Graphics

[Kilkakon]

Well that's all it is really. Any colours which match the special ones need to be nuked out--I select the offending ones and use the edit button to change them to cyan. I also change the shadow colour to a pink colour.

[Buster's Uncle]

siiighh

Head still not wrapping.

[Kilkakon]

Not much else can be said really. :/ Ah well I don't have the time to get into more detail while working sorry

[JarlWolf]

I'll just screenshot my working process to you, to show you what I mean.

[Oblivion]

Hello!

I just recently started playing SMACv4 and I want to change my city graphics to the 40k Hives and I could really use some help with that.

I have GIMP, the technical knowledge, and the guides to do this, but I'm still having the in-game transparency issue where my cities are surrounded by some solid color.

I tried opening univ.pcx, Import Palette from Image, Copying the city graphics, Switching from RGB to Indexed (my palette selected), then Exporting. Is there anything else I can try? I'd really appreciate any help with this, I've tried everything I could find, included the blank.pcx and the palette.pal.

EDIT: Just tried opening a normal .pcx and re-saving after generating the palette and switching between RGB/Indexed modes. This also gives the cities a box.

[Buster's Uncle]

http://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?action=articles;sa=view;article=29

I'm up way past my bedtime, but that should be what you need.  Jarlwolf can help you otherwise, and/or I'll be awake tomorrow.

[JarlWolf]

Right, I can help you with this. Here is my advice:

1. Go to the downloads section: Download the Blank PCX template.
2. Have an untouched copy of that always: NEVER save over it or you have to redownload.
3. Have the Blank PCX open and your pallet with the structures on it at the same time, in their own separate respective windows in GIMP.
4. In the ones with your buildings, go to Tools, then Selection tools and pick Colour Select or "By colour select" and click on the purple surrounding your buildings/icons, and delete it. If it worked you should have a checkered background around your structures.
5. Once you've done that merely select and copy your buildings, and paste on the Blank PCX. Then, export it as a PCX with the shorthand name of your faction and put it in your Alpha Centauri folder.

And then all you do is test. I also advise you to keep a copy of the faction's PCX in a folder somewhere as a backup: If you use facedit and you change stats, it will overwrite your PCX's you've created. So when you do use FaceEdit at all, once you saved and modified you need to immediately copy your backup PCX and override the old one with it.

Hope that helped, if you are still confused, just put the files in an attachment and I'll take a look at them.

[Sigma]

Right, I can help you with this. Here is my advice:

1. Go to the downloads section: Download the Blank PCX template.
2. Have an untouched copy of that always: NEVER save over it or you have to redownload.
3. Have the Blank PCX open and your pallet with the structures on it at the same time, in their own separate respective windows in GIMP.
4. In the ones with your buildings, go to Tools, then Selection tools and pick Colour Select or "By colour select" and click on the purple surrounding your buildings/icons, and delete it. If it worked you should have a checkered background around your structures.
5. Once you've done that merely select and copy your buildings, and paste on the Blank PCX. Then, export it as a PCX with the shorthand name of your faction and put it in your Alpha Centauri folder.

And then all you do is test. I also advise you to keep a copy of the faction's PCX in a folder somewhere as a backup: If you use facedit and you change stats, it will overwrite your PCX's you've created. So when you do use FaceEdit at all, once you saved and modified you need to immediately copy your backup PCX and override the old one with it.

Hope that helped, if you are still confused, just put the files in an attachment and I'll take a look at them.

A slightly quicker way to do this is after doing the color select, go to Select -> Invert, which will cause Gimp to sellect everything except the background color to copy.

[Oblivion]

Wow! I didn't expect such a fast response from everyone. I'll try it out in a second.

I have to say, this game is overripe for a full W40k mod. Just replace the worms with Orks! I'll make a graphic reskin of my faction as the Thousand Sons Legion, and perhaps edit their dialogue as well in the next few days.

EDIT: JarlWolf, thanks for explaining that to me! I followed your directions exactly and it worked. Finally! I tried your guide last night, but without success. It may have something to do with palette generation, which I didn't do this time.

[Buster's Uncle]

I do so love having a deep bench of competent artists - takes so much pressure off me.

[JarlWolf]

Also on the note of Warhammer 40K, I think Chaos Demons would be better replacement for worms, which can also be a cool effect for chaos factions like your Thousand Sons to "harness the power of Chaos." Have Orkz as their own faction,

Ork mode activate*
DA WAAAGH NEEDZ TA BE EN ETZ OWN FACTION. JUZ HAVE DA ORKZ AS ALIENZ YE?
deactivate*
And you have to have the Imperial Guard in their somewhere, it'd be a crime against humanity to not include them.

[Buster's Uncle]

Everyone's familiar with this page, of course - http://alphacentauri2.info/My%20Custom%20Factions/Custom%20Factions.htm  It looks a little like the Firaxis page, a third of the files are just art, and the lazy so-and-so who made it hasn't added any new factions in almost four years.

Well, here's how I turned insomnia Saturday night/Sunday morning useful:
http://alphacentauri2.info/My%20Custom%20Factions/Custom%20FactionsPage2.htm

It's only the tutorials I've had in Articles for about a year strung out consecutively, and it's mostly meant to channel traffic here, but Jarl thought I should make an announcement, so now I have.

I'm intending to/toying with the idea of a .png representation of the primary faction .pcx avec hovertext explaining what each element does, and one more little article talking about modding the terrain.  We'll see...

[Buster's Uncle]

For them as ain't familiar, here's the Factions Page from the Official Firaxis stuff we host:

And here's the top of my custom factions page:

And finally, here's the new addition:

They're all hyperlinked, and you can click on any of the pictures to go have a closer look at the original...

Thoughts?

[JarlWolf]

I quite like it. It's a step by step format and it even details some history of the creation process, thoughts and concepts behind a few factions.

Though I realize its meant as an instructive tool, not one for satiating curiosity on your work history with factions or as a faction wiki style thing, I wouldn't mind more information on the concepts of factions and the making of, interactions between creators, brainstorming, discussions, that sort of thing. You may not think it, but knowing these sorts of things is highly interesting to people (myself included) as it gives insight on how a creator such as yourself and others think and approach things, and on an instructive level it can help people understand and visualize the process of making graphics, factions etc.

[Buster's Uncle]

I dunno - I think I've done a great deal of that already, and there's no end to it if you're too shameless about repeating yourself, a line I'm already toeing...

I suspect my time is better spent, at this point, gathering up factions I've done since the last update of the first page in 2009 and putting them up at last...