Many of you already know that I'm working on a graphics expansion set for the Rebellion / Confederation governments from Escape Velocity. I completed both the sprite and mask for the Rebel Cruiser the other night, which works beatifully once I tested it. Tonight, however, I didn't get very favorable results. I created the sprite and mask for my Rebel Destroyer, exactly like I've done the millions of other sprites I've made in the past. I placed it into Escape Velocity via ResEdit, and tried out the graphics. It didn't work. The Rebel Destroyer sprite turns correctly, but every five to ten frames, black junk and lines appear across the graphic, and at other times the frame is completely replaced with black. I've noticed the problem is identical to the ones I encountered with the ship sprites in the Star Wars plugin for EV. If any of you guys know why on earth this is happening, please let me know. This is the first time it's happened with my sprites. Or is this a mask problem?

Any answers would be appreciated. Thanks.

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As I recall, it's a slight problem with the spďn. Double- and triple-check your spďn, then let me know how it goes.

If nothing else, you could use ResEdit to make sure everything lines up correctly (grid).

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Quote

Originally posted by EVula:
**As I recall, it's a slight problem with the spďn. Double- and triple-check your spďn, then let me know how it goes.

If nothing else, you could use ResEdit to make sure everything lines up correctly (grid).

**

When you say "spin," are you referring to the sprite graphics not being centered correctly? From what I can tell, it's centered perfectly.

How can I preview the sprite in ResEdit using the 36-frame grid?

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I think EVula meant to look at your spďn resource associated with your ship. Check to make sure it has the right PICT ID#s and sizes.

Aside from that, you most likely have a problem with the Mask not being aligned correctly with the sprite. Make sure you rotated them both in the right direction and didn't skip any frames or something while using your primitive method of sprite creation.

If all else fails, send the Sprite file to me and I'll see what I can do with it.

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- Macavenger | e-mail: (url="http://"mailto:e-gamerguy1@attbi.com")mailto:e-gamerguy1@attbi.com(/url)e-gamerguy1@attbi.com

This once happened to me when I was creating my Victory Star Deestroyer for a Star Wars plugin. Make sure that you set the colors to 256, and made each sprite size divisable by 8 (other than 80). My problem was one of these two.

-Matt

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How do you create your sprites? The best way I know of is to create an 8-bit movie of your ship rotating and make the sprite & mask files with Movies2Sprites.
I had the same problem once. I had made my sprite files by hand (copy, paste, merge layers). I solved it by using the Movies2Sprites method, but nothing was wrong with my old mask, so I guess ShipWrite has some bug (I was using ShipWrite).

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ŃCafall

I created my sprites with Infini-D, creating an animation and saving it in Quicktime format. I rendered the sprite in 256 colors, so that shouldn't be the problem.

Let me upload the sprite and mask, and let you guys mess around with it to see what's wrong.

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Ok, here's the graphics:

(url="http://"http://saberstudios.evula.net/RebelDestroyerSprite528.jpg")Rebel Destroyer Sprite(/url)
(url="http://"http://saberstudios.evula.net/RebelDestroyerMask528.jpg")Rebel Destroyer Mask(/url)

-edit- Entire sprite and mask size is 528 by 528 pixels. Individual frame size is 88 by 88 pixels. -/edit-

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(This message has been edited by Captain Skyblade (edited 12-12-2001).)

Quote

Originally posted by Captain Skyblade:
**Ok, here's the graphics:

Rebel Destroyer Sprite
Rebel Destroyer Mask

-edit- Entire sprite and mask size is 528 by 528 pixels. Individual frame size is 88 by 88 pixels. -/edit-
**

I may be wrong (most likely), but I think they was somewhere info not use 88 pixels size for the sprites, cause EV has some problem with this particular size.Still, I dont know, I may dream it out. Anyway try changing sprite(mask) sizes, just for the hell of it.

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Quote

Originally posted by Slav:
I may be wrong (most likely), but I think they was somewhere info not use 88 pixels size for the sprites, cause EV has some problem with this particular size.Still, I dont know, I may dream it out. Anyway try changing sprite(mask) sizes, just for the hell of it.

That did it. I changed them to 80x80 on mine, and it worked fine.

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Quote

Originally posted by Macavenger:
**That did it. I changed them to 80x80 on mine, and it worked fine.

**

Excellent! Let me give that a shot on my machine, and see if it works. Thanks, Slav.

Also, what is the maximum pixel size for EV/EVO/EVN sprites, and up to how many sprite frames will Nova support?

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Yep, 88 doesn't work. The only way to make it the "same" size would be to bump it to 96 and have an unusued black border around your ship... I take it you're making your ships at a more realistic scale than was used in EV?

(edit)Just noticed your reply...ya beat me! The max. size for EV is 176x176, but for EVO 1.0.2 I've successfully created a 480x480 white-circle-ship (the only thing simple enough that I could make with the memory I had!) I don't know the specs for EVN.(/edit)

Restorer: it's 88, not 80. 80 works just fine.

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(This message has been edited by Weepul 884 (edited 12-12-2001).)

Quote

Originally posted by Weepul 884:
The max. size for EV is 176x176

Really? The Confed Cruiser in MAGMA is 200x150. Of course, 176x176 is slightly larger than 200x150, if it's total size, not an individual dimension, which matters.

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- Macavenger | e-mail: (url="http://"mailto:e-gamerguy1@attbi.com")mailto:e-gamerguy1@attbi.com(/url)e-gamerguy1@attbi.com

48 also doesnt work if anyone cares.

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Quote

Originally posted by Weepul 884:
**Yep, 88 doesn't work. The only way to make it the "same" size would be to bump it to 96 and have an unusued black border around your ship... I take it you're making your ships at a more realistic scale than was used in EV?

(edit)Just noticed your reply...ya beat me! The max. size for EV is 176x176, but for EVO 1.0.2 I've successfully created a 480x480 white-circle-ship (the only thing simple enough that I could make with the memory I had!) I don't know the specs for EVN.(/edit)

Restorer: it's 88, not 80. 80 works just fine.

**

I scaled down the Rebel Destroyer sprite to 480 pixels, and it worked perfectly. Thanks for all the help. I should have the 3/4 sprite complete by early this evening...

176 is the maximum? Heh, both the 3/4 and top view sprites for my Confederation Cruiser remake were that size, which added up to a 1056x1056 pixel sprite. It's a large graphic, but does an excellent job of showing it's power. Quite fearful to look at in gameplay. Swing by the Rebel Cruiser topic in the Image Gallery if you care to see the 'Fed Cruiser sprites.

480? Ouch... Even a sixty frame sprite would look extrememly jumpy between frames at that size.

Thanks Martin, I'll keep that in mind.

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Quote

48 also doesnt work if anyone cares.

Are you talking about EV or EVO? My EVO plug-in has several new ships whose sprites have a tile size of 48, and they look just fine.

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ŃCafall

Check the spin resource.

This happened to me before. I was cloning the Corvette and making a different-colored Corvette. I pointed the new ship towards the Corvette's target PICT and mask PICT. In result I got what you are getting.

Did you do what I did?

I doubt you did, though.

(edit) Guess I was too late... :frown:(/edit)
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(This message has been edited by The Space Between (edited 12-15-2001).)

Well, sorry to dissapoint you all, but this is a problem that you just can't fix! I've not seen it much in EVO; it was more common in EV. Bigger ships in plugs sometimes do this, and - here's the fun part - it completely depends on what computer you're using! That's right! Back when I was having this problem, I noticed that the exact same game files would do it to different ships, or none at all, depending on the computer! It's a bug in the engine, so the only way you can get around it is to re-size your ship and hope it works on everyone else's computer. Crazy, huh?
-david-

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Quote

Originally posted by Captain Skyblade:
... up to how many sprite frames will Nova support?

If I recall correctly, EV Nova lets you use as many sprite frames as you want, although they all have to fit in memory at the same time. There's more information in the section of the (url="http://"http://www.AmbrosiaSW.com/news/upcoming/novabible.html")EV Nova Bible(/url) on the shän resource.

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David Arthur
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Quote

Originally posted by David Arthur:
**If I recall correctly, EV Nova lets you use as many sprite frames as you want, although they all have to fit in memory at the same time. There's more information in the section of the EV Nova Bible on the shän resource.

**

Alright, sounds good. I'm somewhat tired of those large, jumpy sprites.

David (Karl, that is :p): Strange indeed. However, I've noticed that plugins which have screwy sprites do no better on any of my other Macs...

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