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How to use custom portraits (BG1, BG:EE, BG2, BG2:EE, IWD, IWD:EE, IWD2)

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  • lefreutlefreut Member Posts: 1,462
    edited October 2019
    SkeleTony wrote: »
    Hello all,

    I am having difficulties with custom portraits in Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition. If I go to 'C:\Users' there are only three folders there: 'Default', 'Public' and '(my name)'. No "Documents" folder at all. And within those three folders there are various folders for many games and programs (including saved games for such, though these seem scattered inconsistently throughout) but nowhere in any of those three folders are any folders for ANY of the 'Enhanced Edition' games from Beamdog that I own (and I own them all through GOG).
    I have still been able to use my custom portraits because of EE Keeper, which seems to use the 'Portraits' folder I placed within the main 'C:\Gog games\Baldur's Gate - Enhanced Edition' folder. Also within game, for my main/created PC I can change her appearance to use a custom portrait but clicking the 'Custom' button within game does nothing at all (save for giving me a brief instruction on using custom portraits) but a great number of custom portraits do appear within the select-able portraits, though these for the most part do not contain the customs within the 'Portraits' folder I created for BG EE.

    Sorry about my confusing mess of a post. Any help is appreciated.

    The path is C:\Users\(username)\Documents\Baldur's Gate - Enhanced Edition\portraits :)

    In the latest version, the custom button only shows instruction. The custom portraits are at the end of the selectable portraits (I know this is misleading and not very user friendly).
  • SkeleTonySkeleTony Member Posts: 5
    edited October 2019
    The path is C:\Users\(username)\Documents\Baldur's Gate - Enhanced Edition\portraits :)

    In the latest version, the custom button only shows instruction. The custom portraits are at the end of the selectable portraits (I know this is misleading and not very user friendly).


    That is the problem. There is NO "Documents" folder at all on my Windows 10 x64 machine and the "Users" folder contains only the three files (see my first post), none of which are "Documents" and none of which contain ANY folders relevant to 'Documents' or Beam,dog or any of the 'EE' games I own.

    EDIT - Never mind...I am an idiot. I am probably still used to older, better Windows OSes and so was trying to navigate via the clickable folders themselves. I was not thinking there might be a separate tab on the opposite side of the screen called "Documents".

    Post edited by SkeleTony on
  • lefreutlefreut Member Posts: 1,462
    Documents is not directly under Users, but it should be inside the folder with your username.

    You can also use %userprofile%\Documents\Baldur's Gate - Enhanced Edition\portraits
  • BillyYankBillyYank Member Posts: 2,768
    edited October 2019
    You should also see Documents under "This PC" in the file explorer.
    gof453d1cflz.png

    If you're synced to OneDrive it will be C:\Users\(name)\OneDrive\Documents. But it can be anything, because you can customize which folder to use as your Documents library.

    I put my portraits in the override folder, it works better with my mods.
  • SkeleTonySkeleTony Member Posts: 5
    Thanks for the help lefreut and BillyYank.
  • shylamanshylaman Member Posts: 173
    After a year or so away from the game I just did a fresh install on my MacBook Pro. I am using EET, like I did previously. Anyhow, my custom portraits aren't showing up and I am stumped. I have been playing the series off and on since BG was released in the 90s. I have been using the EE versions for a several years and several installs with custom portraits no problem. My only hiccup was when I first moved to EE I had to save them in a different size and naming convention.

    They are named like this (same as in the past):
    MELTH06L.bmp
    MELTH06M.bmp

    They are BMP.
    They are 210x330.
    They are 24 bit.
    They are in Documents\Baldur's Gate - Enhanced Edition Trilogy\portraits.

    They worked previously. So, I am not sure what is up.
  • kungfuhobbitkungfuhobbit Member Posts: 169
    edited April 2020
    I havent seen this Custom Portrait problem posted anywhere else

    Some of my custom 210x330 L-sized portraits showed a blank image in-game (EE), even though they had consistent capitalisation, L final character, 24-bit bitmap, =<7 chars etc per OP.
    NearInfinity wouldnt open them; it said they had -330 height (ie. negative).
    yex3hfd0tvdb.png

    [Solution]
    Batch convert in Irfanview to (same format) 24bit BMP. Checked NearInfinity would open them.
    Placed in Documents\...\Portraits

    PS. SaveAs from BMP to BMP in Paint didnt resolve. Batch conversions with Gimp looked OK in windows but opened blue in-game
    Post edited by kungfuhobbit on
  • AsaBMAsaBM Member Posts: 85
    I'm having some trouble in IWDEE. I think it's really cool how the default portraits have a zoomed-in-on-the-face crop for the medium version, but when I use a custom portrait I can't do this! I either have to use lelandl.bmp for the sidebar or lelandm.bmp for the character sheet. I guess I'll go with the medium versions in the meantime since I see the sidebar a bit more than the sheets, but it's still pretty annoying.
  • inethineth Member Posts: 746
    edited January 2022
    Kilivitz wrote: »
    The Enhanced Editions are finicky about portrait filenames, so there are more rules:* Large portrait files always end with an L
    * Small portrait files always end with an M
    * Filename can’t be longer than 7 (seven) characters (including the L or M size letter)
    * Avoid special characters (underlines are okay, though)

    Due to a bug in the EEs, filenames can't be longer than 7, instead of 8 characters.

    It appears that arbitrary 8-characters filenames like
    Mage0001.bmp
    
    work just fine.

    It's only when you want to use separate large and small portraits, then the filenames must be 7 characters or less and the last character must be L or M.

    At least that's the behavior I see on BG2:EE v2.6 on Linux.
    Did this change in v2.6?
  • GraionDilachGraionDilach Member Posts: 588
    Sorry for the late response, @ineth but I already had this in 2.5. Additionally, the L and M needs to be uppercase on Windows as well, lowercase m/l is read as individual portraits.
  • ibismanibisman Member Posts: 2
    I am wanting to replay BG after many years so bought BGEE and am having a problem with my custom portraits I haven't seen addressed here.

    My custom portraits are showing up fine in the character creation page, and on the character page, but not on the sidebar.

    Adding L, M or S (or none of them) to the end of the filename doesn't seem to make a difference. When I create a separate, resized .bmp file for the small image on the sidebar (with the bigger image ending L, and the smaller one ending M or S), it just shows up as a separate (low-res) option during the character creation, and nothing appears on the sidebar during gamplay.

    Any thoughts?
  • ibismanibisman Member Posts: 2
    Finally solved this. My bmp files were 32bit and needed to be 24bit. It was only a problem for the small image in the party bar.
  • AndroclesAndrocles Member Posts: 4
    I’m replaying BG1 and 2 EE prior to BG3.
    I’ve created a custom portrait for my character, popped it in the portraits folder - all good.

    Created a custom portrait for Dorn (DORNL.bmp, DORNM. bmp and DORNS.bmp - all 24 bit and the correct sizes). Put the files in the Override folder, restarted the game and the Dorn portrait doesn’t use the new one.
    The game is a Steam install on the F: drive. Does the game expect the install to be on the C: drive as I am a bit stumped as to what the issue is?

    Thanks
    Andy
  • FrenzgynFrenzgyn Member Posts: 80
    Androcles wrote: »
    I’m replaying BG1 and 2 EE prior to BG3.
    I’ve created a custom portrait for my character, popped it in the portraits folder - all good.

    Created a custom portrait for Dorn (DORNL.bmp, DORNM. bmp and DORNS.bmp - all 24 bit and the correct sizes). Put the files in the Override folder, restarted the game and the Dorn portrait doesn’t use the new one.
    The game is a Steam install on the F: drive. Does the game expect the install to be on the C: drive as I am a bit stumped as to what the issue is?

    Thanks
    Andy

    Strange.
    The "override" folder where you put in the 3 .bmp were was located?
    It seem indeed a path problem if naming, format and size are correct.

    I don't have steam versions of BGEE/BG2EE (but with IWDEE on steam no problem), buth disabling steam cloud worths a try.

    You could also try putting the three files in an "override" folder created in

    C:\Users\Zorro\Documents\Baldur's Gate II - Enhanced Edition

    your documents folder, something like: "\Documents\Baldur's Gate II - Enhanced Edition\override"
  • AndroclesAndrocles Member Posts: 4
    Thanks Frenzgyn
    The filepath for the override folder is
    F:\Games\Baldur’s Gate\Override

    Looking at it now, I’m wondering if the apostrophe and space in Baldur’s Gate could be problematic.
  • FrenzgynFrenzgyn Member Posts: 80
    It should not.
    Try disabling steam cloud and creating a new "override" folder in your document/ baldur's gate folder, it's the one where "baldur.lua" is located.

    Do you use any UI mods?
  • AndroclesAndrocles Member Posts: 4
    Thanks again. I’ll give it a whirl and I don’t have any UI mods.
  • AndroclesAndrocles Member Posts: 4
    I created an Override folder as you suggested and it worked a treat. Thank you so much Frenzgyn.
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