How to add Custom Variations

Time Needed : 30 minutes

JWildfire has a facility to add in custom variations that  have been written by others into your flames, there are two ways of doing this. One is to paste the code into a custom_wf variation, or custom_wf_full which is an existing variation, or you can have them saved as files and use the Custom Variation Loader, which is a built in script you can run from within JWildfire.

You can download some custom variations here , or ones to paste in here ,  or on the JWildfire Forum

  1. Copy your code

    The first way we’ll look at is how to add them via the custom variation code itself as displayed in forums or on facebook or on this site here. Later on we’ll show you how to add the downloaded versions.
    So, the first thing you’re going to want to do, is to copy the code to paste back into JWildfire, so find the code you’re interested in, drag your mouse to highlight all of the code, then either right click and select copy, or press CTRL C (don’t know what it is on a mac sorry).

    copy code

  2. Add a custom_wf transform.

    Ok once all the code has been copied, go to JWildfire, and either start a new flame, or you can modify an existing one. You’ll be adding a new variation called custom_wf or custom_wf_full. This is going to be our custom variation.

    A Select Customwf

  3. Paste In your code

    After you’ve added the custom_wf_full or custom_wf, click the icon that looks like a gear or a cog, which will bring up a code box.

    A Click Settings

  4. Paste in your code

    In the code box, get rid of anything that’s already in there (CTRL A then the delete key will work) or backspace the lot, then CTRL V or right click and paste your code (from step 1) into the box. Then click OK.

  5. You’re done

    You can now work with this variation as if it were any other, please note though that although your flame code will include the custom variation, if you want to repeat the process on another flame you’ll have to insert custom_wf etc again.

  6. Alternative method using external java files

    Built in to JWildfire is a Custom Variation Loader which will add a custom variation into your flame via running a script. It comes preloaded with several ones you can try straight away which is an advantage. Another advantage is you can build up a library of them, then by clicking a few buttons insert the one of your choice into your flame without the hassle of copying and pasting etc.

    Because custom variations are small JAVA files, you’ll often find where they are available there’s a zip file containing the JAVA custom variation. What you do, is extract this to the folder where JWildfire keeps its custom variations. Alternatively if you find one that doesn’t have a separate Java file, you can copy and paste into a notepad and save it out as a JAVA file in the correct folder.

  7. Find location of the Java files

    To find out you need to click preferences.

    preferences settings

  8. Find settings for custom variations path

    Scroll down the list of settings until you see the “tinaCustomVariationsPath”

    location of folder

    This folder is where you will need to either extract your .java files or save them if you’ve copied them to a notepad first. I won’t go through how to extract from a zip, or how to save files into folders. You should know this already, if not leave me a comment underneath and I’ll answer.
    Once you’ve done this, you just need to…

  9. Run the Custom Variation Loader

    You can run it without adding any files as it has some already installed. Head over to the scripts area of JWildfire (see below)

    open built in scripts

  10. Custom Variation Loader

    Once you open the Built In scripts folder, look for the Custom Variation Loader and Run it

    Run Custom Variation Loader

  11. Choose your custom variation.

    It will pop up a box like this, choose your custom variation from the drop down list, then select where in your flame (which transform you want to place it on).

    Choose options

  12. Run script

    Once you click Run Script (see above) , the new custom variation will be inserted into your flame ready for you to play with.

Video Tutorials by Brad Stefanov showing how to use custom variations

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