First thing to note, this is not a guide to getting started with SFM!

So, if you don't know SFM at all, I recommend watching tutorial SFM videos for beginners:
https://youtu.be/PqcRoizrv3Q?list=PL2B46DEB4157E67C4

or korean subtitle ver!

https://youtu.be/PZ6sgS47szw

There are also many good SFM introductory guides made by users on YouTube and Steam guides.
That might be better!!!

There are 11 guide videos on this YouTube channel, but I think just watching 4 is enough.

Videos 1-3 are a guide to animation production. While this guide doesn't cover animation creation, I recommend watching it anyway.

Following these steps won't be so hard to follow. So if you know the basics, it won't be difficult.
(i.e. how to load a model or simply adjust a model).

1.SFM

https://steamproxy.com/steamstore/app/1840/Source_Filmmaker/
Install SFM, it's free!

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2.A Hat in Time 2019 Nyakuza Pack

https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1842477059&searchtext=Hat+in+time
Download the Hat in Time Model Pack!
If you look carefully inside the link, there is a download link on the workshop asset site to obtain the assets. Be sure to follow the instructions of the uploader! Don't just hit the subscribe button!

Once everything is downloaded, go to the SFM installation folder, enter the game folder, and unzip the downloaded file there. (The detailed instructions are in the "Read me" of the download)

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3.Random props from A Hat In Time

https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2171392995&searchtext=hat+in+time
This adds some models that are not in the Hat in Time Nyakuza Pack!
With these models, you can use them to build a bed room for your spaceship.

Once you've subscribed and downloaded, it's time to launch SFM.

First, let's make a simple spaceship that will be used as a background.

Assembling the spaceship itself is fairly easy. It's really simple, just move and rotate.
So, if you are familiar with SFM, feel free to skip this section, otherwise I recommend following this section and practicing with this spaceship assembly!!

(I used this map for my projects!)
https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=218822107

If you subscribed to A Hat In Time's Random Props, you'll be able to locate its assets here.
(If only the folder is visible, make sure there is nothing in the Mod Filter above or the Filter text box below. If it still doesn't work, press Rescan!)



There are three main models needed to assemble a spaceship: walls.mdl (spaceship walls), pillowpile_structure.mdl (stairs?), and pillowpile.mdl (pile of pillows). Load these three.

(A hat kid bed and table can be added later.)



If you add everything, it will look like this!

First, move down the pillowpile_structure prop.



In the case of the pillowpile, it needs to be rotated... There are two ways.
You can just rotate it with the mouse, or there is a way to rotate it by modifying the angle numerically.



Click pillowpile in Animation Set Editor, and double-click rootTransform - rot!
(rootTransform - rot, rot refers to Rotation, pos refers to Position)



Then three numbers come out like this.
These are X Y Z values ​​respectively. The angle by which the model is rotated. This means that the current model is rotated -180 degrees on the Z axis. Here, if we modify the z value from -180 to 90,



Voila, it rotates much more precise than manually rotating it!

Note that!!



sometimes, when using this method, the model disappears, and the modified value becomes like this.
I don't know why this happens, but You can fix it by pressing Control + Z to reset it.



Back to the spaceship... By adjusting the height of the pile of pillows to fit, the making of spaceship will be done!

You can add a table and a bed as needed.

This is the completed spaceship session file. Download it if necessary.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IFh_Bjef3PsXBm5NOwq9Q-D3EfAnsDD_/view?usp=sharing

Hat Kid and Bow Kid models are similar, but have few differences.

The Hat Kid model is more complex and has more features. Hat Kid can adjust the cape, hair, and eyes, but Bow Kid doesn't. But first, let's start with Hat Kid.



If you do a search, you'll find two Hat Kid models. One is a normal Hat Kid (hat_kid_pbr), and one is a Hat Kid (hat_kid_outfit) with a Nyakuza or Vanessa outfit.

Please load hat_kid_pbr first!



Hat Kid will appear right in front of you. First, let's learn how to adjust Hat Kid's eyes.

Set your viewport to the work camera, and move away from Hat Kid



First, hold the Control key, hover over the viewport, and find the purple viewTarget in front of Hat Kid's eye.
The Hat Kid's eye sees this viewTarget. By adjusting this, you can adjust Hat Kid's eyes.



Like this

(I always move the viewTarget down and a little further away.
I personally do this naturally.)

(For reference, there is no viewTarget for Bow Kid. ;~; You need to modify the texture of Bow Kid's eyes to make her look at a certain way.)


Now let's create a simple pose!



Before we attempt in mimicking the pose... One tip that will help you make a pose for Hat Kid
is to try to do the pose in real life.
And be aware of how the joints move and how much it moves.
If you take the above pose in real life, you will find that more joints move than you think.

If you raise your right arm high, your back, chest, and head will tilt slightly to the left, and your feet will move slightly to balance your body...

Implementing all of that into SFM would look much more natural!



Hat Kid's left and right arms.

(The joint names of the arms are upperArm_L and upperArm_R!)

Let's modify these arms! Raise the right arm slightly and lower the left arm.



It's very awkward...
Cloaks through arms, awkward poses.

it's okay Modify the cloak first!



When modifying the arm, rotate prp_clockTop appropriately. (The cape has a lot of joints, so it can be hard to find. Look for it on Hat Kid's shoulder!)
(And clockTop is a joint that is often modified along with adjusting the arm.)



(If it is difficult to find clockTop in the viewport, it is okay to look for it in the Animation Set Editor on the left. Scroll down to hat_kid_pbr/Unknown to find it.)



You just have to rotate it properly like this.

But the other arm...



Even if the cape is rotated like this, the arms are overlapping.



In this case, there are two ways, one is to move the clockTop like the gif above



Or modifying the clockCollar to move the entire shoulder of the cloak.
The collar is also a joint that is often used when modifying the arm. Remember this too :)

It doesn't matter which way. You can try both and use whichever method is comfortable for you.

Once the cape is finished, it is time to modify the hat kids lowerArm to give it a natural look.



I don't think there's anything special to explain!
If the cloak overlaps with the arm and becomes awkward, rotate the clockTop slightly again.

Now it's time to modify Hat Kid's fingers.
Rotate the Hat Kid's fingers inward.



One tip, shift key + click can modify multiple joints at once.
Great for rotating multiple fingers at once, but exclude the thumbs when you do this.

(This is convenient when you need to modify several joints at the same time, but this method is not always good. Based on the last selected joint, the rest of the joints are rotated together, so the joints may stretch or look strange. However, the finger is a small part, so it is very noticeable. It doesn't stand out, so it's usually okay.)

We're almost done!
Now we're going to tilt it to give it a natural look from above.

Slightly rotate bip_spine_0 in the middle of Hat Kid's body, bip_hip_R for Hat Kid's right leg, Upper_arm_r for Hat Kid's left arm, and bip_head for Hat Kid's head.



If you want more detail, modify the hat kid bip_zipper and the hat kid bangs bip_hair slightly to match the rotation direction of the body.



In the case of bip_Hair, there are 3 joints, bip_hair_0 is used for the entire hair, and bip_hair_1 and bip_hair_2 are used to implement small shaking when the head is tilted...



Look how similar it is! Now I think we should implement the hat kid expression...

But before that, I think it would be much easier to see if we simply added a light source first.

(The left is our goal, the right is the pose we are currently making)

Hat Kid's expression can be modified in the Animation Set Editor!



Do you see halfblink, hurt, and sleepy under unknown under hat_kid_pbr1? You can either click on that or just edit what you see on the right.



The eyes and eyebrows can be modified like this.
Pull the EyesShut slide bar all the way to the right, so we can get a big grin!



The way to fix Hat Kid's mouth is a little different. In the Animation Set Editor, right-click the hat kid -> Set Body Groups -> Modify it in Mouths.
FYI, you can also remove the Hat Kid cape, remove the hat, or change the clothes in these Body Groups. :)
Remember that this feature is used very often throughout SFM.



Set Hat Kid's mouth to "mouth_happy" here and you're done! (mouth_determined is also a smiling mouth. This is also recommended.)

Now that the pose is complete, it's time to simply decorate it with a light source.

There are many good guides on Steam for SFM lights!

However, most of the guides are in English (this guide was originally written for Koreans!), and I don't know all of them, but I'll tell you how to use a simple light and how I use it.

prior knowledge
1.SFM can add up to 8 lights. You cannot add more than 8. (but you can add more light by turning off light shadows)
2. It's best to find your own way by arranging light in various positions, making it brighter, and trying various methods often.
3. But when it comes to arranging lights, 3-point lighting is the most acceptable.
It's better to do a Google search for details. (I think it's very simple and easy to learn)



intensity, this is the brightness of the light. I usually use it by setting it to a value between 0.05 and 0.001.
Depending on the brightness of the map or the mood of the art, you can brighten or match it!

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These two refer to the width of the light! See the gif below or try it yourself.

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Skip the other settings and see shadowDepthBias below



This is an option related to light and shadow, and it is recommended to set the value high. I'm not sure what the principle is, but when I pull this to the maximum, the models look pretty smooth.



(This option doesn't make a big difference in preview, so you can see the difference when you print the poster.)

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It is the color of the light
RGB You can combine these three colors to give color to the light, and if you use it well, you can create a good atmosphere.

You can use it to give a good vibe to even plain art.



before adding color


after adding color

I mainly complete all the poses and correct the colors!

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And if you right-click on a light in the Animation Set Editor, several options appear.
Set Light Gobo Texture, Enable Light Frustrum, Disable Shadows, Enable Volumetrics...

Just to explain what I know: Set Light Gobo Texture
This can modify the texture of the light. It's not an option I use often, but it's good to know.
You can understand more by looking at the link below.

https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=388582552&searchtext=gobo
https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1981340737&searchtext=gobo

I used this to represent the light shining through the leaves!



The light on Cooking Cat's hat, the light on the floor, the light on Hat Kid and Bow Kid's hair, etc...

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enable light frustum allows the light to draw lines.
It can be useful, but don't forget to turn it off when rendering the poster.
Because even when the poster is rendered, these lines of light are displayed as they are!

---

Disable Shadows is an option to turn off light shadows, and is often used in situations where shadows should not occur.
and one more! SFM says that if you create more than 8 lights, you can use up to 8, but if you turn off the shadows of the lights, you can create more than 8 lights.

Enable Volumetrics makes the light look like this, It can be used pretty cool.



You can use it like this!





However, the light is strong, so it is difficult to use, and when there are many, the lag gets worse and it is quite tricky.

And there is one bug



There is a bug where the light overlaps like that whenever you add a light or perform an action related to light.
In this case, it can be solved by moving slightly in the work camera mode, but it is a rather inconvenient bug.

---

Back to the hat kid... I covered a lot of stuff above, but here I added three lights and just tweaked the brightness and shadowDepthBias.

I just added a three-point light and three lights, one in front of the hat kid, one on the side of the hat kid, and one behind the hat kid.
Unless the light is used specially, this is fine.

Cameras, like lights, have various functions, but there is no set method. It's okay to just use it, but it has a lot of good features to know.



fieldOfView - FOV! As the height increases, the model looks distorted, so it is recommended not to touch it unless it is for a special production.

focialDistance - The focus. There is a similar function in the Hat in Time game, which blurs the background or front.

aperture - The aperture. Use it in combination with the focus above. A high value will blur the background a lot.

A more detailed description of the focus...



If you look at this art, you'll notice that the background behind looks pretty blurry compared to the kids. Since we want to focus on the kids, we adjusted the settings of the camera so that only the kids aren't blurred out and only the background is blurred.

Going back to our art!



Shall we apply it to the art we make?
Simply adjust the focialDistance until everything else, except hat kid, is blurred out.



Then, increase the aperture and you're done!
The higher it is, the more blurry it will look.

You can preview what it will look like by pressing F2 to jump into the clip editor, then clicking in the viewport and waiting for a second.

What you need to know is that focus makes only the focused area appear sharp.

This means blurring everything that is in front of the camera, not just the parts that are far from focus, the background.



If you look closely at this art, you'll notice that not only the background is blurred, but also the pillow directly in front of the camera.
The pillow is also blurry because the focus is on the hat kid and the bow kid.
If you use this well, it can be a wonderful production, or it can be an uncomfortable element. Be aware.

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toneMapScale - It seems to set the overall brightness of the map. Lowering this value lowers the overall brightness of the map.
This is a useful option for creating a dark night.

When the map brightness is lowered



basic look



If you use this well, you can darken the map brightness so that only the surroundings of the model are bright.

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Then there are the SSAO settings, these are the ambient occlusion settings.

Ambient Occlusion is an effect that adds shadows between objects.

For example, there are small shadows between Hat Kid's hair and head, and also small shadows on piles of pillows in the background.



Ambient Occlusion refers to these shadow effects.
Think of SSAORadius as the range of how many of these shadows you want to create...

(By the way, I don't know much about AO. Please let me know if any information is incorrect.)

SSAOBias - Settings related to ambient occlusion. I don't know the details, but it seems to produce a similar effect to the ShadowDepthBias described earlier in Light.
SSAOStrength - Strength of ambient occlusion. If it is high, the small shadows of the objects will be strong, if not, the AO will disappear.
SSAORadius - Sets the extent of ambient occlusion. A higher value will result in more shadows, and no value will cause the AO to disappear.



I usually set my AO like this. You can adjust it according to the situation to find the optimal value.



If you want to know more about light and camera

These are the guides I personally recommend (although in English)
https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=841709506
https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1148344812
https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1716880745

(Glowing Eyes in our Spilled Beans guide here also applies to hat kids. Highly recommended!)

Now it's time to render the long-awaited image!

First, right-click on the view port and hit Render Settings.
You can make the image quality better here :)




Pictures and your settings may be very different.

First of all, Depth Of Field, if you set it to a high number, the rendering speed will be very slow, but the higher it is, the clearer the result will be!



(When set to use camera setting, the quality is slightly dirty/grainy.)



(When set to 1024, it looks pretty neat.)

It is recommended to zoom in

Motion Blur is used when making animations, but you can turn it off since we are not making animations.

I'm not sure what Subpixel Jitter AA is, but when I turn it off, the image gets messy. It's good to leave it alone.



If you open the AO settings, Outline Only or AO & Outline will appear. If you set it to Outline, an outline will be added to the model.



Outlines work well for special occasions. But some hats look pretty dirty like that, so it seems like a good thing to keep in mind for now.

Rendering settings are now complete.



Click File - export - poster,
It's a Poster, not an Image!



We're almost there!
There are tga, png, and jpeg formats. TGA is not a commonly used extension, so lets not use that

png is of high quality, but its size is high.

The quality of jpeg is lower than png, but it is ok. I recommend jpeg.

4K resolution is recommended!
The recommended extension is jpeg. The png extension has the best quality, but if you print it in 4K, the file size becomes too large, so you can't upload it on Steam or Discord.

If you're not uploading to Steam, PNG is fine too.



Rendering. It may take some time depending on your computer specifications.



Rendering done! It is said that this tga is used in a special place, but I am not sure where it is used. It's very large, so we recommend deleting it.

Once rendered, change the file extension name from jpeg to jpg. Steam doesn't recognize jpegs. jpeg and jpg are different only in the name of the extension, but steam does not recognize jpeg -_-



anyway its complete!!

One more thing, I simply edit the poster with the Windows image editing function before uploading it.

If you right-click an image file and click Edit Photo, you can adjust the color, sharpness, or lighting.



I usually set the color high!! Then most of the time it looks better

This section covers the manipulation tips of sfm
These are good tips to know!

Hide model or hide joints



In the animation set editor, on the left you will see an icon that looks like an eye icon and a mouse pointer.
Here, the eye icon decides whether to hide the model or not, and if you click the icon that looks like a mouse pointer, the joint for manipulation will not be visible even if you hover the mouse while holding down the control key in the viewport.



This is useful when you temporarily hide a specific model or when it is difficult to find joints due to overlapping models.

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Copy Model

To copy a model, right-click on the model, press Copy Animation Set(s), right-click on the Animation Set Editor and press Paste Animation Set.

---

Resizing the model

This is useful if the model downloaded from the workshop is too large or too small.




(Hat Kid here is wearing a hat. It's because I wrote section 8 and late added about model sizing here!!)

or....too cat



big and scary

So, it is better to reduce the size.



Right-click on the model in the animation set editor -> Utilites -> Add Scale Control To Models (You can also right-click on a specific joint to resize it.)





Then it comes out like this You can double-click this rootTransform_scale to adjust it to reduce the size.



You will have to find out the value by adjusting yourself. But for this cat model, 0.01 looks the best.

---

In this section, you'll learn how to apply hats to Hat Kid. Here, we will use Model Lock, a feature supported by SFM.

Let's learn how to apply a hat to Hat Kid





To get rid of Hat Kid's hat, you can remove it from the body group

If you load the hat and expand the hat model in the set editor on the left, you can see the rootTransform and Root like this.



The rootTransform is a joint that all models have by default. You can think of it as the root of all joints. Remember :))



But if you look at the viewport, you can see that the rootTransform is strangely at the bottom of the hat.



If you put this next to the Hat Kid, you'll find that the hat's rootTransform and the Hat Kid's rootTransform are at the same height. This means that the rootTransform is at the same height as the hat kid because the hat was built according to the hat kid standard.
(Hat Kid's rootTransform is hidden behind something called blender_implicit. This is a meaningless joint, so please remove it somewhere.)

Move the hat's rootTransform to where the Hat Kid's rootTransform is.



A hat has been applied to Hat Kid!

But two problems will arise here.
1. It looks unnatural because of the shadows of the glasses casting in her eyes.



2. The hat kid and the hat are not locked together, meaning if you move the position or rotate hat kid's head, the hat will not follow and will be left behind.

For the first problem we can simply solve it by turning off the shadow of the light or adjusting the light sources.

For problem number 2, SFM can lock model to another model by linking them. (And by lock, meaning it will copy the rotation and position of a model)



If you drag and drop the hat kid's rootTransform onto the hat's rootTransform, a lock mark will appear and they will be locked together.

What do you think would happen if you move the rootTransform of Hat Kid in this state?



The Hat goes along with Hat Kid!

But we're not yet done! We also need to connect the head joint and hat joint.

Drag bip_head to the root of the hat in the same way.





With that, the hat connection is also complete.

This locking feature is pretty useful, you can let Hat Kid hold an umbrella in Hat Kid's hand and lock it, or you can place a ribbon or bag to Hat Kid's clothes and lock it. Once locked, it will follow the hand or body respectively!


The model guide ends here.

Now, the guide ends by recommending a few models or workshop items that I use often!!

https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=741818446
https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1981340737
Add a new shape to the light

I used the models above to express the light shining through the leaves in this art:
https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2934576165

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https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2584798596

Great for creating YouTube or Discord banners, profiles, or square artwork.

Right click on the shot below -> edit clip -> set clip overlay
And enter banner overlay

And when rendering, you need to render by setting the resolution to 1080X1080 or 2160X2160.

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https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2717645611
This is a script that tells Discord what it is doing with SFM.

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https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=207878486
It's a script that allows you to adjust the body group with a slider, but it's a bit buggy and complicated.
Useful for making animations

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https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1715830330
https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1711530607
Neptune is an emoji from the game!

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https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2564383063
https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2262490986
https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2336156520
https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2228322663
Animal Crossing Item Pack!
It's a cartoon model, so it goes well with Hat in Time.


star hat, witch hat, star bag, etc.

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https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2347078991
animal crossing human pack
Add things like bags and shoes.
NPC hair is also added here, but it can be applied to Hatkid as well.
It's possible to make Hat Kid's hair transparent and move the hair so that they overlap nicely, but it's quite tricky.

---

https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=511016662
white panel!

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https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=848269649
IK rigs can be applied to models like Hat Kid
It's very convenient when making animations or posters, but I recommend looking up what IK rigs are.
You'll find it easily!

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https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=673815317
space map!
simple and cool!

---

https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2075886437
kirby background models
I often use butterbuildingskybox and greengreens here.

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https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1637378449
Add a variety of constellations.
I used it a lot in "Hat in Star".

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https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1737010936
DIY money!
It's a paper money you make yourself.

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https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2076620702
This is Niko, the main character from the game One Shot.

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https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1198763097
Conductor
MYURDERRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!

The guide is over. thank you for reading... We hope this guide will help you create your SFM art!!

Here's how I made the sticker mod I made(If you don't know what sticker mod I made, check this out >:) )
(And in fact, I think this section will also help you create your profile picture.)



스티커를 만들기 전에 제가 스티커를 만들면서 경험하고 생각한 것들을 말씀드릴게요.

Before making stickers, I'll tell you what I experienced and thought while making stickers.

1. It is recommended to render the sticker resolution at 2048x2048 and compress it at 1024 resolution.
Because I don't know if it's an SFM bug, but if I render at 1024 from the beginning, the shadows come out strong.
And it doesn't matter if you just make a mod with 2048 resolution. However, the mod file size is greatly reduced and there is no big difference in the game.

2. When you make a sticker and apply it to the actual game, you have to look closely at the feeling. The stickers in the game are displayed quite small, so you have to make them bigger for what you want them to express.

3. Light is also one of the things to watch out for, if there are too many shadows (AO), it can look dirty when using stickers in the game.

4. Actually, I think it's better to draw stickers yourself. But I can't draw and I know how to do SFM..

I think you can make it easily if you pay attention to the above.

Here are the preparations.

1.Banner Overlay
An overlay that tells how the image will look when rendered at a specific resolution.
Using this, it will help you when creating square images.

2.paintable screen
Making sticker, we need to remove the background.
And if the background is neatly made up of one color, we can easily remove the background later!
(You can think of this as something like a chroma key.)

Once you've subscribed, launch SFM, create a project, and load a map (any map is fine)

Bring up the camera and right-click in the clip editor.



Edit clip -> set clip overlay!



Then type discord in filter, and call discord_pfp_overlay.



This will create an overlay like this!

This describes how the image will look when we render at 1080x1080.
(The circle in the middle is what you refer to when creating your Discord profile.
Because the profile image in Discord is round)

It says 1080 here, but we have to render at 1024. The Hat in Time modding tool may have problems with 1080 resolution images.
But if you're going to make a profile picture, the 1080 is better!)








Right-click in the viewport and hit "Enable Lightning" to turn off the light.



Then it looks like this. This has the disadvantage of not being able to use the light, but in fact, you can use it if you use the bug.
We'll talk about that later... Let's make the pose simple.

(When I create the pose, I have to render it at 1024 resolution, so I have to express the pose quite narrowly, so it can look a little awkward.)

(If it is difficult, adjusting the camera FOV is also fine, but be careful as setting it too high will distort it severely and look strange.)





A version made by following this 🤗 and Myurder!!! This is the Hat Kid version of the sticker.


Now there are two things left. Making the background a white background, adjusting the AO to make it a bit cleaner.


Load the Paintable Screen mentioned above, place it behind the Hat Kid, and make it bigger!





You may think that rendering is over!, but if you render in this state...



It doesn't render as neatly as the preview screen. The shadows are expressed quite strongly. (AO)



So you need to touch AO in the camera settings.
It's simple, lower the SSAORadius a lot and increase the SSAOBias slightly.

Lower the SSAORadius to reduce the shadows, and slightly increase the Bias to soften them.



To this extent!



For reference, if you don't modify SSAOBias, it will come out like this.



If you set SSAO to suit your personal feeling and render it, sticker production is over!



(Uncheck the checkbox in the red square there and enter in 2048 resolution.)


Now what we need to do is to remove the background of the image, compress it, mod it... Background removal can be easily found on the Internet. (If you have a tool like Photoshop, you can easily remove it with a magic wand or something like that, and there are sites that remove the background online.)


For a guide to making mods, see this awesome guide!

https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1746749075

There are several ways to apply dye to Hat Kid. One of them is the ability to modify and color model components provided by SFM.

It's a pretty useful feature, and it's used often, but it often doesn't work well for many models.

Let's try it though. We may learn something!



Add override materials makes it possible to override components of this model. You must go through to modify the model.



Then click Show in Element Viewer -> model.
(Alternatively, press F2 to enter clip mode, then control key + click the model to go directly to the viewer of the model you clicked on.)



We see a lot of stuff here, most of which can be safely ignored. Unfold the materials!



More and more come in variety. It can be quite messy, but if you look closely at everything, it's the various mouths or eyes or clothes or capes that were in the body group.

First we're going to modify the cape. Scroll down to find the cape!



Unfold the Hat Kid cape.

Then right click and Add attribute -> Color



Set the name to $color2 and click the OK button
(I'm not sure why, but it had to be named $color2.)



So voila, the color has been applied to the cape! From here it seems to work fine, but...



And click the black square to the right of $Color2 to bring up the color palette. You can edit the color here...



I chose sky blue, but it has become a green cape like this.

Because yellow + sky blue = green, the color becomes a green cloak.

It's a good feature, but if the original has colors like this, it's difficult to use properly because the colors get mixed up like this.

(Still, there are many models where this feature is really useful, so keep that in mind. :) )

So what should we do? Could Hat Kid be unable to wear the sky blue cape forever?
That's not it. If we modify the texture file, i.e. the image file of the model, we can apply the color to the cloak. (Like texture packs in Minecraft)



Editing a texture file is pretty simple.

First go to SFM folder/game/usermod/materials/models/gumian/a_hat_in_time/Hat_Kid.



There are several files in it.
And here you will see VTF file and vmt extension.

VTF stands for Valve Texture File, which is a texture format used by the Source engine.
I think you can think of VTF as an image extension used by SFM.
The VMT file is in text format, but I'm not sure what it is.

In any case, to edit VTF files, you must first install VTFEdit.

https://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/VTFEdit

enter this site



Click on one of the two in the circle here to download and install the file.



I installed it with the installer.



Now we can open VTF files!
Drag the VTF file to VTFEdit to open the VTF file. (You need to open the VTF file, not the VMT file)



The texture file looks like this. It will feel pretty strange because it feels like unfolding a 3D model into 2D.

By the way, I think it would be better to change it to a regular image file and see it. You can export the vtf file to png or jpeg by clicking File, Export in the upper left corner.





Don't forget to change the extension to something other than tga when saving. :)



I'm not sure why, but Hat Kid doesn't look right like this when saved as png.
So in this case, it is better to save as jpg.



This is Hat Kid's texture file.

Let's take a look at each...

The yellow part is a cloak, right? In the Hat Kid model, there is no yellow color other than the cape,,,
Brown would be shoes or hair, and that bottom left would be a zipper... :/
You have to distinguish which part is by color.



But you don't have to work too hard. Because here is a program that allows you to easily create dyes. (But if you're good at programs like photoshop, it might be better.)

We'll talk about that program later, but first, we'll simply modify the color of the cape.



Just like this, I simply filled in all the yellow colors.

And now we need to save this as a VTF file, to do that we need the VTFEdit we installed earlier.

Run VTFEdit again, and click File - Import to import the image (jpg) file you saved earlier.



when we load the file



There are a lot of things like this, but I just press the OK button. I don't think there is any problem though.



To save after loading, be sure to save the file somewhere in the SFM installation folder\game\usermod\materials\



I saved the file under the name sky_cape in the HatKid folder.



Save and you're almost done. Come back to SFM :)
It's time to apply the created texture file to SFM.



Right-click and delete the $cape2 you created earlier, and this time click Add Attribute -> String.



As before, we need to give it a name.
Name it $basetexture.



Then, the Hat Kid cape becomes strange like this.

Hat Kid's cape changes into that image because no textures are applied right now.
(It is called Missing Texture that is black and purple like that.)



Go back to Basetexture again, and write the path where the texture file was saved earlier. Only the path under materials!



Then, voila, the sky blue cloak seems to be applied normally. :)

also, It is a program that can easily create the dye image file mentioned earlier. Details are in the link below.

https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2862002646

Time for a quick look at IK rigs. If you learn this, you will be able to create poses quickly when creating animations or posters.

https://steamproxy.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=848269649&searchtext=universial+ik

First of all, please subscribe to this cool one!

Actually, I don't know much about rigs or rigging. So I can't explain in detail what this is, but if I try to explain what I need as much as possible... Rigging refers to making the skeleton of a modeling character and planting it.

And the difference between FK rig and IK rig is how the bones move. Basically, many models are applied with FK rigs. FK rigs move from top to bottom, and IK rigs move from bottom to top.

For example, if we move the hat kid upperArm in SFM, the lowerArm and hand connected to it also move, right? This is the FK Rig. When you move your arm, your hand moves too. Moving from top to bottom.
Conversely, IK rigs move from the bottom up. When you move the Hat Kid hand, the UpperArm and LowerArm move as well. When you move your hand, your arm moves.
I think it will be faster to understand if you see it yourself.



The left one is the FK rig we've been using so far, and the right one is the IK rig. Can you see the difference?

Hat Kid's arm and leg bones are missing.

With the IK Rig applied, Hat Kid's arm and leg joints disappear and instead he has to move and adjust his feet and hands.

What does this mean...



This means that if you move your hand, your arm will move on its own.

It's pretty convenient. Normally, it seems like you have to create a separate IK rig for each character, but if you apply the Universal IK Rig script subscribed above, most characters can use it.

Most of the time it all works. Even the metro cat works, but applying it to the Niko model gets a little awkward



If you apply according to this, you can apply it easily.
Model Right Click -> RIG -> rig_universal

And if you adjust your hands and your elbows are out of position



You can adjust the direction of the elbow with rig_elbow.
The legs can be adjusted in the same way.



Conversely, if you want to remove the RIG, remove it from Detach Rig.