Hello, it's my first time "making" normals. I need help converting a normals map from a 3d model someone else made, into one that's useable for ts3. My pc's old and the nvidia plugin for photoshop gives me an error when I try to activate it. I'm following this tutorial with the gimp normalmap plugin.

I'm stuck on the copy-paste section since it doesn't seem to be turning grey when I paste the green layer into the blue layer. I also looked at the photoshop tutorial here and tried making a rectangle selection and copy-pasting that, but it didn't fix it. What am I doing wrong?

The image I attached is the og normal map included with the 3d model I downloaded. And I attached some screenshots of my gimp channels if it helps

With your Normal Map open in GIMP:

Go to Layer>Transparency and make sure it has an alpha channel. If it doesn't, add one.
Then go to Colors>Components>Decompose and in the box that opens change the dropdown next to Color Mode to RGBA, then click "Ok". This will make a new tab in GIMP where you can edit the channels.
Here, do all the copying and pasting of the channels that you need to. Then go Colors>Components>Recompose. You'll notice your original tab with your original normal map change. Go back to your original tab and export it.

I should note, the normal map won't look gray like it does in that tutorial. It will look mostly transparent. This is still correct, in spite of the visual difference.

First thing, save that .png as .dds dxt5, then open the .dds in GIMP. Top bar, Colors> Components> Decompose. In the new box, click the down arrow and choose RGBA. Next, Colors> Components> Compose. New box, click down arrow and select RGBA (again). Click on Red channel, then in drop down, select GREEN. Skip the Green channel. Click Blue channel, and in drop down, select GREEN. Click Alpha channel, and in drop down, select RED. Click "OK".



I then copy the normals map, and paste "AS NEW LAYER", on the original blue map. Be sure to use "AS NEW LAYER"!!! Doing this, you won't need to scroll around to find your originating work folder. Save as .dds dxt5.

To make original normals maps, I start with my multiplier .dds. Add a black layer behind it and merge down. Using a black layer eliminates the need to change the alpha channel later. It also might show some stray stuff in your multiplier that you can cut out. Play around with brightness and contrast, or curves, it just takes practice. I also use image sharpen and noise reduction on some normals maps for a "deeper cut". Again, things to play with.

Next click Filters> Map> Normalsmap. (This might be a plugin, that I've had forever, and not sure where I got it... probably GitHub.) In the new box, check "Invert Y". Adjust Scale, I usually use between 2.0000 and 5.0000 for garments. Hair leave at 1.0000. You can play around with the Filter, but not necessary. Click OK, and that's how you get to the blue map you started with! You can actually play around with increasing or decreasing contrast of this map. When increasing the scale, or the contrast of the blue map, be careful not to have bumps and ridges in places you don't want them!

Thank you for the detailed instructions! However, when I try to export the decomposed/composed layer as dds, it doesnt show "save all layers" Also, do I recompose after I paste the normals map onto blue map?

It looks like you copied and pasted it into the channels. LadySmoks means to copy and paste it as a new layer above the original, blue image, not the blue channel. This is an optional step, intended only to help you not have to navigate to your work folder when exporting, because GIMP only remembers where it is if you're exporting from a file you opened with GIMP.

Don't worry about that step. Just click File>Export on the window titled rgba-compose-8.0, and just make sure you're exporting it as .dds dxt5.

As for when to recompose, so LadySmok's instructions and mine differ in execution, but have the same outcome. If you're going by her instructions, you don't need to recompose. When you did Colors>Components>Compose, Color Mode: RGBA, and then switched the channels around in the drop downs there, you essentially completed 2 steps from my instructions is 1 step of hers. That is, you did all the appropriate channel switching (red goes to alpha, green goes to red and blue), and composed it. So you are good. The image with a lot of transparency is the end product. So just export that one. And dds only exports the layer you have selected, which should only be one layer. The channels tab is fine and isn't effected by "save all layers" so you should be good.

Ignore the layers box. It has nothing to do with what you are doing. FYI, it messed me also when I was trying to learn normals maps!!! Nothing is eing done there. Everything is done using the top bar.



Again, once you have decomposed, and composed (do NOT use recompose), copy that image using the EDIT> Copy, then EDIT> PASTE AS NEW LAYER, on the blue map. As @bomaye said, it is only to help navigate back to your work folder when exporting the new texture.

Thank you @bomaye and @LadySmoks for all your help! I got the normal map I wanted and it seems to be showing up in tsrw.