for the last few days I've been beating my head against Nifskope and getting nowhere.

I can get my sword into the game. I've now got my model looking good and the normals are correct.

But for the life of me I cant get to to display the right textures.

I've read various tutorials, I've watched youtube tutorials. I've done everything they say.

But I cannot get the textures to work properly.

Does anyone have any advice on what version to use, or what nif.mgl to use, or know of any better way to do it?

Will this all become an obsolete step once the CK is released?

It's very unlikely that the CK has an integrated 3D modelling program.

As I wrote in your other thread, your problems may or may not be caused by bugs in the current Nifskope betas.

The best place to check is the Niftools forums. http://niftools.sourceforge.net/forum/

So, attached to your TriShape(s), you should have a LightingShaderProperty, and attached to that is a TextureSet. The texture set uses relative paths to point to textures, so also make sure your tools are pointing at your skyrim\data folder. Check with vanilla assets for reference on which texture slots are used for what you need.

Oh yeah, I've done all that. Checked it against the origional, etc. I have all the files set up, and all the directories right. But I still cant get it to display the right textures.

Again I ask, what version of Nifscope do you use? How did he get his sword in game in the video? I've done everything he said to do, but its still not showing the right textures.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVPicWtxTWk

When you say you cannot get it to display the "right" texture, what exactly do you mean?
What does the model look like in-game?

The best version I've done only displays the specular map (Alpha Channel), and in all other versions it just looks black.

Here's an idea, maybe your texture or your normal is invalid. Try putting a vanilla texture on your custom model and putting your texture on a vanilla mesh just to make sure both are working correctly.

Well I've tested all my textures on the default steel sword model (I just renamed them to steelsword.dds, etc) and they work fine on that, all the normals and bumps and colors are displayed on the steelsword, they just dont on my model.

Well, that narrows the problem down to your model. Your obviously missing something crucial. Open the the vanilla mesh and your mesh and compare them node for node, property for property and you will likely find the problem. make sure you don't have any empty unused properties within an array because that will often bork your mesh.

I have I have. Many times. Still no dice.

I think i know what's going on. I remember when FO3 came out that it was necessary to not only point to the correct texture within the mesh but the item's object data in the esp also has to point to the right texture because Beth added the ability to alter textures on the fly eliminating the the need to redistribute meshes with re-textures.

Have you tried replacing a vanilla mesh with yours and using it's vanilla texture? If that works than i'm right.

Yep, just did that. It still looks black.

--

Nifscope is not attaching textures to my model.

LOL, just read your sig....

Ok Ok. I changed my sig.

I tried again using the Iron Long Sword .nif as my base, and put my sword into that.

Still no dice.

Vertex colors maybe?

Have you copied an existing Effect/Lighting shader property from a vanilla asset to see if it's a problem with how yours is configured?

Yeah the shader is a direct copy. All I did was change the texture path, so that it points to my textures. I remade the nif and coppied the shader block branch and didnt change the texture path so it would use the default textures, and still it wouldnt work.

Update: I used a sword somebpdy else made as a base and set my textures up, and I finally got my textures into the game

Screenshot:
http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/595831282339079085/70E90F1F08E65DF7442E8FF4D005211C7018B40B/
http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/595831282339183843/C712855D0495024F5BCA31695D124010E8738C1E/

Its weird that If I modify a vanilla .nif it doesnt work, but if i modify that nif some one else made, it works fine.

Had you tried to right-click your mesh in Nifskope and choose "Face Normals", "Flip Normals", or "Flip Faces"? Usually the mesh either looks really light or really dark in Nifskope until I use Face Normals and then it looks normal and shows up fine in-game. Just thought I'd post this in case it helps anyone, since no one else had mentioned it.

I do all the normals in Maya when I make the model and I check them before I export.

In that case you'll most definitely want to fix it in NifSkope. At the very least, Mesh>Update Tangent Space so you get everything you need.

Are you exporting obj or nif from Maya?

OBJ export from Maya 2011

Smoothing the normals in NifSkope messed up my normals for the gems and the blade.

Probably the reason why it worked when you used someone else's nif is because the shader is different, aka the default shader. You were probably using one of the env map shaders.. which makes me think TK is on the money, vertex colors/ _e/ _m map / vert normal issue. that shader requires vertex color. In my experience if you are suing that shader, simply whacking vert color on with fix your issue.
And obviously if you tangents aren't correct.. you'll have issues.

I have no idea what your talking about. lol.

obj import won't create entries for Tangents and Binormals, and potentially not UVs either. If bs num uv sets is not 4097 in a TriShapeData, uvs won't get imported, this is a current bug in NifSkope.

Try this:
-Either create a dummy TriShape>TriShapeData, and in the ShapeData change BS Num UV Sets from 0 to 4097.
-Or use an existing .nif
Select this TriShape and do File>Import>obj.
-rClick the TriShape and do Mesh>Update Tangent Space. If you exported without normals/smoothing do Mesh>Face Normals first. There are cases where this is the better option coming from Maya, but that's another topic.
-In the TriShapeData, check that Has Vertex Colors = yes. If not, double click it and make it so, then click the refresh icon next to Vertex Colors to flood-fill the array with white.
-Drink more Ovaltine.

Well It works fine if I just override someone elses work.

While I would like the shaders to be a bit more shiney, the way it is now is adequate for testing untill a new version of Nifskope is released and the CK comes out.

Hey guys,
Just wanted to ask if there is a way to import existing vertex colors on a model into nifskope?
thanks for all the hard work on nifskope, by the way!