Table of Content :

 

Introduction

The game Planescape:Tourment has animations that are colored with gradients. Usually the skin is a gradient of yellow, the metal armor is a gradient of cyan, and so on. Not easy at first to get back the colors you see in-game. So this tutorial will explain how to use the tools DLTCEP and pst_colors together in order to get better colors.

Be aware that I won't go too far into details, so a minimum knowledge about the Infinity Engine is required, especially the BAM names conventions.

We'll recreate these 5 women from the "Brothel for Slating Intellectual Lusts" :


          As you see, they're using the exact same animation, it's just the colors that are different.

 

 

 

The Tools

pst_colors (736 KB) can be found at :

 

The latest version of DLTCEP can be found at

At the time I'm writing this tutorial, the latest version of DLTCEP is 6.5G (919 KB). That's the one I'll use in the tutorial.

 

 

 

Configuring DLTCEP

The first time you launch DLTCEP this window appear :

Just press OK, and you're in the main window :

Just as we have been asked, let's click the Setup button. You normally need to configure DLTCEP only once, not each time you launch it. The Setup window is this one :

Here, choose a Setup name, the Planescape/Torment game type, click on the first directory icon and locate your chitin.key file that is in your PS:T game directory, and if the next field is not already set click also the second directory icon and locate the .dat file for PS:T which is in the DLTCEP installation directory. That should be enough, so now press the button Save & Back.

A warning message now appear

You'll see this one often when working on PS:T, but since it's just a warning, just forget it and press OK. DLTCEP now do some internal stuff, and we're ready to work :

You can click on the Exit button if you want. The next time you'll launch DLTCEP it should already be configured.

 

 

 

Finding Dolora's Colors

Launch DLTCEP. In the Edit menu, choose Creature (CRE)

This window will appear :

Don't read all, just click for now the Load Creature button. In the new small window that appear, type dolora and then click on the Search next button :

We have only 1 row that match this NPC character name, and since it's already selected, just press OK. The precedent big window is updated and now contain the datas for Dolora :

We're only interested by the colors. They're a little hidden, but it's easy to get them. Click on the Unused tab :

Now, click on the Torment specific button :

And we now have our precious color codes. Write them down :

  • 5 (hair black)
  • 69 (cloth dark blue)
  • 45 (skin albino)
  • 129 (metal silver)

 

 

 

Finding Dolora's BAM animations

Well, I still didn't find a tool where I can know for sure what BAM a creature (CRE) use. So, we'll search the BAM by hand.

Launch DLTCEP and in the Edit menu choose Animation (BAM) :

A new window appear, which contains lots of powerfull stuff :

Click on the Load Bam button, and a small window appear. Normally you'd have to check for yourself, but to be quicker, I'll tell you that the BAM we're searching is DSTDPRO.BAM. So just type dstdpro in the search field, click on the Search next button, and if the Preview checkbox is checked, a preview in the top/right corner appear, showing you the first frame of the BAM :

You can see that this is indeed the animation we were looking for. Now press OK, and the precedent window is updated :

Unfortunately, you can't just click on the Save Bam As button. If you try, a warning about a read-only problem appear. Well, we'll extract it in another way. Close this window and now in the main menu click on Extraction. Then choose Extract from BIF :

Fill the next window like this :

and press Extract :

You have extracted the 10 BAM files contained into the CA_pro.bif file. But where are they ? They're automaticaly placed in the override sub-directory of the game :

Copy these files somewhere else, in a temporary place, as we need at least one, to work a bit later with pst_colors.

 

 

 

Using pst_colors

We're now ready to get back the original colors of Dolora. Put the file DSTDPROB.bam into the installation directory of pst_colors. Then copy a .bat and edit it like this :

 
@echo off
pst_colors DSTDPROB.bam > log.txt

Save the .bat and launch it. If all goes right, this window appear :

On the left side you can see all the available gradients that will replace any PS:T BAM gradient. They're taken from Pal32.bmp, a file that you can extract from PS:T if you wish.

Next to it are 5 layers, from Hair to Cloth 3. On the right side of each layer there's a small gradient preview with its index within Pal32.bmp. Below these 5 layers data there's a big preview of the current selected gradient, in 2 modes : a big box where you can analyse each color chanel individually (Red, Green and Blue), and a rectangular box which is a big preview of the final colors (combining the Red Green and Blue channels).

On the last right side we have the help texts, and a preview of a frame of the BAM, at double size. By default all layers are set to the first gradient, that's why Dolora appear gray here. If you don't like the Sprite Pivot axis which is enabled by default, just press the P key and it'll disapear.

The help text indicates that you can change the direction (also know as Cycle) and the frame. You can also select each layer individualy and assign them another gradient. That's what we will do.

Take back your notes about Dolora's color codes. The hair have the index 5. Well this layer is already good, so let's move to the Skin layer (by pressing the Down arrow key). It uses the index 45. So now use the Right arrow key in order to select the "albino" color into the left rainbow. You'll have this screen :

Good, it's starting to look like in the game. Now, move to the Cloth 1 layer. How do we know if it's using the index 69 or 129 ? Just try them both. You'll find quickly that the Cloth 1 layer use the index 129, and the Cloth 2 layer use the 69 index. Once all layers are correctly set, you'll have this screen :

We have finished for Dolora. Just press the Echap key and you'll have 2 images, a screenshot, and the frame you're viewing with the new palette. Let's compare the original palette with Dolora's palette :

      DSTDPROB.BAM (Original's colors)
 
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      DSTDPROB.BAM (Dolora's colors)
 
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The other women's colors

Just proceed the same for the 4 other women, and you'll get these datas :

NPC Name CRE Layer 1 Layer 2 Layer 3 Layer 4
Juliette SADJULI 5 hair black 67 cloth dark green 40 skin normal 129 metal silver
Ecco ECCO 8 hair dark brown 9 hair brassy white 35 skin coppertone 82 cloth golden
Kesai-Serris KESAI 5 hair black 70 cloth purple 37 skin ghoul blue white 65 cloth dark red
Yves the Tale-Chaser YVES 6 hair blond 94 cloth peach 40 skin normal 94 cloth peach

In pst_colors we'll use the same .bat, but we'll set different layer gradients :

      DSTDPROB.BAM (Juliette's colors)
 
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      DSTDPROB.BAM (Ecco's colors)
 
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      DSTDPROB.BAM (Kesai-Serris colors)
 
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      DSTDPROB.BAM (Yves the Tale-Chaser's colors)
 
Zoom x3