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Baldur's Gate Portraits

Gahbreeil13Gahbreeil13 Member Posts: 10
in Custom Content & Community Exp Pack
Is there anything wrong with using BG I & II portraits or renditions of said portraits in Neverwinter Nights? Particularly, making non-commercial publications of those for NwN.

Comments

  • ProlericProleric Member Posts: 1,316
    In practice, there have been BG portait packs for NWN on the Vault and Steam Workshop for years, so it seems that such usage is tolerated.

    Strictly speaking, they / you need permission from the copyright holder (originally Bioware, but Beamdog now?), whether the work is commercial or not. The terms of use of the sites in question require the author to obtain that permission.
  • Gahbreeil13Gahbreeil13 Member Posts: 10
    And where would I contact either BioWare or Beamdog to ask for permission?
  • Gahbreeil13Gahbreeil13 Member Posts: 10
    Hello again, Beamdog Forums!

    How exactly would I obtain a current portraits.2da file? Is it available to access at all? From what I've gathered, it has been hidden in another file in the Enhanced Edition. How do I extract it?
  • QuilistanQuilistan Member Posts: 187
    There might already be a hak pak for this
    Check the vault
    https://neverwintervault.org/
  • ProlericProleric Member Posts: 1,316
    edited October 8
    Gahbreeil13 wrote: »
    Hello again, Beamdog Forums!

    How exactly would I obtain a current portraits.2da file? Is it available to access at all? From what I've gathered, it has been hidden in another file in the Enhanced Edition. How do I extract it?

    The official 2da files have always been contained within .bif files which cannot be read without the correct tool. Under EE they are found in the \data subfolder of the installation.

    The tool needed to extract them is NWNExplorer.

    If NWNExplorer doesn't automatically show you the contents of all the .bif files, use the big yellow Open button to open the .key file in that subfolder.

    portraits.2da (or any other .2da) can be exported from NWN Main Data > base_2da.bif.

    It's safer to use this method than rely on extracts posted on the Vault, as the latter may be out-of-date.
  • Gahbreeil13Gahbreeil13 Member Posts: 10
    Right, I've done it!

    However, my task is not as easy as just creating a .hak like I have thought. What kind of a file do I put the .2da and the new portraits in? Anyone who can help has my undying gratitude!
  • ProlericProleric Member Posts: 1,316
    It depends what you're trying to do.

    If you're building a module, putting the .2da and .tga files in a hak will allow you to assign custom portraits to NPCs.

    If you want to use the portraits as a player, or distribute them for use by other players, you don't need the .2da, but you do need to put the portaits in the \portraits subfolder.

    More detail in the wiki - I can't vouch for the new stuff about .dds and ruleset.2da, but the .tga files are the tried-and-trusted method.
  • Gahbreeil13Gahbreeil13 Member Posts: 10
    I am building a module and I want to be able to use the portraits in the Aurora Toolset. However, the .hak with portraits.2da and all of the .tga portraits didn't work upon loading. Judging by the wiki that you've offered, the only thing that I can see that went wrong is that the .tga files don't have the po_ prefix?

    I can send you the file if you'd like to help?
  • ProlericProleric Member Posts: 1,316
    The po_ prefix is mandatory. File names and content must match the spec exactly. If you fix that, it will work.
  • Gahbreeil13Gahbreeil13 Member Posts: 10
    edited October 10
    It's almost working. There seems to be a problem with the amount of elven and human portraits! I made sure not to overlap the base game portraits and not go over 98. Is this because of the half-elf race and how it uses both human and elf portraits? What is the limit for available portraits?

    EDIT: Let me rephrase. All races' portraits are showing up. Human and elf, both genders, are not. I do not know why.
  • ProlericProleric Member Posts: 1,316
    According to the wiki, the portrait number can go up to 65536 - certainly, numbers well in excess of 98 work fine.

    When portraits don't a appear for a race, check that they are
    • Not flagged as plot in the 2da
    • Assigned to the correct race in the 2da
    • Named correctly, given the partial filename in the 2da
    • Exactly the correct sizes in pixels
  • Gahbreeil13Gahbreeil13 Member Posts: 10
    Well, I'm checking these portraits in the Aurora Toolset where I need them the most. There are no conflicts in the .hak, no portrait is flagged as plot, 1, the species that I've assigned to each portrait is based on the .2da, the filenames are all correct since it is impossible for all of these to be incorrect. And the portraits work just fine in the portraits folder.

    Regardless, I'll double-check.
  • Gahbreeil13Gahbreeil13 Member Posts: 10
    I finally got it working. Turns out, having the prefix of po_po_ worked?
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