LBM creation question.
 

I'm trying to create some LBM's. I know that they're not allowed to be colour ones, however, when I loaded it all up, MOBhack just showed a huge white square. This square covered most of the MOBhack window. what did I do wrong?

Edit: I had a play, now It's all pixelated, like interfearnce on a TV.

I'm using Jasc Paint Shop Pro 8.

Thanks.

Re: LBM creation question.
 

Well, to start. I know color pics are not supposed to be used but, I seem to get them working in my DL copy.

I use PSP 7 and I can help you out.

1. Open image in PSP.
2. Resize image (under image to 160 x 80), if it is distorted you may need to use seletion to copy and paste a good section of the piture to a new picture and resize again until you get a good looking picture. This takes practice.
3. Once you get it resized, go under color and decrease the depth to 256k (8 bit). I use optimized median cut and nearest color. This gets you the closest color conversion.
4. Go back to color and select load palette. Go to C:\Program Files\Shrapnel Games\The Camo Workshop\WinSPMBT\Game Data\Design\Palettes and you can choose witch WinSPMBT palette you want to use. Don't use JASC_WINSP_FULL_PALLETE.pal. This is the one that has the active colors for water in the game.
5. Now you should be ready to save it. Goto File save as, name it any name, unless you know which number .lbm it will be. After you name it select the save as type scroll and scroll up until you find Deluxe Paint(*.lbm). Then save it.

Now just find out the last used numbered .lbm rename your file and copy it to C:\Program Files\Shrapnel Games\The Camo Workshop\WinSPMBT\Game Data\Pictures. Open MOBHACK and select and save.

Sorry if this is too descriptive, I figure there are others who might want to know how that are not as familar with PSP.

Hope it works, have fun. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: LBM creation question.
 

Colour pictures will "swim" or shimmer if used as unit LBM, if you use the "info" screen on an enemy unit over a map, necause the game palette uses several of the palette positions used in the colour palette as the cycling colours for smoke, rivers, fires etc.

Colour LBM are therefore only useful for those used in the out of game map link pictures seen on some intermediate screens.

Cheers
Andy

Re: LBM creation question.
 

IF you want to use colour pics that fine but the palette is simply NOT capable of consistantly ( that word is important ) producing satisfactory images. Most of the colour ones you do see were the result of trial and error with a number of photos to get one that the colours came out, more or less, "normal" looking. That is why I standardized all game PIC's to B&W becasue the range of greys is much wider than the individual colours. I know there is a little cottage industry of people building colour pics for the game and in many cases some of them are quite good but it's impossible to get 100% colour and it IS possible to get 100% B&W

If you want to TRY colour you can but use the JASC_WINSP_COLOUR_PICPAL.pal found in the \Game Data\Design\Palettes folder rather than JASC_WINSP_PICPAL.pal

However...... that's not your main problem here. I suspect your main problem is you didn't make your PIC 160 x 80 pixels and I also suspect if it's "ll pixelated, like interfearnce on a TV " you didn't apply the PIC palette found in the above mentioned game folder. In PSP click on COLORS then LOAD PALETTE

Don

Re: LBM creation question.
 

Got it thanks.

I was using the wrong palette.

Now my mods can have A new level Of realism! Muwhahahahhaha... ahem. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

Re: LBM creation question.
 

One question guys...how come y'all keep spelling 'color' wrong? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif

EDIT - Just a joke! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/cool.gif

Re: LBM creation question.
 

The English language is highly adaptable and spellings vary. Some nations dropped the U from words like Colour and Honour and others spell them color and honor. Same words. Same meaning. Both spellings are correct but not all in the same places


Don

Re: LBM creation question.
 

Question

Can I create a set of color LBM's for display before scenerios? If Yes what sort of numbers for this Lbm's schold I use and can I send this set for SPCAMO for use in next version of WinSPMBT. Color Intro Lbm's numbers are coded in game or in some files like picklist?

Re: LBM creation question.
 

The colour PIC numbers are hard coded

I don't have the list of pics at my fingertips ATM. I'm a bit busy with other things

If you make better ones I will consider them on an individual basis but not sight unseen and certainly not sight unseen as a full package.

Once we get this patch out of the way we will be up to our ears in WW2 and nothing much is going to be added to MBT until that project is completed. I have had the experience of trying to build two games at the same time and it's not going to happen again.

Don

Re: LBM creation question.
 

I can understand too much work load, so, how about a selection of volunteers's to continue smoothing over MBT?

Obviously not in the game code, but doing stuff like working on OOB's, creating and finding new LBM's and missing Icons.

Re: LBM creation question.
 

Thanks for the offer but no. We'll pick up where we left off when the time comes and then we'll decide on how to proceed on a case by case basis. Andy and I usually have our own ideas on what needs to be "smoothed over". We are not abandoning the game for a year, we are just altering it's priority a bit.

Don

Re: LBM creation question.
 

So I uderstand that works in WinSPWW2 starts. Meaby SPCAMO can create a new forum in shrapnelcommunity yet before game relase so we can post in this place many things like icons , Lbm's pictures and new units for OOB this materials should be useful to create WinSPWW2 beter than today version.

Re: LBM creation question.
 

Blaz, when the time comes that we are ready to look at things like this we'll let everyone know. This is not the time. The groundwork needs to be done first and we need to concentrate on that. Also, OOB's will not be accepted. Andy and I will retain total control of the OOB's through out the process. This helps to avoid "surprises". What we need when it comes to OOB's, when the time comes, if people have things they wish to contribute is information. That's all somewhere down the road from here at the moment.

Don

Re: LBM creation question.
 

Oh dear, I see the 'control freakery' continues. Don, get real! Some of the B/W lbms swim/flicker in the game as well, and how anybody can justify using 1 pic (I'm looking specifically at 13012, cos I'm working on it at the moment) to represent AAA with calibres from 23mm to 57mm is quite beyond me. It actually looks from the helmet like a German 3.7cm FlaK, which barely belongs in MBT anyway!

As for oobs, I haven't got round to MBT yet, but if you consider that I had to make over 200 changes to the Dutch WW2 oob to get it anything like accurate (OK, that included taking it back to 1914, but even so . . .), there's a lot of work still to be done.

No, you'll never get 100% colour, I agree; and if anything, I'd rather have an *accurate* b/w shot over an inaccurate colour shot any day. I can live with the mix - some folk can't. That's their privilege.

Anybody in this forum who wants colour (or color<g>) lbms should search for 'SPColormods' and 'SPColormods2'. I'll be posting a new series of colour lbms which will be compatible with the Windows version. There will be about 1000 new lbms - some will work in-game, some will not. I hope to get positive feedback about those that don't. I've also made a start on renumbering, so that country-specific lbms start with the right pair of numbers - eg all US Army lbms will start with '12'. I know I can't go beyond 65000, but will also publish a list to show which countries are 'doubled up'.

This really *is* a great game, and all those of us who mod are doing is trying to improve it in our own way. I hope this is taken in the spirit in which it is intended.

Richard H

Re: LBM creation question.
 

Really? And which ones are they and I will fix them for the next upgrade? 90% of the people who complain about these type of errors never, EVER bother to pass on any info that allows up to find and correct things like this You are continuing the tradition and it's not very helpful.


Gee, now I have to "justify" why a pic is used buy a dozen or more different OOB designers in 33 different OOB's and 84 different entries ? Well.. I'm not going to bother. Maybe they'll step forward and explain it to you. It's more than likely is the result of not having the correct photo on hand and that one being "good enough" and better than " Photo not available" and to 90% of the people playing, it is and when we find better pics, or someone bothers to constructively offer better alternatives we always accept that.



And I'm guilty of 'control freakery'?? . So sorry we don't quite live up to your standards of accuracy and completeness.




vive le difference


Oh yeah Richard, the attitude come though load and clear. Enjoy your work.

Don

Re: LBM creation question.
 

I have been working on updating and tidying the game lbm,s for about 7 months, at present I have completed 41 countries. I have added an extra 6260 lbm's, every unit now has a picture, most have pictures relevant to that country (ie a japenese F16 will have japenese markings and be a different pic than that of a US F16. All infantry weapons have been replaced with pics of the relevant infantry unit for that period (or as near as I could find). All tank and vehicle variants have individual pics instead of one T-55A representing a number of variants. It has been a long and often tedious project and I still have quite a lot to do. The problem with this type of major OOB change is when you get new patches you will have to individually change every lbm in the new patched version. This will take quite a long time to do. When the new patch is released I will change the pics to correspond with my lbm database and then offer it up to a few keen people who dont mind a lot of tedious number crunching when patches come out. I will have to send it by CD ROM because it is just too huge to put up on this forum (159mb).

Re: LBM creation question.
 

Wow ... that certainly sounds interesting. Can you post a random sample of the pics you've done here? Maybe a couple dozen random samples.

Don

Re: LBM creation question.
 

Not a problem these are a few random lbms

Re: LBM creation question.
 

While I applaud the work you have done but I wish, for your sake, you had asked about this when you first started and I would have given you a couple of suggestions that would have saved you some problems

Most of the pics do not use the correct, abbreviated PIC palette I provided in the games \Game Data\Design\Palettes folder for WinSPMBT. The one you need for B&W use is JASC_WINSP_PICPAL.pal. If you use any other palette for B&W you risk the a "shimmering" effect when the game is run on some systems. These are shades of grey used by the game for smoke etc and if they get into an LBM you will see twinkling. When I find a PIC that does this I fix it but they are not common but all pics should use JASC_WINSP_PICPAL.pal to elliminate any chance that may happen. The reason I have not done this for every PIC in the game is there are now 4,390 in the game and redoing each one is, as you know, a bit tedious

However, I think for the most part you may be OK with the "red bands" palette you have used for most of them but I found two in that sample that use the entire palette so those "smoke" greys are included in your PIC. PM23107 and PM23109 both have the full palette and both pics contain a number of pixels that come from the last row of greys that are used by the games for colour cycling

This is quite a project you've taken on. Good luck with it

Don

Re: LBM creation question.
 

Thanks for the tip, I was aware that some would shimmer, because I initially started with the old DOS SPMBT pallette and didnt realise the palette had changed until about 1000 odd pics later, but never fear I plan on testing and redoing any pics on completion. A labour off love as they say, lol

Intro Lbm\'s
 

I made some color intro Lbm's . Moust of them are with "western" equipment and soliders. So I made with "eastern". Here are pic from war in Chechenia , Iraq with Warsaw pact equipment and from rusian intervention in Afganistan. Pic are from range 1500 to 15117 is that posible to coded this range for use as intro pictures in game?

Intro Lbm\'s part two
 

next pocket of color lbm's range 15118 to 15152

Re: Intro Lbm\'s part two
 

Blaz......wouldn't it make more sense to ask if this can be done BEFORE creating 152 colour PIC's? I wish I had your spare time.

Yes, I *could" change the code to open up those numbers as potential colour LBM's pics for the screens that use the colour pics but it's not a trivial code change ( there are over 1 dozen colour pic lists in the code ) and it is WAY too late for this patch and, as I said in another post.... not all colour pics look good when converted to the palette we have to use when displayed in the game and although there ARE a number of the ones that you did that look fine there are a number that don't and while I don't claim the ones we do use in the game now are the crème de la crème of colour pics I culled them down from 4 or 5 times the number of ones you do see because most simply do not turn out well when converted

Also, I noticed in some of the pics something I've seen other people do as well and that is resize the existing photo to fit the game PIC's 2:1 aspect ration without maintaining the original photos aspect ratio which either stretches or squashes the original photo and distorts the image when turned into a PIC. 15020 is one example 15067 looks like another and a few other pics just look a bit "compressed" as well.

I'm not trying to discourage you from creating items for the game but if you'd asked about this first I could have explained a few things that would have saved you a lot of work. For example. I like the pic 15128 but I would have liked to have seen the original photo. Sometimes colour pics have to be done twice, once using "error diffusion dithering" and once with "nearest color matching" then the two cut and pasted together but I don't know until I see the original. Sometimes the best pic is square and simply won't fit a 2:1 ratio and in that case I use the square pic in a 2:1 frame then fill in the background using cut and paste from the original photo then reduce it to 160x80 ( and sometimes that doesn't work and the whole thing has to be tossed out and start again )

Don

Re: Intro Lbm\'s part two
 

Don

Strange you don't like my attitude but Ian's (Cusbut) is OK.

Ian, last I saw you were doing colour as well. Have you changed to b/w?

Don, if I had the time, I'd be delighted to instance every b/w flickering shot, but I don't. That's one issue. I guess what really gets to me is that the game is so accurate in so many respects, so why skimp on the graphics? And if you're going to rubbish my efforts, please don't copy (some of) them, as you *appear* to have done with the modded Polish oob. I may be flattering myself, of course, & you may well have thought of the new units all by yourself.

You want specifics re lbms? OK. 23800, 25019, 25154, 34064, 34078, 34601 - all wrong size, & that's just in a sample of about 500. 36190 - I think it's probably the last of the 'white borders' - at least I hope so. Anything duplicated - although I can understand that, with so many people involved. *Any* missile graphics.

Most of the shots are there somewhere, whether on the net or in books. I'm sorry - and this is *not* intended personally, but not to find them = sloppy research. I repeat, why be so accurate in some ways but not others?

Richard H

Re: Intro Lbm\'s part two
 

Richard, it's quite obvious you do not pay the least bit of attention to what's said on this forum. The " modded Polish oob" HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH SPCAMO. Any "modded" OOB HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH SPCAMO unless we specifically endorse it and the Polish mod is not endorsed by us. You might want to contact the guys who did the mod and ask them about it. If any of your work has been used in the OFFICAL OOB's issued with the game I want to know which pic if it WAS used I want to know about it becasue I issued specific instruction that NO PIC from third parties was to be used without their express permission and if that was the case their names would be in the credits. "Modded" OOBs are NOT my problem.

As for "23800, 25019, 25154, 34064, 34078, 34601 all wrong size," If I could get people to follow simple instructions I would have less crap like this to deal with months or years after the fact. Yes, they are the wrong size. One is 1 pixel too short, 3 are one pixel too tall and one is two pixels too tall and neither error make the least bit of difference when displayed in the game and yes..... they all should be 160x80 as I have explained repeately to anyone who makes them but people screw up and I simply don't have the time to check that every PIC sent to be during development is 160x80 unless it shows up incorrectly in the game. And 25154 isn't even used by a unit in the game and there are lot's of "old" PIC lurking in the files that are no longer used as well.

Don

Re: Intro Lbm\'s part two
 

Richard. If "Richard_H" is "Richard Hopkins" you are credited in V3 of SPMBT with OOB and LBM contributions. If you did NOT OK the use of your work in V.3 I was not aware of it.

Don

Re: Intro Lbm\'s part two
 

And Richard, please do show me where I "rubbish" your efforts in any way? Please show me the text on this forum where I have belittled your work. ALL I stated to someone else entirely was why I don't use colour in the game for regular units and the exact quote was ..."I know there is a little cottage industry of people building colour pics for the game and in many cases some of them are quite good but it's impossible to get 100% colour and it IS possible to get 100% B&W" Explain to me how that "rubbish" your efforts in any way at all. I wanted consistency in the unit pics in the game and B&W gives me that and in the vast majority of the cases B&W gives a better image in the game because their are a wider range of greys than any other colour.You start off your first post with "Don, get real! Some of the B/W lbms swim/flicker in the game as well" and ***I*** never mentioned anything about flickering or shimmering at all. Andy did and then in your next post you accuse me of plagiarizing your work with "please don't copy (some of) them, as you *appear* to have done with the modded Polish oob. " and even a simple investigation would have revelled I had nothing to do with that modded OOB and SPCAMO does not support it

In two posts you attribute two other peoples comments or work to me then go on to say I "rubbish" your work when I clearly said "there is a little cottage industry of people building colour pics for the game and in many cases some of them are quite good " and that is complementary. You don't check the facts and you twist my words and THAT explains why I don't like your attitude. Starting off with "I see the 'control freakery' continues" pretty much set the tone and saying in the second "this is *not* intended personally" is almost amusing.

Don

Re: Intro Lbm\'s part two
 

Don, I know SPCAMO doesn't endorse the mod. Granted, that was a bit off-topic given that I started on about lbms.

May as well reply to all your posts while I'm here. Yes, I am that Richard Hopkins and apologies, I hadn't seen any attribution. Thank you.

Can't quote the post of yours that I *really* got cross about cos it's disappeared - as has my first.

Seriously, my remarks were not intended personally. How could they be? I don't know you except via the forum. I take your point about the greys, it's the pain of working with only 256 colours. And it's to an extent why colour will not work properly unless & until we get the (now) standard 16.7 million to work with. I know I despair every time I make what looks like a decent lbm, add the palette and watch it skew (particularly) the blues. But I guess that's a code issue.

Odd about the sizes - every time I make an lbm that isn't exactly the correct size, I get a pic in the encyclopedia that I can only describe as 'brown noise'.

Unlike Leo,I have no wish to fall out with either yourself or anybody else on this forum. But I do feel that I'm entitled to an opinion, & to get angry every once in a while. If you recall from the old forum, I was actually usually playing the part of mediator - or trying to!

Richard