Okay, I've been gone for awhile. I need news on the BG pape

[Oblivious]

Has anyone added anything to them since last I was here?

[Dominus]

Not so far. I'm still hoping you will do some more.

[Oblivious]

Okay. So far I have an improved caddelite helm and vastly improved Jaana head. I might need someone to do some testing on the fire sword I did (it's messed up, but I'll need to figure some stuff out)

[Oblivious]

Okay, fixed the fire sword. Only problem is that when I did the palette swaps, there were two colors on the blade (a light, light, light periwinkle and a gray) that I made two alternate swaps of to see which one looked better..... BUT NOW I CAN'T DECIDE...!!

[Sslaxx]

Put them up somewhere, and let the Exult users decide!

[Dominus]

a screenshot would be nice

[Oblivious]

Hold on, let me do a couple other accessories, first. Also, the difference is rather minute (actually, that's what makes it so difficult!)

[Oblivious]

Okay, I'm going to try and get at least two more pieces done before I submit everything I have so far. I'm going to stay away from the clothing for the time being for complicated reasons which I don't feel like explaining right now.

I've also noticed (at least on my computer) that on the paperdoll items I've worked on, the black is transparent like an invisible item. Why is that? And can this be fixed? Or is it just my computer (like how the Sword of Defense paperdoll doesn't glow, it's just gray)

[Oblivious]

Another question: I've noticed that white (red/blue/green 255) is used both on glowing and non-glowing items. How does the program know whether or not to make it glowing then?

[wjp]

By the palette index. The whites with indeces 224 and 232 are cycling, while the one with index 15 is static.

[Oblivious]

Where is this palette index? Is it associated with a specific program other than MS paint or Adobe Photoshop Deluxe Business Edition?

Also, the white on both the cycling and static items is the same. red255/green255/blue255, I checked it. Maybe MS paint messes it up, somehow....

[wjp]

What exactly are you using to view/edit the shapes?

The palette the photoshop plugin uses by default has been carefully modified to prevent colour clashes, since photoshop and PSP seem to be unable to properly handle palettes with two (or more) identical colours.

[Oblivious]

I use both Adobe Photoshop and MS paint. I use MS paint because Photoshop doesn't work when you're trying to change the colors pixel by pixel, as it tints nearby pixels as well. Adobe Photoshop doesn't seem to have color increment numbers, either. So basically, unless you can find me a (downloadable, free) program that will magnify an image, and change it manually pixel by pixel, I believe I won't be able to help with the paperdolls any further. I am sorry.

[Dominus]

hm, also make sure that you download the photoshop plugin again as it changed in the last weeks...

[wjp]

Paint Shop Pro should work pretty well. There's a free 30-day trial of it available. (www.jasc.com)

[suraimu]

Yes. PSP rocks, it's what I typically use all the time, and if I remember
correctly it supports Photoshop plugins, too.

[XxVenomxX]

You can change colors pixel by pixel in photoshop without tinting others. At least versions 4.0 through 6.0 can, so long as you select the pencil tool, and select the smallest brush. You should notice that the available brushes for say, airbrush are feathered, and give you that blended look anti-aliased look, where as the brushes available for pencil tool give you the harsh pixely brush shapes, which is what you're looking for.

[Jon Miller]

Yeah, I'm very, very new to Photoshop, but I think Venom's right that you can change some settings and you won't have that problem. There may be an "anti-aliased" box you need to switch off...

[drcode]

There's also the Gimp, which is free, and handles palettes and individual pixels fairly well. If only I could draw better...

[Oblivious]

Hmmm.... Okay, I'll have to look into it tomorrow (it's off to bed for me, now) Looks like I only have Photoshop version 1.0, though.... bummer.

[Dominus]

Oblivious: good news!!!
Kirben managed to get the plugin for the Gimp to compile and it's usable and far better than the Photoshop plugin (all the restrictions of Photoshop are the issue not the plugin itself ).

'The GIMP is the GNU Image Manipulation Program. It is a freely distributed piece of software suitable for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition and image authoring.'

Recently version 1.2.3 has been released. If you are still interested in doing some art for Exult this is probably a must-have. Go to our download page and get the "Gimp Plugin (for Windows)".
Go to http://www2.arnes.si/~sopjsimo/gimp/ and get the installer for the Gimp and also the update you will find there (fixes a little issue with layers).
Install the Gimp and then run GimpPlugin.exe that you downloaded from us. This will copy our plugin to the correct dir (if you installed Gimp into C:\Program Files\Gimp ). and you are ready to edit shp.
With Gimp you can now also use multilayered shp files - so no more splitting needed.