How to create glow maps in Nifskope?

[Zombie007]

Hi, guys. I´m about to star a new custom bow and i wanted to make the string as if it were made of energy. Here is an image so you can see what i'm talking about:
http://s23.postimg.org/wjzs24hyf/Bow_Sword_01.jpg
The idea is to make a bow craftable with the aetherium forge. This weapon will be able to split into two scimitars, that's why the string must be of magical nature.
So, how do i do something like this on Nifskope?

[gizmologist]

This would be fairly easy if the string is a separate TriShape. Just give the associated BSLightingShaderProperty an emit color.

 

If it's all one TriShape, you'll need to make a glow map, which is basically a texture with the glowy parts white and the non-glowy parts black (though you can use greyscale to vary the glow, too). You'll need to set the Shader Type to Glow Shader, check the Glow Map and Own Emit shader flags, and uncheck any Environment Map shader flags (can't have both envmap and glowmap), give it an emit color, and attach a glow map.

 

It's all done in the BSLightingShaderProperty, except for the glow map, which is in the associated BSShaderTextureset. The glow map is the third texture down from the top.

 

There's got to be a tutorial out there somewhere.

[Zombie007]

Thanks! I guess i made a good call to leave the string as a separate mesh!

[ghosu]

Jeah, exactly...here are some glow settings from one of my old projects so you know how to set up the nif file:

 

http://666kb.com/i/ci1d9sq5raaypvjmw.jpg

 

2nd window, _g.dds in the third line is the glow map. In my case i used an alpha map as well (second texture, though you won't need one since you've got a seperate mesh, i needed this version for my project) - so the red areas would be invisible ingame, only the runes, eyes and the gem are visible. The first texture is the glow map, black = nothing and white = maximum glow, grey = everything between. The intensity of the glow effect are set up in the nif itself, first image.