[LDPatternCreator] User Guide / Tutorial or help - Creating Templates

[ShireBrickz.com]

Hi LDPC Team and crew.

Just wondering if there is any user guides or tutorials on creating templates or importing .DAT data to create patterns onto Pieces not in the supplied template list. 
I have no problems creating my own custom patterns onto the supplied templates but am looking to expand my output onto other bricks.
Its is just a case of importing existing Dat files and then export? This seems to leave me with just a sticker looking finished product rather than a complete piece.
As a relative newbie to LDraw and surrounding programs, am I missing something in the process?

Thanks in advance?
Adam

[Philippe Hurbain]

There is this description/documentation/tutorial: http://jc-tchang.philohome.com/manuel/LPC_a.htm
...but it's written in French. Hopefully Google translate will allow you to get started with LDPC templates.

[Travis Cobbs]

There is this description/documentation/tutorial: http://jc-tchang.philohome.com/manuel/LPC_a.htm
...but it's written in French. Hopefully Google translate will allow you to get started with LDPC templates.

I was curious, so I had Chrome translate the page into English. I have to say that machine translation is far better now than it was a few years ago. In the past, you could usually figure out what the original was trying to say, but the wording would often be really obtuse. Now, it actually reads pretty well, perhaps as well as a person writing in a language that isn't their native language.

[Mikkel Bech Jensen]

It is actually quite easy to do. In LDraw Pattern Creator you simply press 'File -> Import from DAT' and then choose the direction of projection. You then get three import options. If you want to the template to appear as the supplied templates then you should pick the bottom option: 'Overwrite and import projection data'. Then you can pick a part from the LDraw parts library and use that as a template.

I would however recommend to open the part in and a part editor tool, like LDPartEditor, first to isolate the surfaces you want the pattern to be moddeled on. Of course you would have to save it as a seperate '.dat'-file so you will not ruin the original part.