Custom Tiles

[delta]

ok, so how do you get custom tiles to work in DizzyAGE?

i've edited a tile, and saved it in a 'custom' directory, but it's not loading it. two other tiles (taken from The Other Side) loaded fine.

i tried using GIMP to edit it, but it didn't load in.

By the way, i <b><u>HATE</u></b> using Windows picture it, cause i can never find out how to actually do basic stuff like drawing.

so i saved it from Picture it as a bitmap, then edited it in Paint, then loaded it back into Picture it and saved it as a TGA file.

as far as i can see, it should load. but it doesn't.

any ideas?

[delta]

never mind, it did load....

i'd just forgotten that i'd taken another tile out a while back, so the tile count stayed the same....

doh.

EDIT: just realised i didn't remove the tile, i just gave the new one the same number as another one....

double doh!

[delta]

GAHHHHH more problems!

ok so saving a tile from Picture It gives it a red background that can't be changed in the map editor. :cross:

so i edit it in GIMP to remove the red background, save it, and Bingo! the map editor won't load it! :hitwall:

HOW IN THE NAME OF ALL THATS HOLY DO YOU EDIT THE DAMN TILES?!?! :dizzy_mad:

sorry... any help would be appreciated.

[Peter]

Also i find it easier to edit all gfx in windows paint brush. Use white for the object where you would normally have colour, then black for any outlines. I then fill all sections that i want transparrent with the light purple colour (ff00ff). i then select and copy the gfx into gimp. from here i then put the transparancy in by selecting the layer menu, transparancy, then Colour to alpha.

next thing save all files as TGA and make sure if using gimp that when the save as TGA dialog comes up you untick the two options in that box (RLE Compression, and Origin at bottom left)

ok then make sure the filename follows the following rules

1000 name 2.tga

replace the 1000 with a unique id number, i always start with 1000 and work my way up. next is the name which can be what ever you want but no spaces! e.g. objects2 instead of objects 2. then finally the 2 on the end is optional, this refers to the number of frames in the animation if the title contains the any animation frames.


hope this helps :)

also remember in the map editor to change the location of the tiles dir to the tiles dir of the game your working on!

[delta]

sorry for the late reply.

that did help a lot, i wasn't unticking the two boxes in GIMP when i saved it...

it all works fine now!

everything else i'd already worked out! :tup:

[Peter]

original when i started with dizzyage i never used to untick the boxes, and so the tiles wouldn't load. It took me ages to work that one out :v2_dizzy_crazy:

[xelanoimis]

Here are a few things about tiles:

The tile pictures format, they must be
TGA
uncompressed
24bits (red,green,blue channel) for tiles that are to be opaque, or
32bits (red,green,blue and alpha channels) for tiles with transparence.

For example, if you want to paint a blue ball tile, you just make a square tga at 32 bit,
draw the blue ball, fill the rest with another color (like red or purple to make it obvious)
and draw a white ball on a black background in the alpha channel.
When the tile is painted, the DizzyAGE engine will not draw a whole square, but it will
use the information from the alpha channel to draw only the blue ball (where the alpha is white).
It is somehow as the transparence of GIF images.
In the same way, painting levels of gray in the alpha channel will make the engine paint it more
or less transparent. Like a fire flame that is more intense at the bottom and fades at the top.
That's not really in the Z80 style but the engine supports it.

A BMP file can also store alpha information (32bit), and it can be converted to TGA with any
image conversion software. That's if your image edit software does not support tga.

Take care, that some simple image edit software, does not allow you to edit the alpha channel,
so they are not good for DizzyAGE. I don't know about Gimp, but since PTeal uses it, I guess it works with alpha too.

However, if most of you don't have such software, I can create a tool to convert 24 bit TGA images into 32bit TGA, by creating the alpha channel with a convention. For example it can write in the alpha 0 (black) values where the image is red (or a specified color) and 1 (white) in the rest.
Just let me know it this tool is really needed or the free Gimp does the alpha job.

I use Photoshop to edit the tiles and it works very well. Unfortunately it's not free, like Gimp.

As for naming the tiles, you must respect the DizzyAGE notation for tiles, to specify the id and the frames (if animated). Check the manual. And no duplicate ids. See the report in the log file, it shows a tiles report about failures and duplicates.

[delta]

i'll just add that GIMP is available to download free from the website. a quick search on google will find it.

it does have an alpha layer for transparencies too.