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The controls for Workbench are fairly simple and are shown in the bottom right.
Hold down MOUSE LEFT to rotate the weapon a complete 360 degrees.
You can use your mouse wheel to zoom in and out
And by holding SHIFT and MOUSE LEFT you can pan the camera.
By clickin on the "Paint Style" menu, you get a list of all available Paint Styles that you can configure in Lambda Workbench.

By clicking on the "Weapon Menu" you get a list of weapons that support composite painting

There are two toolbars you can use to get a live preview of your paint kit

Colour control allows you to change the pattern or solid colours in real time.
This is good for experimenting and seeing how the PBN (Paint-By-Number) system works.

Pattern Control alows you to control aspects of both the pattern and wear.
You can configure the scale for your paint kit and view how your pattern will look like with X & Y offsets and rotation.
You can also change the wear value and see how your paint kit will look like at different wear randomistions such as offsets and rotation.
By clicking on Edit and then selecting "Paint Kit Settings"
You can modify various aspects of your paint kit, such as the name, description and configure maximum translation and rotation values and wear values.

By clicking on Edit and then selecting "Composite Inputs" you get a window that shows all current textures used for your Paint Kit

Each Paint Style requires you to put your input textures in to different folders.
You will be required to create the following folder structure. You can either put this structure within an addon or within the main materials directory in Garry's Mod.
Here is an example folder structure if you were to use the materials folder in Garry's Mod.
Or if you wanted to segregate your Workbench files in to it's own addon, you can do that also.
When browsing for the pattern it should show up.
Depending on what composite input you are trying to load, it will expect a certain file naming scheme.
These are as follows:
| Composite Input | Supported Styles | File Name Format | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pattern | All (Except Solid Colour) | *.vtf | ddpat.vtf |
| Bump Map | Custom, Gunsmith | *_normal.vtf | ddpat_normal.vtf |
| Phong Exponent | Anodized Multi-colored | *_phong.vtf | ddpat_phong.vtf |
| Animation Mask | Animated Style | *_anim_mask.vtf | ddpat_anim_mask.vtf |
| Colour Mask | Chromatic Style | *_color_mask.vtf | ddpat_color_mask.vtf |
| Self Illum Mask | Solid Colour, Hydrographic, Spray Paint, Custom, Animated, Chromatic | *_glow_mask.vtf | ddpat_glow_mask.vtf |