Hey Evry1! i know some people dont want to spend any money when it comes to a good image program, so they get the gimp, but there is not many tutorials for it, so today im going to show you how to make hair textures with it! i will provide pics for the actual texturing but making the brushes and such i will not because this is basic gimp and you should know how to do this.. you can do this with other image programs but you just have to know the tools.. there might be better ways to do this is just a beginners way but this works for me, these textures are not fantastically realistic but i hope some people will use them.
So Lets Get Started,
1.First, you should all know how to export a body shop project, so export a hair and then open gimp, i am using the messy adult female hair but you can use any one.
2.Next We Need To Make The Brushes, so we create a new image at 50x50 pixels,
and we put about 5 dots on it with the 3 pixel brush, then we go filters>blur>blur blur it one more time. then we click image>mode>grayscale, we get the magic wand tool, click on the white part, and then click select>invert. click file>save as and save the name
hairfull.gbr, and save it in the folder
C:\Documents and settings\yourusernamehere\.gimp2-2\brushes and make the
SPACING 1 this is important, and make the description
hairfullgimp 2-2 is my version, you may have something different which would have a different folder name but it should be fairly the same.
3.You have created your first brush! only 2 more to go. repeat step 2 but only put one 3 pixel brush dot, somewhere in the middle, and then blur twice again. when you save it save it as
hair1pb.gbr (hair 1 pixel blur) make sure the spacing is 1 again!
4. One More Brush To Go, this time get the 1 pixel brush, not the one you just made, the actual one pixel brush that came with gimp, click it in one spot about 4 times so it is crisp and repeat this in about 4 different spots. again make it grayscale but
DO NOT BLUR save it as
haircrisp.gbr and make sure the spacing is 1!
5. now to make the brushes show up press the down arrow where you select your brush, then the pic explains the rest
![](http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o271/hazza_6660/brushes.jpg)
6.next i will how you a little trick i use for alpha edits to make the ends of hair, i actually do not want to edit my alpha but i will show you if you want to! make sure you have white selected, click on your hairfull brush, check the fade out box, and have the length set to about 110 pixel and just flick the brush in the direction you want, i go over it about 3 times.
![](http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o271/hazza_6660/alphaedit1.jpg)
of course when you do it, attach it to the hair.. lol
7. now we need colours... i like to do a search on google images for blonde hair, or brown hair, or red hair, or even black hair and when you get the photo you want get the dropper tool and get the 2 shades of colour.. i use this photo because i want blonde and you are welcome to, just save the picture.. i have circled the two tones..
![](http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o271/hazza_6660/blondehair.jpg)
get the dropper and set it to set foreground colour, and pick the darkest tone, click set background colour and select the lighter colour.
8. Now we are setting the gradient, open up the texture file, and click use colour from gradient and make sure you have it set to triangular wave, have the length set to about 130, but you can experiment with this..
![](http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o271/hazza_6660/gradientbox.jpg)
9. Time to create the texture, select your hairfull brush and check your gradients are all set and start stroking in the direction you want, it's hair so make sure you have a few waves in it and dont always start at the exact starting point, even if you want it to be straight, dont try to go into details with this brush though, that comes later, do this all over the texture.
![](http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o271/hazza_6660/texturecreate1.jpg)
10. Now You Have The basic idea of the hair, keep the gradient settings the same and change brush to your hair1pb and make some waves in it, not to dramatic cause it will make it look non real.
![](http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o271/hazza_6660/afhair_Casual1hair_alpha3stdMatBase.jpg)
11. now get out the haircrisp brush and start using that experimenting with different starting points and gradient length.. this is my result.
![](http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o271/hazza_6660/afhair_Casual1hair_alpha3stdMatB-1.jpg)
as you can see it looks very messy but its just right when its on the sim.
12. now you have to copy your result and paste it onto all the other textures, i only want the adult female to have it so i just open up the ones shown on the pic and select all of the one you first edited press ctrl+c and then go onto a not edited texture and press ctrl+v and continue this for the other unedited texture..
![](http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o271/hazza_6660/copynpaste.jpg)
13. save all the textures and go to bodyshop and press the refresh button ( little round arrow next to the tool tip box) and you'll have a picture of your end result! just type your name in the tool tip box and click import to game, and you have successfully made a hair!
![](http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o271/hazza_6660/result.jpg)
Please Tell Me Any Problems with it!
Enjoy!
Harry