it whatever you like, however, it needs to be a name that SF will not choose in the future.

  4. Open the renamed file with Notepad or the Mac equivalent.

  5. In the first line, between <name> and </name>, change the text to Head Euro Young_Bruised_Mod (or whatever you named it), and save the file.

Move the BODYPART to your Addon

  1. With Moviestorm NOT running, make sure that you have an existing Addon to use or create one by browsing to Moviestorm/Addon and creating a new folder.

  2. Fire up Moviestorm and go to the Modshop.

  3. In the Master Browser, go to Models>Puppets>Male01>Body Parts and locate the Head Euro Young_Bruised_Mod.

  4. Right-click it and choose Addons>Move to>Your Addon.

  5. Go to the left corner of the screen and change the Current Addon to Your Addon.

  6. Go back to the Master Browser, left-click Head Euro Young_Bruised_Mod, and, at the bottom of the window, hit Save. This just ensured that, when you save again later, you don’t accidentally save the BODYPART in the wrong Addon.

  7. Browse to the Moviestorm directory, locate, and open Your Addon. Notice that, when moving the BODYPART, the proper folder structure was built.

  8. Within the Male01 folder, create a Heads folder. Within this folder, create a Modified Euro folder. Within this folder, create a Young folder. Within this folder, create a Textures folder. You should now have this path- Your Addon/Data/Puppets/Male01/Heads/Modified Euro/Young/Textures

Add the New or Modified Texture(s) to your Addon

Note: If, instead of using a pre-made texture, you’re creating or editing one yourself, see the Texture Editing tip at the bottom of this page.

  1. Download roguevirus’ Black Eyes Male from Machinimods.

  2. Unzip and extract this to Your Addon/Data/Puppets/Male01/Heads/Modified Euro/Young/Textures

Setting Up the New BODYPART

  1. Back in the Modshop, with Head Euro Young_Bruised_Mod still highlighted, go to the lower window of the Master Browser and scroll down to the list of Materials.

  2. Heads/Euro/Young/Young_Euro_01 and 02 are the Materials which contain the facial textures for this model. Rename them to Bruised 01 and Bruised 02. In the list of Materials that have already been applied, double-click a Material. This will open up the Material’s name text for editing.

  3. Click Add Material, choose Heads/Euro/Young/Young_Euro_01, and rename it Bruised 03. roguevirus included ten textures in this zip, so, you can continue adding Materials up to Bruised 10. However, this walk-through will only go through the first three. Note: This is how variants are handled in a BODYPART. You add the same Material over and over, renaming it, and applying different textures to it. This particular Material is the face. When in the Character Customization screen, clicking on this Head and scrolling through its options, you’ll be scrolling through these Bruised Materials.

  4. Click Bruised 01. The Body Part Material Editor (BPME) window opens. Next to Diffuse, click inside the file path, change Euro to Modified Euro. After Textures/, change the rest of the path to male-01.dds. Hit enter. If you had Specular and Normal textures, you’d add these now. Note: Sometimes the Modshop’s Browse feature doesn’t notice a Texture folder or its texture files, even after you’ve published an Addon and restarted. This was the case for me when writing this tutorial. You should try to Browse to Heads>Modified Euro>Young>Textures and choose the textures.

  5. Highlight the entire modified path and (for PC) press Ctrl+C (copy) or Command + C (Mac).

  6. In the Master Browser, click Bruised 02. In the BPME, highlight the entire Diffuse path and (for PC) press Ctrl+V (paste) or Command + V (Mac). Change the 01 at the end of the path to 02.

  7. Repeat step 6 for Bruised 03, remembering to change the 01 to 03 and that there are a total of ten textures if you choose to add them.

  8. Save again.

  9. Login as a Publisher and, remembering to untick the Requires a License box, publish your Addon.

Tip: Texture Editing - If you’re going to create your own texture (or edit one), for a model, it’s helpful to set up the new template first. Once you’ve done so, leave the Modshop running, open your image editor, edit the image, and save it into Your Addon, in the model’s Textures folder with a name ending in 01. Fill in the appropriate file path and see how the texture looks. If you need to make changes to the texture, do not save it with the same name. The Modshop will not re-read the texture and will continue to display its first iteration until it’s been restarted. Instead, save the new texture with the same name but change the 01 to 02. Then, in the file path, change the 01 to 02 also. Do this as many times as you like (03, 04, 05, etc.) but remember to delete any unused textures before you do a final publish and pack of the Addon.