Alpha Centauri 2

Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri & Alien Crossfire => Modding => Topic started by: BFG on February 05, 2013, 03:34:19 AM

Title: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: BFG on February 05, 2013, 03:34:19 AM

So...I was looking today at all the art icons, as I'm planning to create new icons for Inertial Damping and Global Energy Theory, the two techs that were partially implemented but ultimately left out of the game.  (Their tech icons are duplicates.)

I noticed as I was browsing the icons that several of their colors don't match their primary attributes.  Typically, a CONQUER tech is red, a KNOWLEDGE tech cyan, a WEALTH tech yellow, and a GROWTH tech green.  But between 19 and 21 of them (depending on how you break a couple of ties) don't match the definitions in alphax.txt.

The techs, and what colors they SHOULD be, are:

(click to show/hide)

tech000 BLUE
tech011 YELLOW
tech012 BLUE
tech017 RED
tech021 ??? (tied RED/GREEN, currently GREEN)
tech025 BLUE
tech034 BLUE
tech040 RED
tech041 RED
tech044 ??? (tied YELLOW/GREEN, currently GREEN)
tech061 YELLOW
tech066 BLUE
tech069 YELLOW
tech072 BLUE
tech077 BLUE
tech078 GREEN
tech079 RED
tech081 YELLOW
tech082 RED
tech083 RED
tech084 BLUE

Am I missing something here?

Title: Re: Aren't tech icons supposed to match their attribute color?
Post by: BFG on February 05, 2013, 03:54:49 AM

Here's a better view of what I'm talking about.  (OpenDocument Spreadsheet-compatible viewer required.)

Title: Re: Aren't tech icons supposed to match their attribute color?
Post by: BFG on February 05, 2013, 06:06:49 AM

On a related topic: what do people think of the new tech icons I created for Inertial Damping and Global Energy Theory, since they didn't have their own?  I tried to make them look like original SMACX icons.

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: ete on February 05, 2013, 02:17:21 PM

I'd imagine that the colors were original, and the designers changed the AI focus values during testing without bothering to change the icon color. The color seems to almost always be at least second highest in the AI priorities. Interesting spreadsheet.

I'd discourage editing the colors for now, perhaps at some point in the AI work the AI tech focus values will get a load of changes which would render at least some of the new colors incorrect.

The new icons look good, though I'd think Inertial Dampening seems like much more of a Conquer tech since it gives Tachyon Field and Global Energy Theory more of a Wealth/Build tech. Out of the two GET ones.. I think I prefer the second. Also, I'm pretty sure the two techs should swap positions in alphax, since Global Energy Theory comes MUCH sooner in the tech tree.

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: BFG on February 05, 2013, 03:59:55 PM

Thanks for the feedback ete!

On editing the colors so the icons match their categories: I think I'll go ahead and do so anyway, if only for my own game.  I'd be happy to make them available to others though.  And of course I can recolor them again to match any changes kyrub or yitzi make to the AI values.

On the categories for the new techs: One must be Conquer, and one must be Discover.  That's because (in SMAX) there's already 22 Build and Explore techs, but only 21 Conquers and Discovers.  I made GET the Conquer tech since it gives you Economic Victory.  But I easily could be persuaded to make Inertial Damping the Conquer tech if others agree with that (particularly since, in my copy of the game, Inertial Damping also enables Sea Boreholes...)

Thanks for the kudos on the new icons.  I must credit the original artist: it's difficult to illustrate a technical concept with a 215x215 monocolor graphic.  My aim was to make these fit with the current designs; hopefully I did so.  I'll probably redo the GET icon though as I see some problems with the grid pattern.

According to blurbs.txt, #24 is the correct position for Inertial Damping, and #70 for Global Energy Theory.  But I agree, it seems like these should be reversed...



One technical problem remains: I've found a program that will read PCX graphics, but I haven't yet found one that saves them properly (with the purple background becoming "clear").  Any suggestions?

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: Buster's Uncle on February 05, 2013, 06:20:31 PM

GIMP is a free download, and a powerful graphics program.

Nice designs.

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: gwillybj on February 05, 2013, 06:27:14 PM

Quote from: BFG on February 05, 2013, 03:59:55 PM

One technical problem remains: I've found a program that will read PCX graphics, but I haven't yet found one that saves them properly (with the purple background becoming "clear").  Any suggestions?

I use Paint Shop Pro, but it's version 3. It handles pcxs just as easily as Paint handles bmps. It will save gifs according to your wishes, as either transparent or not. It imports and applies the smacx palettes in just two steps. You can play with the palette and save it.
I don't know if the current version (12?) has the same abilities because it seems to be focused instead on photo editing.
hth

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: BFG on February 06, 2013, 03:23:03 AM

Here's improved and recolored icons for Inertial Damping and Global Energy Theory.  I also changed ID to Conquer and GET to Discover, as you can see.  Thoughts?

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: BFG on February 06, 2013, 04:20:17 AM

Well, I have good news and bad news.
First, the good news: the colors in the PCX files don't actually matter.  It looks like the game always overrides the file's color and displays it properly in-game.  So there's no need to post a bunch of new icons.

Now, the bad news.  I can't, for the life of me, get the two new icons to show up as anything other than solid colored squares.  Obviously I'm doing something wrong with the transparency layer and/or color indexing, but half a dozen approaches have yielded no results.  Anyone have any ideas?

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: Buster's Uncle on February 06, 2013, 04:53:59 AM

Here.  I loaded the SMAX palette - this should work.  Tech 70 came up blank.

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: Buster's Uncle on February 06, 2013, 04:57:09 AM

Okay, I did this one from the .bmp copy.  Again, it should work.

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: BFG on February 06, 2013, 03:27:19 PM

Thank you!  Do you mind sharing what you did, step by step?  (I just downloaded GIMP last night to try to do this, and am still learning my way around it.)  I obviously missed a few steps.
For example, what did you mean by "loading the SMAC palette"?

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: Buster's Uncle on February 06, 2013, 06:20:57 PM

I've attached the palette.    For instructions on what to do with it, see the article here (http://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?action=articles;sa=view;article=29).

You can ask questions in the Graphics thread here (http://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?topic=1237.0)

I'm coming down with something, but if my head clears later, I'll answer in more detail.

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: BFG on February 06, 2013, 06:38:30 PM

Thanks! I'll read through as soon as I have a chance.
Unfortunately, your versions did not work in-game either...still solid colored squares in both cases.

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: Buster's Uncle on February 06, 2013, 06:48:36 PM

Dang, that's right; GIMP has a problem with pasting backgrounds.  I can fix that in Photoshop, but I need to figure out a workaround for GIMP.

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: gwillybj on February 06, 2013, 09:40:21 PM

Here they are, all set as pcxs and with the smax palette. No blanks.

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: Buster's Uncle on February 06, 2013, 10:49:40 PM

Okay, here's how to do it in GIMP. 

The problem last night is that I'm not feeling well, and forgot that GIMP has a problem with pasting in the transparent background color, which is what I did.  Instead, it's a simple matter of making the 215x215 window from a source of unaltered, smax-paletted background, like one of the official faction .pcxs:

(http://alphacentauri2.info/MGalleryItem.php?id=477)

Note that the selection was exactly 215x, like the original.  Now go back to an open copy of the tech file and add a tranparent layer:

(http://alphacentauri2.info/MGalleryItem.php?id=481)

Select the Select by Color Tool:

(http://alphacentauri2.info/MGalleryItem.php?id=478)

Click on the background color:

(http://alphacentauri2.info/MGalleryItem.php?id=480)

Hit delete:

(http://alphacentauri2.info/MGalleryItem.php?id=479)

Now, select all, and paste it into the blank background.  Save as, in this case, tech070.pcx.  I've attached the results, redundant as they may be, to prove this works.

Title: Re: New tech icons! And, aren't the icons supposed to be the color of their type?
Post by: BFG on February 07, 2013, 04:56:12 AM

Excellent!  I'll give that a try when I'm not half-asleep.
Your approach really didn't differ that much from the one I used.  The only difference, besides how I handled the background, is that I used the "Color to Alpha" tool under the Layers-->Transparency menu.  Nevertheless I can see that they work properly now.  Thank you!