11-04-2003 05:56									#1
	Makespr.exe Enter the AD-FREE zone

Could I get some help with makespr.exe please.

I have completed 165 .tif files with 165 matching shadow files for a new sprite.

After some initial difficulties I am getting makespr.exe to run but get the following error message.
"Processing "GU20.txt"
[Move..
Error in Bitmap data. Pixel with no Associated Alpha"

I checked GU..MA1.2.tif and resaved it and ran it again and it started then came back with the same error but "[Move....." was different, there were 5 ". " now instead of 2.

Could someone explain the error messages you get with makespr.exe please? Do the "." relate to frame no's?

I am using Paintshop pro to make the tif files. Could someone indicate the best settings for-
a) magic wand, and
b) color replacer.
I think that may be where I made the mistakes. I noticed I had some near black pixels in my picture, ie 1,1,0 rather than 0,0,0. thats in the background.
c) do pixels that close in colour in the picture cause any problems, ie shhould I aim for a bigger gap and whats the best way to do it?

Thanks for any help.

	11-04-2003 06:51									#2
	Support Apolyton, buy Call to Power 2

You didnt created an alpha channel.

Quoting Harlan Thompson's unit creation document:

quote: Harlan Thompson 7. Now comes the tricky part of getting the alpha channel to work. Find the Layers window in Photoshop. Along the top of this window you should see three tabs, Layers, Channels and Paths. Click the Channels tab. You should see four channels for your graphic already: RGB, Red, Green and Blue. If you have any other channels, delete them. 8. Select the pure black background behind your unit. To make sure you select every last pure black pixel, use the Select -> Color Range command. With the eyedropper, click on the black background, then click OK. Now use the Select -> Inverse command. You should now see every last pixel that is NOT pure black selected. If you see pixels that should be pure black but aren’t, fix that now, then repeat step 8 until you have it right. 9. Now make the Alpha channel. With all the non-pure black pixels selected and the Channels tab open on the Layers window, click the “save selection as channel” button at the bottom of the Channels tab window. The icon on this button is a black box with a dashed circle inside it. When you click on this, a channel called Alpha 1 should appear in your Channels window.

	11-04-2003 11:53									#3
	Increase Your PM Length

I used PaintshopPro and followed IW instructions.
a) saving both the main picture outline to alpha channel before saving the whole to .tif and
b) the shadow to alpha channel separately before saving the whole picture as a tif file.

I used magic wand/invert selection to ensure I got the whole of the image (without background) and used color change to change the background or shadow where approp. When I rechecked, I saved to alpha and it came up with an outline and separate background called channel 1. When I resaved it I saved it over Channel 1. So as far as I know I have the alpha channels required for each frame, ie I have 165 .tif files for the main image and each has a matching alpha chanel, and 165 .tif files for the shadow and each has a matching alpha chanel.

I thought I read somewhere that if you read the dots in the makespr report you can work out which frame has a problem, that is what I was alluding to in my request.

However, now I know a bit about paintshop, I will re-read Harlans instructions and see if I missed a process. I have checked some frames and it SEEMS everything should be ok in that i cant find any non 0.0.0 pixels in the background or any 0.0.0 in the image, only an occassional 1.1.0 in the picture around the edges.

Thanks for your help.

	11-04-2003 11:55									#4
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However, just a thought, I did not give each alpha chanel a name, just let the computer name it channel 1 which i thought I read in some instructions.

	11-04-2003 18:43									#5
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I have attached two files, MA1.1 and MS1.1 in case anyone can find the problem.

Attachment: gu20.zip
This has been downloaded 1 time(s).

	13-04-2003 00:42									#6
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

Actual no alpha channel needs a name you can't give something like this to an alpha channel in PSP4 the program for that Harlan's instructions are written.

So Far I did not figured out what is wrong with the GU20MA.tif file. The GU20MA.tif is in the wrong format. All files needs to be in the *tif format, 24 bits uncompressed. The shaddow files is in a compressed type. Actual the only thing that is not quite correct with your alpha channels are that they are black/white only channels. For the shaddow file this is ok but not for the other file. The result of this is that you will see some terrible looking black edges around your units. So the edges of your alpha channels needs to be in grey tones. The alpha channels is there for controlling the transparency of each pixel if you have for a pixel a total black alpha channel then the pixel is not saved in the sprite, if it is total white then the pixel and only the pixel is saved in the sprite file. If the alpha channel is some grey then the according pixel is saved with tranparent information.

-Martin

	13-04-2003 03:26									#7
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Thanks for the help Martin.

Just checking, what you are suggesting is that I need less near black pixels around the edge of the main picture.

How do you achieve this please?

a) If I select the image, color change from 0.0.0 to 32.32.32 with a tolerance of say 25, will that do the trick?, or
b) is there another way to do it when saving to alpha?

This was my procedure.

I am redoing CIV 3 flic files and this is what I did.

Picked 10 -13 frames from the Flic animation, cropped to get the unit in the right place, then loaded the frames into PSP. Then frame by frame-
1)I used colour replacer to change the pink to pure black in the CIV3 frames,
2) then selected the red shadow, pasted as new frame, re-sized to 96X72, selected the background and painted it pure white,
3) inverted to the shadow and painted in pure black, saved it to alpha while the shadow was still selected,
4)then de selected, saved to file with the GU.. S .etc. tif prefix.
5)Then went back to the main image where the shadow was still selected, painted it pure black, de selected, resized to 96X72,
6) selected the black background with magic wand then saved to alpha,
7) de selected then saved to file with GU..A .tif etc.

Just confirming the objectives,
a) background selected and saved to alpha with only 0,0,0, black colour in it
b) picture frame saved as GU A with no pure black in any part, (should I make sure there are no near black as well?)
c) shadow, selected saved to alpha with only 0,0,0, black colour in it
d) shadow background, with only pure white, saved to GU S..tif.
e) there must be no pure black in the picture and only pure black in the picture background. (should I remove near black pixels in the picture here?)
f) there must be only pure black in the shadow and only pure white in the shadow background.

Thanks for your help.

	13-04-2003 04:49									#8
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

Well it is late here in Berlin so the complete answer has to wait until tomorrow.

An example unit sprite spipped with the sprite maker you should take a close look on the alpha channel and you will notice that the edges of the cow's alpha channel are neither black nor white but grey. I use the blur tool (I think this is the name for it in English) to make make the edges darker. Actual on the my good sprites I used much more of the transparent effect provided by the alpha channel then the cow example demonstrates.

-Martin

	13-04-2003 08:01									#9
	Get a bigger avatar today!

Hi Martin,

When I saved the PSP files I saved as .tif, uncompressed, RGB. I checked back, cant see where you get the 24 bit option in the save dialog box. Is it somewhere else?

Thanks for your help.

	13-04-2003 11:16									#10
	Suffering from ads?

I have made some progress.

I found the main problem seems to be that my starting frame for each animation was 1 rather than 0, ie GU20MA1.1.tif instead of GU20MA1.0.tif. I asked in an email whether this could be the problem but got no response, so I assumed it was not the cause.

I took a punt and started a sample sprite with only 1 frame for each event and direction, all numbered 0 and ran makespr.exe and it started to create a sprite, occassionally hanging up on a frame where I had missed so all black pixels in the unit image or had forgot to invert properly for the background, but completed eventually.

I then tried it again, but this time adding a few frames at a time. The dots do relate to frames as it came back with messages when it could not find the next frame and the dots equalled the number of frames processed, less 1 for each "0" frame.

Eventually, I made the sprite and now I can see how to improve it. Mainly centering the units and my spearman is a little large.

However, there was one issue, when executing the makespr (remembering I had insterted 1 frame, numbered 0 for each event, move, attack, death with matching shadow file) requested all the movement frames, then requested 16 more victory frames for direction 4 then finished executing and produced the sprite.

I gather from this that the GU01.txt file provided in the download is not complete in the number of frames for each event. I had a quick look but was a bot overwhelmed.

I am not good at altering .txt files so can someone post a GU.txt file for a complete move, attack, victory sequence with 10 frames for movement/victory and 13 for attack.

As far as the sprite for the spearman goes, I should be able to clean it up fairly quickly and once I have a text file, make it available. I need to put a border around some frames as he is a bit big and a bit low down on the square, but otherwise seeks OK.

Thanks for help received and in advance for the .txt file.

	13-04-2003 19:43									#11
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization III: Complete

quote: Originally posted by stankarp Hi Martin, When I saved the PSP files I saved as .tif, uncompressed, RGB. I checked back, cant see where you get the 24 bit option in the save dialog box. Is it somewhere else? Thanks for your help.

That is not in the save dialog box but if you save a *.tif file uncompressed then it is 16bit if it has an alpha channel then it is 24bit. I got this information from the image information in Paint Shop Pro 4.

The Immortal Wombat already posted such a file in one of the threads, I think the file I attached is it.

-Martin

	14-04-2003 04:10									#12
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I have downloaded the file but it appears to not have the full number of animation frames for it. eg, movement frames are 1 and attack frames are 4.

For some reason which I have no idea about, after I constructed my first sprite yesterday using 0 as the first frame number, which is the way both gu.txt files are deliverd, makespr started crashing when I executed.

I experimented and found out if I changed the first frame number in movement to 1 it would run. So I constructed a new sprite with more frames in it but when I run it in the game , the game crashes when I attack with it.

I wondered if it had to do with the line UNIT_SPRITE_ATTACK_IS_DIRECTIONAL 0.
I tried changing it to 1 and makespr wont finish executing , coming up with the error gu20.txt line 35:Expected Keyword UNIT_SPRITE_ATTACK not found. I go to line 35 and its there, UNIT_SPRITE_ATTACK 1 is there?

I cant work it out. After making my first sprite I added some new frames to my folder and started makespr and it just started crashing with the illegal operation message. If I removed the first movement frame it came up cant find GUMA201.0.tif, if I added any file named that including once which I know ran through makespr before, it crashed. If I change first movement frame to 1, I can run it but it isnt using the full number of frames and crashes when I attack with the unit in the game?

I thought I had it all sorted out yesterday now i havnt got an idea

	14-04-2003 10:01									#13
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

I did some further experimenting and found if I renumbered everything away from 20 which is the number of the sprite I created, (in this case 2) I found I can run makespr.exe and create a sprite with either gu01.txt(the cow sprite text file) or with IW GU0002.txt.

It appears that either something was corrupted and wont let me continue to use the 20 number for a sprite or there is some mechanism that excludes the number once you have created a complete sprite. I have no idea.

However, neither GU01.txt or GU0002.txt are complete files. 01 has no attack sequence while 0002 uses only 1 frame for movement and 4 for attack and death. Whenever I try to change ANYTHING in the files I get error messages, and when I go the the line referred to, the missing thing is there, for eg line 35 errors say expected keword UNIT_SPRITE_ATTACK not found, I go there and there is the missing statement exactly as recorded in the error message. I tried moving it up or down a line and it made no difference. I tried to count the number of blank spaces and that doesnt work or cutting and pasting

I must be missing something ?

Can anyone help. I need a GU...txt file with 10 frames for movement and death and 12 for attack.

	15-04-2003 00:12									#14
	Got spare money?

Another hint I can give you is that programmers start to count with zero. So if you first frame starts numbered with 0 then this is correct. And I think the sprite script should be named gu02.txt. Well if the sprite maker accepted the other file ok.

-Martin

	15-04-2003 02:41									#15
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

quote: Originally posted by stankarp Can anyone help. I need a GU...txt file with 10 frames for movement and death and 12 for attack.

Sorry, I've been away for the weekend, and my webmail is all screwed up.

This script (GU20.txt) has 10 movement, 12 attack, 10 death frames, all starting from *.1 rather than *.0


Also, the line(s) you need in the file (I think) are "SPRITE_FIRST_FRAME 1" <-- you can change this 0 if your frames are numbered from *.0. You need one of these lines from the movement animation block, the attack animation block and the death animation block.

	15-04-2003 02:49									#16
	Support Apolyton

Attachment: gu20.txt
This has been downloaded 2 time(s).

	15-04-2003 06:35									#17
	Support Apolyton, pre-order Civilization IV

The mystery deepens.

I ran gu20.txt (renamed to 02) and it created a spr which i put in the game and it crashed as soons as I tried to move it or attack with it? exactly as described in above posts.

I changed frame number to 0 in the movement sequence and it ran but again the game crashed when I used the unit.

I tried changing another number for frames from 1 to 0 in attack sequence and makespr does not work, coming up with line 35 error described above.

I cant work out why this is happening.

In summary,
1) i can make a working sprite with either cow.txt or gu0002.txt which does not crash the game (but these sprites do not have full movement or attack sequences).
2) I can run makespr with gu20.txt as is or changing only 1 number, ie, frame number for movement from 1 to 0, but the completed sprite crashes the game.
3) if I change any more numbers at all in gu02.txt, makespr comes up with the line 35 error.

HELP PLEASE

I have attached the frames in a zip file. As far as I know wirtually all of them have been used in one or other sprites without a problem. EG all the death ones ran in cow.txt as did the movement ones. The first 4 attack frames ran in gu0002.txt.

	15-04-2003 06:43									#18
	Remove this text

Sorry, zip file attached.

	15-04-2003 06:45									#19
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

Dont know what happened, I have uploaded it twice and its not there.

Can the moderator attack please, file spear.zip or spear1.zip?

	15-04-2003 20:28									#20
	Got spare money?

All the animations should start with the frame number zero otherwise the game searches for taht frame and rashes if it does not find it. For attachments: Here on Apolyton is a limit of file size for attachments of 500000 bytes alternativly you can use the 'Poly upload service. For attachments you should make sure that you really attached them.

-Martin

	16-04-2003 01:04									#21
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

ok, I got your email with the attached frames, double-checked the script file, am now running a bug-free script. I commented out the victory shadow files that you included in the zip, and tried to make a shadow-free sprite (perfectly possible) rather than a semi-shadowed sprite (questionable) and yes, something in either the death or attack animations crashes the game.

Which is odd, because usually a game-crashing type error will mean the sprite should fail to compile in the first place.

I also substituted a copy of GU02VA5.9 in for 5.8 which was looking a bit weird. That doesn't appear to be the problem, the game crashes regardless.

What I did notice was odd is that the sprite compiler has only 10 dots following the Victory[] line, when the script dictates it should have 10*5 = 50 dots (=50 frames)

Oh hold on. Real-time posting here. Martin, didn't you find that sprites didn't like having the alpha channel touching the edge of the image?
If so, your problem is with GU02VA4.10.tif

edit: no, that doesn't solve it either.

Have you tried it with shadows?

Last edited by Immortal Wombat on 16-04-2003 at 01:23

	16-04-2003 06:51									#22
	Inflate your Upload Space

I noticed that the compiler did not make all the death animations, only 1 sequence.

I am using a sprite in my game made with the cow.txt which as movement and death animations but no attack animation. I tried to cut and paste an attack sequence but it wont work. The compiler works but the unit crashes the game.

The shadow files are in the folder but I dont know how the compiler uses them but the finished sprite has a shadow under it.

I know the first 4 frames of the attack animation are ok because I used IW's gu0002.txt posted above and made a sprite that does not crash the game. It used 1 movement and 4 attack/death frames.

How about trying to copy and paste an attack sequence into the cow sprite?

I was beginning to think that my computer was corrupted or the notepad was not working properly. But I used it last night to cut and paste .txt files to add advances and buildings to the game and they work fine.

	16-04-2003 21:26									#23
	Inflate your Upload Space

So somewhere in the latter half of the attack animation is the problem?
I'll have a look tonight and see if I can figure it out.

	17-04-2003 03:30									#24
	Got spare money?

Thanks IW,

I made a Phalanx over the last two days, and had trouble with a VA frame and eventually, I cut it out and renumbered another one and it ran.

I noticed I need to be more precise about the placement of the figure in the screen because it doesnt sit so well in the square, but I am learning from experience. I sharpened each frame once and that made a big difference to the brightness of the unit.

What about just reusing the first 4 frames of the attack animation a few times and see if that helps although when I MOVE the unit it also crashes the game.

If you can sort it out I can churn out a few sprites for everyone quickly including brushing up the heavy spearman.

Thanks again to everyone for their help. I am sure we are almost there

	19-04-2003 11:11									#25
	Remove this text

Like IW, I assumed that if a .tiff frame went through the makespr utility it must be OK. However, I was thinking that there are only two common things that related to the problem of the game crashing with the completed spr file, one was the altered text file and the second was the attack animation frames. Seeing that the attack frames went through the utility, it followed that the problem was in the text file.

I was thinking and decided to try something. I knew the movement animations worked so I moved all the attack animations, copied the movement animations, renamed them as attack animations and put them back in the folder and ran the utility. Hey presto, the sprite was made , I put it in the game and it worked, although the spearman just charges the enemy, not thrust his spear. Nevermind, now I know I need to check all the animation frames. Obviously, there is an error after frame 4 of the attack sequence 4 that manages to go through the utility but then crashes the game.

Thank god I eventually found it. I was beginning to go bonkers. Should have 3 new sprites available within the next week. Heavy Spearman, Phalanx and war chariot.

Thanks for everyones help.

	19-04-2003 18:27									#26
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yay!

	20-04-2003 11:09									#27
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The problem turned out to be GU02AA2.5.tif, after all that.

The following lessons have been learned about making sprites.
1) Most importantly, dont assume a frame is OK if it goes through the makespr utility. i have now had at least 3 instances where a frame crashed the game after makepsr had created a sprite.

2) I think the best thing to do is to have a set of frames from one sprite known to be working, then as you make each new frame, save it as the appropriate one in the existing folder of working frames. This also saves time in typing out the numbers. Every 10 frames or so, run the utility and make a sprite and run it in a game to make sure. That way you can quickly narrow down the problem if the game crashes. Dont assume that when checking a frame, that it is ok, I did that many times and it appears that some .flic frames just dont seem to convert properly. I cannot think of any other explanation.

3) the picture should be about 85-90% of the height of the frame, ie, 85-95 % of 72 pixels, mainly to the top of the frame, ie have a gap at the bottom of at least 6-7 pixels. this will sit much better on the game screen, not appear to be down a bit in the next square.

4) The picture should be as close to centre as possible, except for movement animation no 5. For some unknown reason this always set to the left for me and with experience, I now have this frame with the picture sitting to the right as far as practicable, if not for the movement frames, for frame no 0 which is the one used as the idle frame.

I have attackhed (I hope) zip file, Hvy Spearman which includes the necessary TGA files.

Special thanks to Immortal Wombat for making it possible.

Last edited by stankarp on 27-04-2003 at 09:43

	27-04-2003 09:46									#28
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PLEASE NOTE.

FURTHER TESTING INDICATED A PORBLEM WITH THE SPEARMAN SPRITE SO I HAVE REMOVED IT FROM POST.

It will be posted again when full testing is complete.

There was a problem with a frame that led to an opaque flash when executing an on screen special attack in direction number 5. Have fixed now but will post theis sprite and 2 more shortly, both undergoing final testing.

	28-04-2003 21:19									#29
	Support Apolyton, buy Call to Power 2

stankarp

I few hints on making spr file in psp

One if you are assigning a mask to more then one image the

Ctrl y command will automatically assign a mask to every picture you clicked on ones the first mask is done with

Second
Use

Ctrl z

To undo your last action useful after a mask has been saved to the alpha channel to instantly get the black background back.