Vtex (Source 1)
Vtex (Source 1)

Not to be confused with VTEX (Source 2).
Vtex, or Valve Texture Tool, is the command-line tool used to convert targa (.tga), portable floatmap (.pfm), or Photoshop (.psd) (Orange box SDK) image files into Valve Texture Files (.vtf) for use in the Source engine. It takes a targa (.tga) image and an optional list of compile parameters, and creates a Valve Texture File (.vtf) from them.

Basic Usage
- Make sure that Steam is running.
- Place the targa image to be converted inside the
SteamApps/common/gamefolder/materialsrc/
folder, where gamefolder is the game folder of the current game (cstrike
/dod
/hl2
/hl2mp
/tf
). You can also place the image within a subfolder of this folder, to make Vtex compile the texture to the correspondingmaterials/
subfolder. (For instance, placing the image in amaterialsrc/metal/
subfolder, will make Vtex compile the texture to thematerials/metal/
subfolder.) - If necessary, write a text (.txt) file containing a set of Vtex compile parameters. Give it the same name as the targa image (with the exception of the .txt extension) and put it in the same folder. If you choose to omit this list, Vtex will create an empty one for you during compilation.
- The Vtex executable (
Vtex.exe
) is located in the/Steam/SteamApps/common/gamefolder/bin/
folder, again wheregamefolder
is the folder that corresponds with the target game. It can be executed in one of two ways: Through the easy "drag-and-drop" method (described below), or the more advanced command prompt method, described here. Steam must run while it is executed. - The resulting Valve Texture File (VTF) will be compiled to the
materials/
folder of the current game by default. For instance, if the current game would be Half-Life 2, the texture file would be compiled to theSteamApps/common/Half-Life 2/hl2/materials/
folder. If the targa image resided within a subfolder, Vtex will compile the texture file to the correspondingmaterials/
subfolder. If that subfolder doesn't exist, Vtex will create it automatically.
The Drag-and-Drop Method
The drag-and-drop method is the easy way to use Vtex. Just drag the icon of either the targa image to be converted, or its list of compile parameters (from its materialsrc/
folder) on top of the icon of the Vtex executable (Vtex.exe) and let go, and Vtex will compile the texture file automatically.
See Also
Official Source SDK tools | |
---|---|
Map editors | ![]() |
Map compilers | vbsp • vmap • vmpi • vrad • vvis |
Map tools | bspzip • glview • VBSP2 • vbspinfo |
Model compilers | Studiomdl |
Model tools | Dmxconvert • Dmxedit • ![]() ![]() |
Texture tools | ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Sound tools | VSoundEdit |
Engine tools | ActBusy Script Editor • Commentary Editor • Foundry • Material Editor • Particle Editor • ![]() |
Other | Captioncompiler • Demoinfo • Elementviewer • Motionmapper • Sfmgen • VConfig • Vfont • Vfont_decompiler • VICE • vpk |