Making a custom book cover, and adding pictures

[OpheliaNeoma]

There's a mod I've planned to make, and this is one of the issues that I can't seem to figure out by searching, for a custom book cover, would I just copy the model and texture and apply it in NifSkope like I would with other items, along with editing the texture as I see fit?

 

But the bigger issue is adding pictures and text on the same page - not a 'watermark' style picture for every page, i.e; a picture book with a small amount of text describing the picture - how would I go about doing that? Not many tutorials are on books and with what I found only seem to be showing how to copy a book and type text into them. Any help?

[BrettM]

Regarding the cover, I really recommend that you check out Daniel Coffey's Better Book Mesh resource. Even if you don't download it, the page for that mod explains everything you ever wanted to know about how book covers are defined in Skyrim. However, the mod provides a PSD template for making cover textures for his meshes that is super handy. I've made two book covers with this mod, which you can see HERE and HERE.

 

In short, you need two meshes: a low-poly mesh for the World Art (what you see lying on a table or sitting on a shelf) and a high-poly mesh for the Inventory Model (what you see after you take the book). Both use the same cover texture, and it is applied using NifSkope as with any other mesh.

 

Regarding the pictures, it is possible to wrap text around a picture by ensuring that both are enclosed in <p></p> tags. For example, <p><img src=...> Here is my text.</p>, similar to using one of the illuminated letters.

 

The problem is that there doesn't seem to be any way to control the wrapping, such as by forcing the text to wrap-right or wrap-left, or of forcing the text to begin at the top border of the picture rather than the bottom. You have to insert the image tag deeper in the paragraph and see where it comes out, then move it and try again to get the usual kind of alignments that are used with picture books.

 

I found this to be such an enormous pain that I ended up placing all my illustrations between paragraphs or on facing pages. If you look at the books provided by Bethesda, such as the Beginner's Guide to Homesteading, they seem to do the same thing.

[Shadeybladey]

Regarding the pictures, it is possible to wrap text around a picture by ensuring that both are enclosed in <p></p> tags. For example, <p><img src=...> Here is my text.</p>, similar to using one of the illuminated letters.

 

The problem is that there doesn't seem to be any way to control the wrapping, such as by forcing the text to wrap-right or wrap-left, or of forcing the text to begin at the top border of the picture rather than the bottom.

 

I found this to be such an enormous pain that I ended up placing all my illustrations between paragraphs or on facing pages. If you look at the books provided by Bethesda, such as the Beginner's Guide to Homesteading, they seem to do the same thing.

 

 

I had the same problem trying to make an ink and blood splash on a page of a book - I could not get it to be where it needed to be.

 

In the end I had to make a fake page, including the writing and ink and blood splash, and insert it as an image. It works, but it looks a bit sloppy and unprofessional.

 

You can change the size of the image, but it's all trial and error.

 

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<img src='img://Textures/MyModTextures/MyMod_BloodSplat.png'height='475' width='297'>

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Regarding the cover, I really recommend that you check out Daniel Coffey's Better Book Mesh resource. Even if you don't download it, the page for that mod explains everything you ever wanted to know about how book covers are defined in Skyrim. However, the mod provides a PSD template for making cover textures for his meshes that is super handy. I've made two book covers with this mod, which you can see HERE and HERE.

 

Now THAT is very useful to know.

 

Cheers!

 

~.~