Minecraft Forums

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Introduction

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Welcome to the world of texture packs.

This guide is meant to be a quick reference for the answers to any and all questions you may have about texturing, from the mundane to the complex. If you have any questions or feel that something could be added to make this guide more complete, please feel free to leave a comment.

For those of you who are new to the world of texture packs, the sections below detail what texture packs are and why you should consider making one.


A texture pack is a zip file containing a series of special images that can be used by Minecraft to change the appearance of almost every aspect of the game, from blocks and water to weapons and mobs.

The core of a texture pack is an image file called the terrain.png. This file determines how the blocks that make up the majority of the Minecraft world look. Almost all texture packs you will find have edited the terrain.png. Some texture packs, however, only edit mobs or items, and are called 'Mob packs' and 'Item packs,' respectively.


There are many reasons to make a texture pack.

For most texture artists, the main reason is to replace the default look of Minecraft with a customized look. Texture packs can create any sort of atmosphere you can imagine, from fantasy to steampunk to post-apocalyptic. Texture packs can also be made to enhance the world of a custom map and give certain blocks the specific look needed for that map.

Sometimes an artist will make a texture pack in order to practice their artistic skills or to try out a new artistic technique. There are many packs that are made with a specific art style-- such as impressionism or pixel art-- to allow the artist to flex his/her creative muscles.

And last (but certainly not least), texture packs are often made just for fun. Watching your art come alive through Minecraft is both exhilarating and inspiring, regardless of skill level.

So if you're ready to try something new and exciting, pull up a chair and read on.

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Technical Basics

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++HD Resolutions++

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Before you can get started on editing the look of Minecraft to your liking, you need to understand a few basic things about the textures themselves.

As I'm sure you have already noticed, Minecraft has a very 'old school' look. Unlike most of today's video games, Minecraft's graphics are simplistic and pixelated. Let's take a look at why that is:


Here is an example of a common minecraft block texture. As you can see, this block is 16 pixels wide by 16 pixels high. This is what is referred to as 16x resolution. A texture pack where all the block textures are 16 pixels wide is called a 16x pack. Here's what a 16x texture looks like at it's normal size:



Pretty tiny, right? The default minecraft textures are created from blocks with only 256 pixels each in order to reduce the amount of memory your computer needs to devote to running the game, allowing you to have nearly infinite worlds. With 16x textures, the game only has to render 256 pixels per block. This gives most operating systems a significant speed boost.

If, however, you are not a fan of the small space provided by 16x textures, it is possible to increase the size of the terrain image file in order to have more pixels per block to work with. Here is that same dirt block, only now its size has been increased by 200% so that it is 32 pixels wide instead of only 16 pixels wide:


This increase in block dimension allows you to put much more detail into your textures. Here is an example of a detailed 32x side dirt block, taken from Vattic's Faithful pack.


Because of the wide-spread desire to bring more detail into Minecraft textures, there are many different HD resolution packs. The defining characteristic of all HD packs is that their blocks are more than 16 pixels wide. The most common HD resolutions are 32x (200%), 64x (400%), 128x (800%), 256x (1600%), and 512x (3200%). Although it is possible to have blocks that are 43 pixels wide or 15 pixels wide, there are many downsides to increasing or decreasing the size of a block to unusual resolutions, which will be touched on later.

F.A.Q:

• "How do I make an HD pack? Do I need a template?"
Although there are many templates available, the process of creating the base for an HD pack is so simple that there is no reason to rely on templates. Just follow these three easy steps:

1. Open the terrain.png in an image editing program. (Where do I find the terrain.png?)


2. Go to 'resize image'.


3. Resize the image to 200% (for 32x), 400% (for 64x), 800% (128x), 1600% (256x), or 3200% (512x). Make sure the box that says "Preserve hard edges/nearest neighbor is checked! This will keep the image from becoming blurry. Also, do not attempt to resize beyond 3200%-- Minecraft cannot run textures larger than 512x.

• "My gold blocks are on fire and the nether is water! What gives?"
You are attempting to use a non-16x pack without first downloading and running the HD patch.

• "What is this 'HD patch' I keep hearing about?"
Minecraft is programmed to look in a very specific location for each of the textures to be used on the blocks. Resizing the terrain.png shifts the locations for these textures, so that minecraft end up pulling 'filler' textures from places it's not supposed to. That's why gold blocks look like they're on fire, pumpkins are riddled with pieces of portal, and the nether is turned into water. The HD patch is a small, easy-to-use program that fixes these bugs and makes your game look the way it's supposed to look.

Get there HD patch HERE.

• "My pack is only 16x, but my custom water/lava doesn't show up!"
Any pack that edits the water/lava texture found on the terrain.png must use the HD patch in order to see that water within the game. Custom water/lava animation files also require the HD patch.

• "Great! Now I'm going to go make a hyper-realistic 512x pack!"
Before you run off on your grand texturing adventure, keep in mind that the more pixels Minecraft has to load, the more memory it will take to play the game. The best advice here is to know your operating system. If you have a top-of-the-line, cutting edge super computer, you probably won't have any trouble using that 512x pack to your heart's content. If, on the other hand, you're still using that boxy desktop you got back in 1998, be aware that trying to run your 512x masterpiece may cause extreme lag and/or crash the game.

• "I have a really slow computer. Should I try making each block only one color to reduce lag?"
No matter how many or how few colors you use in your texture pack, if the underlying blocks are still 16 pixels wide Minecraft will still have to load 256 pixels for each block. Or, in other words, how smooth or how grainy a texture pack is has no effect on the performance of the game. The only way to reduce the lag caused by the terrain.png is to resize it to less than 16x!

• "Okay then, I'll reduce the terrain.png to 8x. But I really like having realistic water, so I'll make a 512x water animation! (How do I make water animations?)
Beware! Animations are even bigger memory hogs than the terrain.png!The best way to reduce lag is to have no animations.Barring that, make sure the resolution of your animations is no greater than the resolution of your pack, i.e. have 16x animations for a 16x pack to limit the amount of lag they cause.

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The first hurdle all beginning texture pack makers have to overcome is actually finding the files they want to edit. For those new to the Minecraft world (or to computers in general) this may seem like a daunting task. But with the aid of a simple program and a few short steps, the process is actually ridiculously easy. Never fear! It will become routine in no time.



Now that you can access the default textures and edit them to your liking, the next challenge is packaging your texture pack. While it is entirely possible to re-insert your edited files back into the jar, if you want to post your pack for other people to download you need to package your textures into a downloadable zip file. You cannot use rar files for texture packs! The game cannot read the .rar extension. Your textures must be contained inside of a file ending in '.zip'.

WARNING: Do not extract the textures and then attempt to re-zip the file! This will destroy its ability to function as a texture pack. Simply use 7-zip or Winrar (for windows) to access the file without extracting. Mac users do not have to use a special program-- your machine can access the zip file automatically.



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Getting Started

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"I have an idea for a texture pack, but I have no idea how to make one!"

Don't worry, you're not alone. We've all been there at one point or another. So take a deep breath, relax, and read over the following sections to see where to get started on your artistic journey.

++The Terrain.png++

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The picture below is an image file referred to as the terrain png, so called because it is used by the program running Minecraft to determine how the 3D environment of the game will look. Notice that the file extension is 'png'. The terrain image must always have this extension, or else it will not be rendered correctly by the game.


The terrain png may seem hopelessly complex at first glance, but when broken down into it's basic parts it's really quite simple. Here is the terrain png with every textured square labeled. Each of these squares corresponds to a block texture found in-game, the names and uses of which are listed next to the block number below. Note that the red blocks indicate textures that are not currently in use.


Click the button below to see the explanations of each of the textures!

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++Texture Wrapping++

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coming soon

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++Derivative Textures++

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One of questions frequently asked by new texture pack artists is, "Where is the fence/stair/pressure plate texture, and how do I edit it?"

The answer to this question is two-fold:

First and foremost, there are no stand-alone textures for fences, stairs, half blocks, or pressure plates. These items are are made from derivative textures-- they have no separate file all to themselves, but instead are made from the texture of another block.

Let's use the texture for wooden planks as an example. As every Minecrafter knows, planks can be crafted into wooden stairs, wooden half-blocks, wooden pressure plates, and fences. As shown in the image below, the plank texture found on the terrain png is recycled to make each of these wooden items. They themselves do not have unique textures, but are rather pieced together from the plank texture, which is 'wrapped' around the model. Let's take a look:




This principle also applies to cobble stairs/halfblocks, nether brick stairs/fences, and stone brick stairs/halfblocks, which take their textures from cobblestone, nether brick, and stone brick on the terrain png, respectively. Except for smooth stone slabs, every derivative item uses derivative textures. The image below shows this process for stone plates, buttons, and levers. As you can see from the image, the lever takes its base from the cobble used in its crafting recipe.


Although it is not possible to directly edit the textures on these items, they can be indirectly edited by changing the texture from which they are made. To observe how the textures fold around the items, let's first take the wooden plank and make a 2px wide line down it's center:


With this red line serving as a guide, we are now able to observe exactly how the square textures are pieced together into complex 3D shapes:


From looking at the top image, it's clear that the center post of the fence is made from a 4px wide vertical strip taken from the center of the texture (this is true for nether brick fences as well). This means that in order to have a clean vertical fence post, you would need to have a 4px wide vertical wood grain texture running down the center of the planks. From looking at B, you can also see that each step of the stairs is 8px high-- in order to avoid having a joint between the planks land on or near the edge of the step, be sure to keep this 8px spacing in mind.

But fences and pressure plates are not the only items guilty of borrowing textures-- many blocks on the terrain png also share textures with each other, and some even reuse parts of their own textures to fill in their 3D models.

First let's take a look at an example of texture sharing between different blocks:

As you can see from the image above, the furnace side texture and the furnace top texture are shared between the lit furnace, unlit furnace, and dispenser. This can sometimes cause the furnace or dispenser to appear strange if careful planning is not done in advance to ensure that the side/top texture is not too dissimilar from the furnace/dispenser texture.

Below is another example of this texture sharing between blocks:


As you can see, the jukebox will always use the noteblock texture for its sides.

Another common question sometimes asked by first-time texture artists is, "Where do I find the texture for the side of the door?"

The answer to this is very similar to the one above for fences: the texture for the side of the door is found on the door itself. In the image below, you can see how the edge of the door appears to have hinges, an effect that is caused by a strip of the original texture being mapped onto the edge:

By drawing several multicolored lines on the edges of the door texture, we can map out exactly where this strip is taken from and how it is wrapped around the model of the door:


From this image you can see how a 16x by 3x wide rectangle is taken from the left side of the door and repeated end to end along the edge of the door. The opposite edge of the door is given the same treatment with the same strip of texture. Redstone repeaters, traps doors, and pistons also employ texture reuse to fill in 'missing' parts of their model.

Another block which reuses parts of its own texture is the piston. The arm of the piston takes its texture from the wooden part of the side texture, as shown in the image below.


For more information on which blocks share/reuse which textures, take a look at the section on texture wrapping.


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++Editing Programs++

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Coming soon.


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