How can I control the Transparency of an alpha texture? Example: To make smoke fade away. I am controling the burst and movement with IPO’s, but can’t seem to figure out how to control the alpha value of the object… UGH!!! Can someone help, Thanx…
The NDN…Beat down by Blender once again…
If you go to the IPO window you will see the material ipo button (looks like a red sphere) Click on it, then look at the list on the right, you should see Alpha. This is the IPO for an object’s alpha value, click on it, then you can add keyframes by shift-clicking in the IPO window.
Thanks much wiseman303, greatly appreciated, now going to check it out, thanks again for your help…
NDNChief…
Materal ipo’s don’t work in game engine i don’t think, you need to use ColA in the object IPOs.
Pooba
Thanks Pooba, Im going to test it out today!!!
The NDN…
The IPO’s for Material do not even show up in the IPO window, but object does. I tried fooling with the cola button in the ipo window, but still cant figure it out. I am not real familiar on how to use this window. How would I use this window to control the transparency of an object, and since it is an object and not a material, do you have to have an alpha channel, I would think not, but I do not know. Here is the problem. I have an animation of 100 frames, using logic bricks, once the animation reaches frame 80, I want to start it to fade to 100% transparency by the time it reaches frame 100. Just to give an idea of what I am trying to do… Need more help, or more of an explaination on HOW TO…
Thanx…
NDNChief, Once agian, I’ve come to a GRINDING HALT!!!
are u ppl talking about blender 2.23? or blender 2.25?
i dont think alpha ipos are possibly in 2.23, i might be wrong, is it?
I am using Publisher 2.25…
Still need help with transparencies in game engine. How can I make an object fade out. Please read this string, if you know could you please help, Thanx
The NDN, Now getting Desperate…
Jeez, i guess i need a more in-depth explanation…
To make a alpha ipo first select colA in the ipo window by right-clicking on it, and then ctrl-click to create points on the “graph.” 0 is solid, and 1 is transparent. If you want to create a fade out type thing, ctrl-click on 1 in frame 1 and then ctrl-click on 0 in frame 11 (or whatever).
Hope that helps, i’m not the best explainer, but try it.
Also i think you have to use a texture (like just a jpg with just plain black on it) and then enable “alpha” in the face buttons.
Pooba
In the ipo window, whenever you press ctrl and leftmouse, it will insert a control point in the ipo curve wherever your mouse is located. So to insert a point on frame one, align the mouse horizontally on frame 1, and vertically over the value you want alpha to be - probably 1. Then ctrl-click.
For the last frame, align the mouse horizontally on the frame you want to be the last frame; align the mouse vertically where you want the alpha value to be - probably 0. Then, ctrl-click again. Now you will have two controlpoints on the alpha curve that should give you the alpha animation you desire.
In 2.2, there were no alpha ipos available to my knowledge, and any col ipos on alpha textures made them disapear. I’m glad to hear about the first thing being true, what about the second problem. I suppose I should test and see if that issue is fixed also.
OK, in the materials ipo window, there is the values from 0 to 1 on the left side of screen to choose alpha value, but it seems the ipos in the game engine dont work or even show up in this window, so if you go to the ipo object window, the ipo “graph” does show up, but there is no way of selecting alpha value on the left side of screen those are for location only, hence OBJECT window. Both what Pooba and Saluk said is true, but in the object window there is no way of choosing alpha value 0 to 1, and in the materials window you can just as saluk said, but game engine ipo’s do not show up in this window, as Pooba had mentioned. I really appreciate your replies, but I am still no where with this, Do you all understand what I am saying, can tranperancies be controlled in the game engine in conjuntion with ipo’s. I am starting to lose faith on this one. If anyone have any answers to this, please reply. Mabey I am just not getting it, wouldnt be the first time, LOL…
NDNChief…Desperate to find a solution>>>>>>>>>
Still looking for answer, or help with this problem…POST TO MOVE UP!!!
The NDN…UGH!!!
Did you use an ipo actuator to actually play the ipo? I got it to work, don’t despair! Rescue is near… hehe…
Wybren van Keulen
Funny Farm
It’s not the realtime window, nor the material window, but the ipo curve window. You can select it with the icon that looks like a graph. It should be a graph. One thing we all forgot to mention is that you have to right click on “alpha” on the right side of the ipo editor before you can place the points.
Also, I think your object’s texture has to be a saved tga with an alpha channel, whose faces are rendered in alpha mode. And make sure to PLAY the ipo with an actuator.
I realize it is the IPO window, I was referring to the Materials window and the Object Window within the IPO window. I have realized I can use the materials window, I have added control points at zero and 1 from frame 1 to 100, also used actuator IPO from 1 to 100 and tried it with both targa and jpeg, the animation works fine, but i get no change in tranperency, all I get is a throbbing head-ache… LOL… Hey WAVK, you said you have gotten it to work, could you explain the way you did it for me, I hate to keep asking, but I really need to get this to work, thanks to everyone for their time, and replies, any other ideas of what I am doing wrong please let me know, thanx…
The NDN…
-It must work.If you have a tga image and have selected “Alpha” in Paint Buttons Window.Then open an IPO window with Shift+F6.Select ColA and with Ctrl+LBM select the point you want.It must work.If you want to see colors of the texture have to do the same thing with ColR,ColG and ColB,
otherwise you will see only a black to transparent image.
The targa has to have an alpha channel. This doesn’t mean you have to give it transparencies, but most paint programs don’t save an alpha channel automatically. In paint shop pro you can make a mask (mask from image) choose source opacity, then say make alpha channel from mask and use the mask. Then save as a tga.
I don’t know how to do it in other programs, but there usually is no alpha channel by default.
And don’t forget to set all the faces to render in alpha mode. Select the object, hit f, go to the paint buttons, select alpha, and click on copy drawmode. Make sure you have all the faces selected as well.
OK, I’ve got it all figured out. Like Ben said, you need to make curves for the R, G, B colors as well. Also choose Alpha in the paint buttons, but the image does not need an alpha channel, I have made this work with even a jpeg.
I’ve made a demo showing how it’s done. Note that even though I’m using a jpeg, I still have Alpha selected in the paint buttons. Also the IPO curves for RGB stay constant at 1.
http://blended3d.cjb.net/fadeout.html
I’m pretty sure my explanation was right… you don’t need an alpha channel, i did it with a plain jpeg saved in paint and it works fine. Just follow my steps…