41shots Livery Editor - how it works
Printable guide (PDF) - the essentials on a few pages, for paper or a second monitor.
Place & select
- Place: pick a decal on the left, then click the car (with In-game mouse on: right-click). Esc cancels.
- Select: click a decal on the car, or a row in the Layers list. A click into empty space deselects; a click on the car beside a decal keeps the selection, because that is the drag handle for it.
- Multi-select: tick the checkbox on each layer row, or Shift-click a range / Ctrl-click to toggle rows. The checkbox in the Layers header (or Ctrl+A) selects every decal at once; untick it to clear the selection.
- Vehicle picker: click the vehicle name up top and type to filter the list. A not buyable in vanilla tag marks vehicles that cannot be owned in the vanilla game, so a livery cannot be applied there; some modded servers allow it.
- Pick on car (bottom bar, under Editing, on by default) is what makes clicks on the car select decals. Turn it off in crowded designs: clicks then never change the selection, you pick decals in the Layers list only, and dragging on the car always moves that selection, so overlapping decals cannot steal it. The hover glow on the car follows the toggle.
Move & rotate
- Drag the selected decal on the car, or nudge with WASD / arrow keys.
- Snap: while dragging, the decal clicks exactly onto the nearest guide line once it gets close, and the engaged line lights up across the whole body so you can see the alignment run. It also snaps to the height and centre lines of your other decals, even with the guides hidden. A locked decal makes a good fixed reference to snap everything else to. The Snap box in the bottom bar turns it off, holding Shift drags free past a line, and the keyboard always nudges freely. Grid lines only pull while the guides are visible.
- In-game keys: Q/E rotate, F/V scale up/down, Z/C stretch narrower/wider, R flip, T mirror, G duplicate. Keys go by position, so on a German keyboard the Z pair is Y/C. [ ] still rotate too. Duplicates land directly above their originals in the Layers list.
- Step size (top of the panel) sets how far each −/+ button and the move / rotate / scale / stretch keys jump. It is split per category - Move, Rotate, Scale, Stretch and Opacity each have their own Fine / Med / Coarse, or type an exact amount. Hover a category to see which fields it drives; click the bar to fold it away. Your choice is remembered.
- Group edits: with several selected, drag / keys / sliders move, scale and rotate them all at once.
- Scale as group scales sizes AND the spacing between the selected decals around the group's centre (the plain Scale slider only resizes each decal in place). Decals on different faces of the car scale around their own face's centre.
- Align to primary: with several selected, Same height and Same centre (right panel) move the other decals onto the line of the primary decal, the one you clicked last. The alignment is solved on the car itself, so it stays exact across curved panels and across both sides. A decal whose face cannot reach that line (a roof decal has no height) is left where it is.
- Copy to other side duplicates the selection onto the opposite side of the car, readable and at the mirrored spot - unlike the Mirror flag, which draws a pure reflection (text becomes mirror writing). On a single face like the roof, a mirrored copy of text still reads backwards - that is what a mirror does.
The sliders
- Type a value: click the number next to any slider and type it in - Enter applies, Esc cancels.
- Position X / Y - where the decal sits (cm from the vehicle centre; height is measured from the ground up).
- Yaw / Pitch (aim) - the spray direction of the projector: sets the perspective and how the decal wraps. Changing it also shifts where it lands. Aimed straight down (Pitch 270), Yaw spins the decal on the roof - and crossing exactly 270 with the Pitch slider turns it 180 degrees, which is what the game does too.
- Scale uniform size · Stretch width factor (below 1 = narrower, above 1 = wider) · Rotate · Color · Opacity.
Color tools
- Color fields: click one to open the color picker, the same in every browser, or type a value straight into the field. The small button inside the picker switches entry between HEX, RGB and HSL. Opacity stays on the Opacity slider.
- Screen pipette: the pipette button next to the decal and body color fields picks any color on your screen, even outside the browser window. It exists in Chromium browsers (Chrome, Edge, Opera ...). Firefox does not offer screen sampling to websites; a system tool such as the free PowerToys Color Picker does the same job there, and the picked code pastes straight into the field.
- Design colors lists every color used in the design, most used first - click one to paint the whole selection with it.
- Fade blends the selected decals from one color to another, in the order they were added (bottom of the Layers list first) - for flame fades and gradients.
- Swap decal: Shift-click a decal in the left palette to put that decal on every selected layer - position, size and color stay.
Lock & snap
- Lock (padlock) freezes an axis (X, Y, Yaw or Pitch) - e.g. lock Y to slide only along X, or lock Yaw+Pitch to move a decal without changing its aim.
- Snap "90" jumps Yaw/Pitch to the nearest 0 / 90 / 180 / 270 to straighten a decal.
Flags
- Flip mirrors the texture vertically in place.
- Mirror adds a mirrored copy on the other side of the car.
- No opposite side stops the projection punching through to the far side. On by default, like in-game.
- No backface culls surfaces angled away from the projection. Projections aimed along the vehicle still run along flat side walls and skip roofs and hoods, matching how the game paints them. On by default, like in-game.
- On wheel lets the decal paint the rims, on by default like in-game. The preview paints exactly the rims the game paints: only some rims accept decals (each rim declares it, most stock wheels do not), and tires never take paint. One thing the game leaves open is wheel rotation: a freshly spawned vehicle carries the decal exactly as previewed, but after driving, the painted rim can come to rest at a different angle. Respawn the vehicle in the garage before importing and it matches the preview.
Layers, guides, camera
- Layers (right) list top = front; thumbnails show each decal, the swatch its color. Hover a row to highlight it on the car; the list scrolls to a decal you click on the car. Drag the bar between the list and the panel below to resize it.
- Reorder: drag a row up or down and drop it on the insertion line; the dots at the row start mark the grip. Rows of a multi-selection move together as one block. The bar-arrows jump straight to the very front / very back, and the number field on each row takes an exact position (1 = back; out-of-range numbers clamp to the nearest valid position, typos just snap back). Positions 1-30 are what the game imports.
- Eye (per row): hides a decal on the preview while you work on layers behind it; one more click shows it again. Hidden decals stay in the design and the export and still count toward the game's 30. They are just not drawn here, not clickable on the car and never snap targets. With several layers selected, one eye click hides or shows them all. Hiding also deselects the decal, so the next drag cannot take it along; you can still select its row in the list and edit it there. Like the padlock, hidden states are saved in this browser and undo with Ctrl+Z.
- Padlock (per row): freezes a decal completely: the mouse cannot select or drag it on the car, and sliders, keys, color, flags and delete are all off until you unlock it. Even Clear all spares it. Only its layer position stays adjustable, since reordering happens anyway when other layers move past it. With several layers selected, one padlock click locks or unlocks them all. Locking also deselects the decal, so the next drag cannot take it along. Locks are saved in this browser, survive a reload, and undo with Ctrl+Z like any other edit.
- Body color (bottom bar, under Preview) previews your design on any paint color. Preview only: the exported code carries decals; the real paint is set in the game's paint menu.
- Wheel color (right under Body color) previews the rim color: in the game, rims that take decals also take their own paint, independent of the body. The field appears whenever the vehicle wears such rims, colors all of them at once, and the ↺ button returns each rim to its factory color. A second field appears for the one rim with two colorable areas (the Trophy #3). Preview only, like the body color.
- Scene & grid color: the background (dark to light) sits under Preview in the bottom bar, the grid line color under the arrow next to Guides. Both help when judging bright designs.
- Sun (bottom bar, under Preview) shades the vehicle with a warm daylight close to the in-game sun, so colours read the way they will on the road. Follow view (the default) keeps the sun over your shoulder, so whatever you look at is lit. Fixed pins the sun in the sky at the vehicle's front left: orbit around and you see the same door once in the sun and once in shadow, exactly what happens in-game. Off is the neutral studio look the editor always had, with soft shading only, where a colour renders exactly as you picked it on lit surfaces. In the game the light also changes with time of day and street lamps, so treat these as points on the same range.
- Edit quality (bottom bar, under Preview) decides how the preview renders while you drag or nudge a decal. Auto (the default) briefly measures your graphics hardware and, if it is slow, switches to a lower editing resolution that sharpens again the moment you pause. The yellow ⚠ Performance mode marker in the stage corner shows when that is in effect, and clicking the marker turns it off. Fast always uses that lower editing resolution. Sharp always renders at full resolution, which can stall for a moment on every edit if your hardware is slow. Colors, layer order and the exported design never depend on this choice, and your pick is remembered in this browser.
- Game limit: the game keeps only the first 30 decals of a design. You can place more here to experiment - the layer list marks everything past 30, and Export warns you - but trim back to 30 before using it in-game.
- Guides draws an alignment grid on the body plus centre lines - on by default at 20 cm; untick the box (bottom bar) to hide it. Spacing and grid color sit behind the small arrow next to it, and the spacing goes down to 1 cm.
- Undo / Redo: the bottom-bar buttons or Ctrl+Z / Ctrl+Y. Your selection stays on the same decals afterwards, as long as they still exist.
- Camera: right-drag orbits, middle-drag or Shift+right-drag pans, and the wheel zooms toward your cursor. The buttons in the corner of the 3D view (or keys 1-5) jump to straight front / back / left / right / top views; Home resets the view. Left and Right mean the vehicle's sides, so Left is the driver side. Double-right-click a spot on the car to spin around it from then on, press . or double-click a layer row to fly to that decal - the camera comes around to the decal's side by itself.
- In-game mouse (bottom bar, under Editing, off by default) swaps the mouse buttons to match the game's decal editor: left-drag moves the camera and right-click places, selects and drags decals. The camera extras move along with it - Shift+left-drag pans and double-left-click sets the spin centre. The wheel and middle button stay as they are, keyboard nudging is unaffected, and touch input keeps working either way. Your choice is remembered in this browser.
Photo mode & reference pictures
- Photo mode (the Photo button in the bottom bar, or P) hides all panels and helpers for a clean look at your design. The camera stays fully yours: orbit, pan, zoom and the view keys 1-5 all keep working, and the small bar at the bottom holds the backdrop and sun settings so you can stage the shot. Esc or Exit returns to editing exactly as you left it.
- Take photo saves the current view as a high-resolution PNG straight to your downloads. Every photo carries a small corner badge with the 41shots mark and the Motor Town logo (because we love Motor Town: Behind the Wheel and its community); in return, the watermark lettering that normally tiles the editor background stays out of photo mode entirely.
- Custom backdrop: Load image in the photo bar puts your own picture behind the vehicle - garage shots, scenery, whatever fits the design. Picking one of the plain colors brings it back later via the Custom image entry; the × button removes it.
- Reference panel (the Reference button in the bottom bar) pins a picture over the 3D view while you work, so you can rebuild a design without switching tabs. Load a file, drop one onto the panel or paste it with Ctrl+V. Drag the header to move the panel, drag its corner to resize, zoom with the wheel and drag inside to reach details, double-click to fit the whole picture again, and use the Opacity slider to fade it for comparing colors.
- Your pictures stay yours: backdrop and reference pictures are shown only to you, are kept only until you leave the page, and never leave your browser - nothing is uploaded.
Decal groups
- Group: drop a layer row onto the middle of another row (the row lights up), or select two or more decals and press Group above the layer list. Grouped decals indent under a header that shows the group's name and size.
- Work with a group: click the header, or any grouped decal on the car, to select the whole group and move, scale or color it as one. Ctrl-click on the car, or a single row in the list, picks one member. Double-click the name to rename it, the small arrow folds the group, the scissors ungroup it, and dragging the header moves the whole group through the stack.
- Editor only: groups organise your layer list. The export code and the game import are completely unchanged by grouping. A group left with fewer than two decals dissolves on its own.
Saved groups
- Save: select decals, open the Saved groups tab (left), give them a name and hit Save as group, or press the save button on a group header in the Layers list. Stored in this browser, a saved group survives reloads and vehicle switches.
- Load from the same tab adds the group at its saved position as a live group, selected and ready to drag. Groups are per browser/device, they don't follow you elsewhere.
- Organise: search saved groups by name, create folders and move groups into them, and click a group's vehicle tag to see only the groups made for that vehicle.
- Share: the export button on a saved group downloads it as a small file to pass to another player; they bring it in with the Import button on the same tab.
Parts
- What it is: the Parts tab (left) lists the tuning parts of the current vehicle that you can actually change: bonnets, bumpers, wings, racks and so on. Each slot carries one part at a time, exactly like the game. Ticking a different bonnet swaps the current one out, and unticking a part takes it off entirely where the game's workshop allows that. Parts the game treats as mandatory (some fenders, bumpers and headlights) only swap between variants - the preview will not remove those either. (stock) marks the factory part.
- Welded-on parts are not listed: things like the side boxes on some trucks never appear in the game's parts menu and cannot be removed there, so the preview treats them as part of the car.
- Work parts too: where the game's workshop sells cargo or utility parts - the delivery bikes' boxes, the Bongo spare tire, trailer ramps - they show up here as choices and start off, matching the factory state.
- Wheels: every wheel has its own rim dropdown, offering exactly the rims the game's workshop sells for that vehicle, under their in-game names. (stock) marks the factory rim, (paintable) marks rims that take decals. Each wheel can wear a different rim, like in-game. A rim that does not fit all of a vehicle's wheels is not offered (the twin-tire Lomax rim only fits the all-twin trailers), and a wheel with no alternative shows a greyed-out box - the game does the same (the Goliath trailers cannot swap their wheels at all).
- Wheel view (button under the wheel list) shows one wheel alone, big in front of the camera - the easy way to place rim decals precisely. The arrows at the top switch between the wheels, painting works exactly as usual, and Esc or Exit returns to the whole vehicle. A decal placed on one wheel stays on that wheel, so every wheel can carry its own design.
- Factory setup puts everything back to the way the vehicle leaves the dealer, wheels included. Vehicles without swappable parts say so.
- Display only: your decals and the export code are not touched by this. Decals sit on the vehicle, not on a part. Swap a bonnet in the game and the decal reappears on the new one; the preview behaves the same. Mount the parts themselves in the game's workshop.
- Remembered: your part picks are saved per vehicle in this browser, like the other view settings.
Saving your work
- Automatic: your current design is saved in this browser as you go, and comes back on its own if you reload or close the tab by accident. The dot next to Import/Export shows Saved or Saving. It is one slot (the design you are working on) and stays on this device.
- Export is how you keep a design for good or move it: copy the code and paste it into the in-game workshop, or share it. Clear all starts over and forgets the auto-saved design.
Export / import
- Export copies the design code to your clipboard - paste it into the in-game workshop's import. Import loads an existing code here to edit it.
- Copy link (top bar) copies a link that opens this design straight in the editor - handy for showing a design to other editor users. The link carries no access: whoever opens it needs their own editor invite. Very large designs make very long links; some chat apps refuse those, and the export code always works instead.
How close is the preview to the game?
- Very close where it matters: where a decal sits and how big it is comes out in-game the way you placed it here. The notes below are the small ways the game's own rendering can differ from the preview.
- Fine details: the game paints designs a little coarser than the preview. Very thin lines, outlines and tiny details can look slightly ragged in-game, and a thin border may even drop out in places. Give small details a bit more room and they hold up fine.
- Sharp tips: the pointed tips and corners of shapes tend to come out a touch rounder in-game than they look here. Shapes placed exactly tip-to-tip can show a tiny gap in-game.
- Mirrors and small attachments: on some vehicles the game also paints pieces the preview leaves clean - side mirrors, for example - and on others it may not. If a decal lands near such a piece, give it a quick look in-game.
- Grey hardware, bed frames, glass and lights never take decals in-game - the editor shows them in fixed colours. A projected decal may show through onto inner surfaces that stay clean in-game.
- Which surfaces take paint: the preview follows the game's own per-vehicle list - every surface that takes a decal in-game takes one here, and surfaces the game keeps clean stay clean in the preview too. That includes trim strips, chassis frames, door frames and edge rails whose names look like body panels, and parts that move with the vehicle (pop-up headlight covers, the fender on a motorcycle fork). A few parts the game excludes from painting one by one, like the Rotator's crane, outriggers and underlift, stay clean here too. Checked against in-game photos on 2026-08-09.
- Whether a projection aimed along the vehicle fills a perfectly flat side wall differs per vehicle in the game itself. The preview shows the common case (filled), so a few vehicles leave such a wall blank in-game.
- On strongly curved panels the preview may differ slightly - the exported code still applies correctly in-game.
About
The editor works best in a Chromium-based desktop browser (Chrome, Edge, Opera, Brave ...) with hardware acceleration enabled; it needs WebGL2.
The vehicles and decals in this editor match game version . Vehicles or decals added in a newer game version show up here after the next editor update; importing such a design already works, the editor just cannot preview the new content yet.
41shots Livery Editor - made by the 41shots community (41shots.cc). Motor Town: Behind the Wheel and all related trademarks are property of their respective owners. 41shots.cc is a community fan site and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the developers or publishers.
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