Before you dig in  to this tutorial I must remind you that this is the second installment of the tutorial that I made last week, and in order to follow this tutorial the way you should I feel obligated to point you to the  first one again. I really hope that you  already got your grasp on Total Commander and have set Notepad++ as your default editor. Good news is that our buddy and one of Aston2 masterminds Dimpal (Dmitry Cashev) has compiled a great Skinning Manual that contains almost all technical details that you need to know in skin making process. If there is something that you don’t understand it is most likely that it is explained there.
I hope this video will help you get started and give you an idea of how it can make the whole process a bit easier. I apologize if my spoken English is not that good, if it is hard for you t o follow me I’ll “write” it next time.

Theme for Aston2 inspired by DJ Hero game. I have never liked the idea of using brushed metal in UI and skins in general but I must admit it fit in quite nicely. My first animated wallpaper but so I hope you’ll like it. You can get the theme here and below you can see the 1440×900 screenshot. I hope you will enjoy it as much as I did while making it. It took hours and hours too polish the look the way I wanted but I think it has payed off well.

First installment of skinning A2 my way. It is the way I do it and I’ll show you some tools and tricks of the trade. Skinning Aston2 is still very hard at first but later is getting … well … not so hard.. I mean it is getting easier. First I’ll show you what tools I use and how to set them up for maximum productivity.

Notepad++ – Or some other text editor that supports syntax highlighting. You can use Windows built-in Notepad but Notepad++ has some great features and it is absolutely free.

Total Commander – download, install it and set it up like in video below. Watch it on youtube directly for better quality.

What features are important that makes TC (Total Commander) ideal for skinning?