Team Fortress 2

Team Fortress 2

324 ratings
Full color Objector and Flair!
By Ryuke [TBM α]
A guide for getting full color Objector and Flair! decals.
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Overview
This method takes advantage of the material layer Valve uses to spice up images you send to them. Valve put in a file that goes over whatever image you send them, and you simply load a replacement with your target image in place of it.Overlay on darkest and brightest imageThis image when fully opaque goes over whatever image you load, making it perfect to bypass the funky colorization scheme.
Step One: Locate your TF2 Install
First go to your main Steam window, and click on Library. Find Team Fortress 2 in your list, and right click it. From the pulldown menu, select Properties.

From here a window pops up, click on the Local Files tab, and then click "Browse Local Files..."
Step Two: The /custom/ folder.
From step one, double click the /tf/ folder, then the /custom/ folder. If it does not exist, create it.
Inside the /custom/ folder you should create a new folder and name it whatever will help you remember that this is for full color flair/objectors.
For example, let's say I name my folder "PEBKAC", once I open it I should be in
Steam\steamapps\common\Team Fortress 2\tf\custom\PEBKAC
Inside that folder you create the folder named "scripts".
Inside /scripts/ you create the folder named "items"
Inside /items/ you create the folder named "custom_texture_blend_layers"
We're now at
Steam\steamapps\common\Team Fortress 2\tf\custom\PEBKAC\scripts\items\custom_texture_blend_layers

For Objectors
Go to Step Three
For Flair!
Go to Step Four
Step Three: Objectors
Inside the last folder you created, custom_texture_blend_layers you need to save your image as a 128x128 pixel png image with the name "paper_overlay". After you've put it there, start or restart tf2, then start the process of applying your decal to an objector.
You can pick any image, I usually just use my avatar. Click the Next button. If you've done it correctly your image will show up.If your image shows up like mine did, it's time to finish the application.
Step Four: Flair!
Inside the last folder you created, custom_texture_blend_layers you need to save your target image as a 128x128 pixel png image with the name "flair_template_guide". After you've put it there, start or restart tf2, then start the process of applying your decal to the Flair!.

You can pick any image, I usually just use my avatar, but for Flair! it works better if you have a fully white image to load. Click the next button. If you've done it correctly your image will show up.

Adjust the gradient slider until whatever image you picked isn't interfering with the image you put in the flair_template_guide.
If your image shows up like mine did, it's time to finish the application.
129 Comments
Ryuke [TBM α]  [author] 6 hours ago 
Welcome, buddy.
Korik 15 Feb @ 4:42pm 
THANK YOU THANK YOU I SPENT 2 MONTHS LOOKING FOR A TUTORIAL THAT WOULD HELP ME AND I DIDN'T FIND ANY BUT I SAW THIS ONE AND I CAME IN AND DID EVERYTHING AND IT WORKED FOR ME THXX I LOVE YOUUU :medicon:
Ryuke [TBM α]  [author] 26 Jan @ 3:05pm 
A fair note, I nearly never interact with Linux file systems.:praisesun:
Darsk 26 Jan @ 7:06am 
Hello @Ryuke and other people using this guide, especially on Linux (snap install here).

I followed the tutorial, using the exact same folder naming ("PEBKAC"), but it was failing to work.

When I checked back the \tf\custom\ folder I noticed that there was a new folder name "pebkac" that was auto-generated by TF2 to store sound cache files, but it did not match the full cap name.

So I started the tutorial again, this time using a lowercase folder name and it worked !!

It seems that on Linux (at least my install) it might not pick up correctly upper case folders (not that rare of a bug regarding filesystems), so use lowercases and maybe the guide could be updated to notify that lowercase should be preferred ?
TheZeroed 18 Dec, 2024 @ 10:21pm 
@Ryuke i named it just as you said to as the flair_template_guide.png in my custom_texture_blend_layers yet when I decal my Flair! It still uses the Gradient shit.
Ryuke [TBM α]  [author] 17 Dec, 2024 @ 12:47am 
Please describe the nature of the file formatting emergency. @theZeroed
TheZeroed 15 Dec, 2024 @ 11:13am 
Hey, for some reason your Flair! guide just is NOT working. Any tips?
Lady Oogie! | Trans Rights 11 Nov, 2024 @ 7:01pm 
Still works :))
nad 2 Nov, 2024 @ 1:07am 
yeah, I was not reading your guide properly, jsut wanted to mention that anyway