How to make seamless tiles?

[ismetteren]

So, how do you make seamless tiles? Does it require special software?

Jools is the guy who does tiles in MSpaint right? how does he/you do it without any fancy software?

[andrew]

You're probably looking for something like this: Obliterating "The Grid"

[Moosader]

Special software, lol...
No, it's skill and experience.

What I do is draw a tile, remembering that it will loop on every side.
I then paste my 32x32 tile four times into a 64x64 image, look at what doesn't tile right, fix it, and select the fixed region as my new 32x32 tile, test it again.

When drawing stones and such, remember to let some stones go off the edge of the tile, and will be looped on the other side. It just takes some-- foresight?

[Spikey]

I'm no expert, but here's how I do it.
Find a picture, open Photoshop.
Crop a portion out that isn't too unbalanced, it looks like it will be good for tiling.
Crop the portion at 512x512, 256x256 whatever.
Goto Filter -> Other -> Offset.
if your texture is 512, offset it by 256. You will be able to see clear edge in center.
Click on the clone brush, keep the hardness a little low, and paint over the edges, until you think it looks unnoticeable.
Done.

[Jools64]

Pretty much just like lusikka said. I just take the tile, say 32x32 and copy and paste it 3 times around the original (now 64x64). I then select from around 16,16 to 48,48 and crop it. (copy it, shrink the canvas down to 32x32 or lower and paste) and then from there I just look and see what to change to make it seamless.
I often can just work it out as I pixel though without going through all that.

[ismetteren]

Ok, thanks. I have found a plugin for Paint.NET that does that for me, but it is nice to know that it can be done without any special software. The plugin just make it a little easier.

[LeonBlade]

I've struggled with this before...

[mgold07]

It's difficult I tell you, (I think I saw that tutorial before, or maybe it was the one with Secret of Mana tiles), anyway, back on topic. It can take many careful hours to get a seamless tile, to tell you the truth i'm a little bit iffy about discussing seamless tiles as quite a few of mine turned out...blocky ><, but, try pasted a couple of the tiles into paste, then make em "blend" together. I mean, mix the tiles around, see if they work well and are seamless etc. That's the best I got atm, I mean i only just woke up ><

[CC Ricers]

I take the approach Spikey mentioned. The Offset and High Pass filters are especially handy tools for texturing in 3D games, but they work well for any photo-realistic textures. Gamasutra has a nice article on it.

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3 ... filter.php