Alpha Channel Tutorial

[AlienArsonist]

We need a better alpha channeling tutorial. I'm trying to edit some terrain .blp's and i need to know how to do all that alpha channel thing but the tutorial we have on THW is really vague and hard to understand.

I'm stuck on how to export/convert/import it

Can anyone make a better tutorial or just tell me how to alpha channel?


Here is the Tutorial we have on THW

 

[Pharaoh_]

Well, you will get Warcraft III Viewer, located here: http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/tools.php?id=rgy4bk
You will open it, go to Edit -> Search and type the blp path you want. When you find it, double click on it and the blp file will be viewed in the Viewer. Go to "Current File" and then "Extract (and convert) BLP". The default file output is *.bmp, but I suggest changing it to *.tga.
After you're done, open Photoshop or the paint program you have (I'll speak of Photoshop, cause this is what I have). In the right column there is the "Layers/Channels/Paths. Go to the "Channels". You will see "Red"/"Green"/"Blue" channel. If there is no extra channel, called Alpha or something, then press the third tiny button below, which, when you hover your mouse will display "Create New Channel". There is your alpha channel. Now, select this channel, so that the "Alpha" becomes blue = selected. Now go to the brush and get the default settings of the brushes, so that it returns black as the forground color and white as the background color. The alpha skinning works like this: Everything you paint with a black brush will not be displayed in-game (this is the alpha skinning) and everything you pain in the white color will retain it in-game. That's all!
Have fun