If you are making a skin for yourself, and you have a machine with 3D acceleration, there really is no need to convert the .raw file into the .bmp file necessary for playing in non-3D.  However, if you are planning on sharing your creation with others, you need to remember that there are a lot of people without 3D acceleration.  Therefore, it would probably be a good idea to create a .bmp file.  This can be easily done by converting the .raw file.

To do this, you will need two programs.  Paint Shop Pro 5.0, for some reason, cannot convert the .raw file correctly.  It creates a .bmp file that is 1KB too big.  This causes the game to crash.  As a result, you will need to convert the file with a program other than Paint Shop Pro.  I personally use Adobe Photoshop 5.0.  Adobe Photo Deluxe will also work.

The guide below details how to convert the file from .raw to .bmp with Photoshop 5.0.  If you would like to see how to convert the file with Adobe Photo Deluxe, check out Vampire’s Non-3D Converting Guide at  http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/wcwnitro/help.html