This a repost from the general forum thread. Here's to hoping it'll put some life back into the mods forums ^_^.
So, what is it? A lot of galciv files are in a special format specific to galciv and were impossible to edit except with Mutil, which is very hard to use and prone to random crashes. There's three tools in the suite that will allow you to faily easily modify all those graphic files you couldn't change before.
If you want to see an example of a modification along with screenshots of the tools, you can visit my website : Link
Of course, there's a link to download it too.
I'm hoping we'll see a lot of new original mods created with this tool. I imagine I'm not the only one who's tired of "new" anomaly that use the same graphics as before and random events being the bulk of the mods created for galciv.
Ships will be much easier to create now, heck ships with idle animations will be easy too. Not only that, suns, interfaces, planets etc are all easy to modifiy now.
  
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#1
by Citizen turgotZ - 4/20/2004 3:28:00 PM
as one of the few that learned how to use Mutil, i look forward to try your suite of tools.
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#3
by Citizen turgotZ - 4/24/2004 4:29:47 AM
fantastic job with this suite, i have had just a little time to try out the spirit editor. i really like the functions, layout, and the over all utility of the program. it will make life far easier for those who wish to create graphics for the game.
there are two things i have notice though (do tell me if i have missed something)
1)the menu special,its options are only available after a newly created spirit is saved and re-opened
2)the Save function does not seem to work; Save As works fine though.
keep up the good work
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#4
by Veteran Dark Rain - 4/24/2004 1:35:43 PM
1) The special menu is to create a new sequence in the sprite, not a new sprite. So it's normal that you can't create a sequence without having an active sprite.
2) How are you saving? I mean I just tried save under various conditions and it works fine for me. Can you tell me a bit more precisely what you're doing so that I can have an idea of how to reproduce it?
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Dark Rain - you have a website and email!
Alex
           
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#6
by Citizen turgotZ - 4/25/2004 7:26:04 PM
So to save i would go though these steps beforehand:
1)create new spirit, set palette, save the spirit
2)create a sequence, import a frame
3)file>Save
upon reopening the spirit i have found the sequence was not saved. If i use "Save as" instead, and overwrite the existing file.The spirit will contain the sequence.
If you say it works on your end, i dont doubt it. my computer is in need of a good format anyway.
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#7
by Veteran Dark Rain - 4/26/2004 1:57:33 AM
When you click on Save after creating the sprite, doesn't it bring up the save as menu? If that's what you meant by "save as" being the only option, I did it on purpose. The editor doesn't have a file name and directory yet for the new sprite you created so the first time you save it, it ask for the the name and location of the file.
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#8
by Citizen turgotZ - 4/26/2004 4:56:17 AM
| When you click on Save after creating the sprite, doesn't it bring up the save as menu? |
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this it does without issue, the "save as" menu appears and the file is created. it is when the file is appended(ie a new sequence added during the same session and the "save" option under file menu is used) it does not seem to add the new content to the file.
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#9
by Veteran Dark Rain - 4/28/2004 3:40:41 PM
Ah yes I see what you mean. It's actualy rather embarassing. I never did play around too much with a fully new sprite, I edited existing ones rather. I just noticed that there's a couple of save problems, sorry about that! I'm getting on it right now, shouldn't take too long.
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#10
by Citizen turgotZ - 4/28/2004 3:52:36 PM
cool.other then that its really a great program suite you have made.
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#12
by Citizen Coplann - 5/22/2004 2:33:26 AM
I successfully replaced the Star Fighter with a Minbari Nial for testing purpose.
Grats on your nice toolset. Its really alot easier now.
Dunno if you mentioned it somewhere, but the different strips/frames in a spr1-file need to stay in the exact same order (default up top, then Icon24TRans, then Icon).
 
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#13
by Veteran Dark Rain - 5/22/2004 4:44:35 PM
Mmmmmm really? I never had that problem? I change their order all the time.
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#14
by Citizen Coplann - 5/23/2004 5:57:43 AM
yeah, when I changed the order on the starfighter the 120*120 picture would be displayed as first frame of the strip (flying down). the other directions were then rotated by 1 frame more than they should ^^
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#15
by Veteran Dark Rain - 5/24/2004 12:46:39 AM
Oh, I guess you put the files in the mod folder? That doesn't work too well. I had a similar problem. If you just overwrite the original files, it work perfectly.
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#16
by Citizen Coplann - 5/24/2004 9:23:51 AM
well it works with the mod folder too if you keep the order. only problem I have is to get a good alpha channel so the right parts of the pictures are transparent.
even when converting a pic to black and white and then inverting the picture and using that as a 100% fitting mask I seem to get weird results.
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#17
by Citizen turgotZ - 5/24/2004 3:00:55 PM
Coplann are you desaturating(making it black and white through the removal for the colour info) your image? if so, that is likely why your are getting strange results. If there are greys in the alpha channel, those areas covered by the greys will be semi transparent.
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OK, here is a enquiry to the expirienced users of this great tool:
I have some JEPGs (which will need some work) that i'd like to have as ship images for my mod pack (not to replace the original ones).
Due a leak of time and knowledge, I would be very happy if I could find someone who could build this for me. Of cause the only reward will be the mentioning in the Info and the knowledge to have mastered this (i think pretty difficult) task.
Any chance one of you is interested?
   
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#19
by Citizen turgotZ - 5/25/2004 1:47:53 AM
If you post them or send them to me  Email, i could have a look and see what can be done to make ships out of them.
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Will send them, if they are usable, it will be a BIG pice of work i think.
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#22
by Citizen Coplann - 5/25/2004 1:55:25 PM
um, Iam using Irfanview (free image tool/viewer) for this. I simply say "reduce to black and white". If I then choose "edit palette" it only shows 2 colors black and white. I then choose "negative" and black and white are swaped. that didnt work. I got to try some more but had no time yet.
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#23
by Citizen Coplann - 6/1/2004 1:10:38 PM
ok got the Nial as Starfighter, the White Star as Ranger and the Sharlin Warcruiser as Avatar. Next will be the Tinashi Cruiser probably as Dreadnought, the Minbari Flyer could work as Corvette, maybe the Vorlon Dreadnought as Overlord and the Vorlon Planetkiller as Doomstar.
overally Iam not too happy with how the ships look after all that work on the palettes to get them into the game with correct mask and stuff. Additionally Minbari Ships are not really meant to be viewed from up top. they are either thin and long like the Nial and Tinashi or go more into the depth than into the lenght or sides like the Sharlin causing the ingame ships to not make full use of the 64*64px sprite size.
well, maybe we get 3D models in GC2. 
Until then after I finished the Minbari (all models and then going through all of them again with hope to increase quality) I will probably start with Earth Alliance ships (Starfury, Thunderbolt, EA Transport, Hyperion Class Cruiser, Nove Class Dreadnought, Omega Class Destroyer, Omega-X and Warlock Class, eventually Victory Class too). That all depends whether I find more/better pics of those ships to work with or good 3d models/scenes to create those on my own.
but that is still way ahead. not enough time to work on it. 
edit:
one more thing. Its really sad that with better tech ships only get bigger. Afterall a squadron of starfighters has no chance beating an Overlord/Dreadnought/Avatar.
the modding community should probably look into ways of using less ship types (and therefor ship icons) over the course of the game and giving small ships bonuses so they make up an important part of a fleet (usually starfighters take down other starfighters and bombers to protect the capital ships, you get my point). A fleet with 5 Dreadnoughts, 10 Rangers and 30 Starfighters should be more efficient than a fleet with 10, 15 or even 20 Dreadnoughts.
Is there a way to have carriers? Like a ship that can carry 6 bombers at a speed of 8 while the bombers have an own speed of 2 or 3, no defence but a huge offence potential.
well this probably goes to far for this thread. just food for thoughts for the modders.
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