How to create promotion buttons similar to vanilla Civ4?

[Maniac]

I'd like to make some promotion buttons, but I'm wondering how to make them look alike to the vanilla Civ4 promotion buttons.

The blue background is available in asio's buttonmaker, but I don't know how to process the icon itself to be placed on top of the background.

To anyone out there who has already created promotion buttons, can you tell me what colour, pattern, lighting effects, bevel, shadow or anything else do you use?

Thanks!

 

[DVS]

thread bookmarked; I could also use this info.

thanks to anyone who posts it.

 

[mechaerik]

In addition, i would like to know how to transplant weapons and such; like putting the marines M4 on the Great Scientist button.

 

[xienwolf]

You'll need photoshop to use this, but the design makes it quite simple to create your own buttons that look near to exactly like the Civ promotion buttons. Unfortunately if you don't know how to lift weapons from one picture and place them on another it hints heavily at you not having photoshop, or not being overly familiar with some of the tools that make life considerably easier (like paths).

 

[mechaerik]

While I do not have photoshop, the computer lab at my school does, even if im not particularly skilled or aware of how to use it. I do have GIMP, however.

 

[Maniac]

I also have GIMP, but not Photoshop. So alas, I can't use that attachment.

 

[Refar]

I didn't mess witht the promotion icons yet, but generally, concidering how small the icons are, i dont think the exact setting do matter a lot. You could blend the original icon next to the one you are working on (or over it in a extra layer) and just look what bevel/drop shadow give you a similar result...

PS.: Or attach some source picture that you want to make icon off, then i can process it and give you the settings/filters i used.

 

[mechaerik]

gIMP can open PSD files; however there is an odd occurence.

When i open it in GIMP it was COMPLETELY different than in Photoshop. Also, in GIMP it said there were 46 layers, but i dont recall ther being that many in PS.

 

[Refar]

Xienwolfes PS has a lot of layers. Some layers are collected in sets, others have sub-components like masks. Gimp is probably reading everything as separate layer.

 

[Maniac]

gIMP can open PSD files

Ah woops. Opened it myself too now, but as far as I can see this file alone does not answer the question how to make promotion buttons.

It answers what base colour of 'gold' to use.

However it does not answer what pattern, bevel and shadow to use. Bevel and shadow is something one can probably get right by experimenting, but I wouldn't know what to do with the pattern. There's definitely a noticable difference between buttons with or without a pattern to add some life to a monotomous colour.

Also I see the xienwolf's buttonmaker includes a glow and lighten layer, but after having another look at Firaxis' buttons, as far as I can see their promotion buttons don't use such effects.

PS.: Or attach some source picture that you want to make icon off, then i can process it and give you the settings/filters i used.

One of the buttons I'd like to make is for the Empath Song promotion. I'd like to use the heart from the SMAC Centauri Empathy icon.

 

[Vrenir]

Tsentom1 has just released a couple of modded python promotions with custom, vanilla-looking icons.

 

[Maniac]

They're unused Firaxis-made buttons.

 

[xienwolf]

In Photoshop you can assign a "style" to each layer, and the gold layer utilizes a style with a mask to achieve the bevel and shadow appearance you want. I am guessing GIMP doesn't open that up so well

 

[Maniac]

GIMP says that layer has a mask, but that mask certainly doesn't add a bevel or shadow in GIMP. I don't think that's possible in GIMP. Or perhaps it is, but I just don't know GIMP well enough.

What are the details of the bevel and drop shadow you use btw?
In GIMP for buttons I've created so far I used:

Filters/Decor/Add Bevel... : Thickness 5
Filters/Light and Shadow/Drop Shadow: Offset X: 0; Offset Y: 0, Blur Radius: 45: 80% opacity; uncheck 'Allow resizing'

Is that comparable to how you can specify bevels and shadows in Photoshop?

Do you use a pattern??

 

[xienwolf]

The mask just works to define your shape. The layer styles are applied under that, to what (without the mask) is just a large chunk of solid gold color.


I use a Multiply Drop Shadow at a 135 degree angle Global Light, 75% Opacity, distance and size of 5 pixels and a 0% spread. Inner glow is a yellow to transparent gradient Screen Blend, 67% Opacity 20% Noise, softened edge effect with a size of 5 pixels and no choke, contour is a 45% angle 50% range 0 Jitter plane. Then the Bevel is a Smooth Inner Bevel with a 103% depth going up, size 3 pixels and 1 pixel softening, shading angle is 120 degrees with a 30 degree non-global light, Gloss Countour is again a 45% angle with a white Luminosity Highlight at 94% Opacity and a black Luminosity Shadow at 65% Opacity. Finally I have a Vivid Black Light Satin at 12% Opacity using a 108 degree angle at 17 pixel distance and size 9 pixel, once again just a plain 45% Contour.


If any of that made sense... impressive. I just pretty much fiddled with buttons and sliders till it seemed to look how I wanted it to look for all of the shapes I could think of at the time.

 

[Refar]

Yea, Gimp is indeed missing some nice tools, not just layer styles... More than i expected actually, concidering that my version of Photoshop is 10 years old by now... Well maybe it's just hidden too well in the unfamiliar interface...
Anyway... After fiddling a bit with what is there, i think i came close... Made the circle a bit too big, so there is less blue than usual... But since it's just a prototype... meh ;-P

It's without any 'custom' hand editing - just using layers and filters. The invisible layers are for reference or to document some steps. The title of each layer tell you what filter setting were used to obtain it.
Used the latest Gimp 2.6.

 

[Maniac]

If any of that made sense... impressive.

It sorta did. But of course GIMP doesn't have all those options. :dizzy:

Anyway... After fiddling a bit with what is there, i think i came close...

Thanks!

I tried to replicate your results yesterday, and have two big questions though which I can't figure out.

1) How do you 'move' the saturation and divide brightness/contrast layer '2 down'. Move 2 what down? As I haven't figured this out yet, the shadows just 'overwrite' the brightness/contrast layers.

2) Do you know the exact HTML notation of the base colour you use?
For some reason the colour picker is giving me some troubles. Never happened to me before. Eg sometimes it doesn't pick up the colour at all, or it only switches to black or white. Or I pick a colour, but when I paste it as a new layer, it actually looks different. In any case the colour picker isn't giving me the colour which I would assume it is picking. Is it ffac0b or e09a12? Or yet something else?
Screenie for instance:

 

[Flying Pig]

I made a few in Macromedia Fireworks MX by copying and pasting a section of blue background then using one of the gold shades almost identical, when used softly, to the vanilla one. Before that, I mushed together a whole layer of gold atop the blue and erased as required.

 

[Azurian]

Color is #E08E00 / R: 224 G: 142 B: 0