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How to merge sprites
Topic Started: Apr 6 2013, 02:49 PM (238 Views)
MechPilot524
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Alright, so some of you are starting out as spriters and releasing new sprites. Well, it's nice if you include screenshots with your posts.

Someone recently posted this:
Posted Image

The problems with this are: The screenshots are attachments to the file. They're there but it might not occur to a user that they are screenshots of the file. It's much nicer to display it using the BBcode [img] instead.

So first, you need to open up SPRing and select the implemented (modified) BMP files. Use ctrl+click to select multiple BMP's at once.

Posted Image

You next need to right click the selected files and hit "Merge Sprites".

Posted Image

And then save them to a retrievable directory.

Posted Image


The merged image will still be .bmp formatting. However the [img] bbcode doesn't accept .bmp images, so we need to convert them to .jpg format to show them in the posts.

First, with GIMP, find and open the merged .bmp file you made.

Posted Image

Then, after opening it, hit File > Export.

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Change ".bmp" in the file extension to ".jpg"

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Finally, adjust the quality and hit Export when you're done. GIMP will automatically do the rest, leaving you with a nice memory-compact JPG file!

Posted Image

At this point, you can use a trick I use. You attach the pictures you want to use to your original post, then after posting, open up the attached images in their own tabs. In still another tab, edit your post. Copy the URL's of the pictures that you attached and now have open in tabs and use the [img] BBcode. And there you go!

If it says your file is too large, adjust the quality when you export it in GIMP. Although, merged JPG's after this process are usually only about 70MB in size. Post questions and comments as replies to this thread.
Attached to this post:
Attachments: BadExample.jpg (53.25 KB)
Attachments: SpriteBMP_JPGConversionFrameA.jpg (124.42 KB)
Attachments: SpriteBMP_JPGConversionFrameB.jpg (136.33 KB)
Attachments: SpriteBMP_JPGConversionFrameC.jpg (121.33 KB)
Attachments: SpriteBMP_JPGConversionFrameD.jpg (30.96 KB)
Attachments: SpriteMergingFrameA.jpg (79.46 KB)
Attachments: SpriteMergingFrameB.jpg (89.99 KB)
Attachments: SpriteMergingFrameC.jpg (123.13 KB)
Edited by MechPilot524, Apr 6 2013, 02:52 PM.
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(Team NFSP)quigly32
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Quigley32
got it
Edited by quigly32, Apr 8 2013, 02:19 AM.
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(Team NFSP)quigly32
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Quigley32
now how do i do the battle sprite turning thing?
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MechPilot524
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Merge each battle sprite's frame. You know how NF divides the pictures into segments? Taking the VIIA as our example, you merge the hull with the top. You do that in each of the 36 instances. Then, using Gimp, you open all 36 as layers, making sure that the order of numbers in each merged frame range from 0000 to 0035 or from 0035 to 0000. Export it or save it as a .gif file. Then set the delay between frames to be about 333 milliseconds (intending to achieve a framerate of 3 fps), and finalize the export. That should do it.

You might want to adjust the framerate depending on how you want the preview to look, but the NF game engine never alters the ship battlesprites at a rate faster than 3 fps (based on my dead reckoning) so I think that framerate should work. Just play around with it until you find the rate you feel best with.
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(Team NFSP)quigly32
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Quigley32
thats really awesome and cool thanks

Posted Image
Edited by quigly32, Apr 8 2013, 11:30 PM.
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(Team NFSP)quigly32
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Quigley32
bit bugy but what ever it works
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(Team NFSP)straswa
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Thanks, very helpful. This will save me from having to jump ingame just to see how the sprite looks whenever I would make a change.
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MechPilot524
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straswa
Aug 12 2013, 03:11 PM
Thanks, very helpful. This will save me from having to jump ingame just to see how the sprite looks whenever I would make a change.
Okay, but you might want to still view it ingame when testing it, because SPRing has a tendency to darken sprites. This can cause holes in the sprite that frankly don't look too good. Opening it in NF will confirm its true quality. Or, using your photoshop select all pixels of color html#000000 (in other words, pick the "Select by Color" tool and click the black edges) with 0 threshold to ensure it is at max sensitivity (dark spots that aren't holes will be highlighted as holes if you don't set it right) and use the color html#000001 to paint over the highlighted spots that don't seem to belong.
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(Team NFSP)straswa
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Oh ok then.
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