Afghan Ant Artistic Advances: 12-07-2008 Atomik Backwards

[steamteck]

 Here's the description of his powers he included with the skin of his Avatar available at NPI


Character description:
True identity: William Kight
Height: 5'11''
Weight: 185lbs
Gender : Male
Transhuman type: A
Threat level:7
Powers
ENERGY MATRIX CONTROL - Wil can create and control matrixes of energy, this power is non-generative so he must use energy from his surroundings, Usually the electro magnetic spectrum (Hard Radiation, Light, Heat, sound, Microwaves, Radiowaves, Magnetism, and Gravity)

Anyway hope that'll help for HERO files

[AfghanAnt]

Here's the description of his powers he included with the skin of his Avatar available at NPI


Character description:
True identity: William Kight
Height: 5'11''
Weight: 185lbs
Gender : Male
Transhuman type: A
Threat level:7
Powers
ENERGY MATRIX CONTROL - Wil can create and control matrixes of energy, this power is non-generative so he must use energy from his surroundings, Usually the electro magnetic spectrum (Hard Radiation, Light, Heat, sound, Microwaves, Radiowaves, Magnetism, and Gravity)

Anyway hope that'll help for HERO files

Ah, I did not know he did that, maybe instead of an Avengers redesign (which is proving to be harder than I thought) I should just go  ahead and do a normal redesign.

[Previsionary]

Didn't Matrix also make a herofile...or someone made one for him? I thought he did so at one point. Also, Matrix did post his av's whole bio on NPI and it should still be there under the NPI-cyclopedia.

On the skin side...AA, that rocks too hard. Rock less, thanks. I could pick out almost every X-men element and I thought that was pretty cool. I actually connected the "turn to steel" more so with Mimic than Colossus for some reason, heh. Buuuuut, you need more shiny metallic parts! I remember most of Matrix's designs having a shiny metallic piece somewhere (I know Sven's and my avatars had them), so it's only fitting that he also have a shiny metallic piece somewhere, me thinks. Yep...shiny. Shiny shiny pieces....

*disappears in a puff of....shiny*

[AfghanAnt]

Didn't Matrix also make a herofile...or someone made one for him? I thought he did so at one point. Also, Matrix did post his av's whole bio on NPI and it should still be there under the NPI-cyclopedia.

Buuuuut, you need more shiny metallic parts!

I never had got it for some reason and you know what I remember his bio being posted after I did the costume.

I know, right! Instead of a boring Avengers costume (in my design it was must Crystal and Sersi anyway) I'll do a skin of how I would do his design aesthetic.

Also I kept thinking Mimic too when I did this but I also thought Peter from Heroes which is what I imagined my Matrix design to be like.

[AfghanAnt]

No more pink pieces in-game anymore! I solved the quality issue with dds file formats and from now on I will only be saving my skin with dds rather than tga.

Here is a pic of a skin I did and is saved in dds format:

It's Marvel Adventures Storm and as you can see no crappy grainy crap!
The only issue I've had so far is the skins won't skin up in nifskope but I'd rather they didn't show up in nifskope than in game. I'm actually annoyed at Irrational for not saving their dds in the highest quality. I hate the in-game skins because they look so gross.

[Previsionary]

AA...it's like you're tugging at my non-existent heart! I'm glad you got the DDS thing figured out (as I recall IPS also did a pretty long post on the quality between TGA and DDS and how the gap could be closed). Nifskope should pick up dds pieces. It does for me. Obviously...yours is a clone plotting to get you in a phonebooth. Yep.

[UnkoMan]

DDS? Bah. I'll never surrender!

[AfghanAnt]

Damn clones! Anywho, I was just so frickin' tired of pink pieces or crappy quality skins I decided I'm going to find a solution. It is all in the way the files are saved:

Save as a 32 bit ARGB and make sure you also click No MIP maps (for PS Cs users).

[Podmark]

hmmm interesting...Do I dare make the switch?

Is using a DDS just like I skinned to TGA just saving it differently?

[AfghanAnt]

hmmm interesting...Do I dare make the switch?

Is using a DDS just like I skinned to TGA just saving it differently?

Just saving differently.

[Lunarman]

Yeah, but what are the settings you used to save the .dds like that?

Thankyou :)

[laughing paradox]

I've found that you could save all the extra pieces as DDS, but the main skin you can still save as a tga and you should be able to avoid the pink problem.  I wouldn't save the main skin bigger than 512x512, though. That should work.

[AfghanAnt]

Yeah, but what are the settings you used to save the .dds like that?

Here:
http://freedomreborn.net/archive/index.php?topic=41272.msg662918#msg662918

I've found that you could save all the extra pieces as DDS, but the main skin you can still save as a tga and you should be able to avoid the pink problem.  I wouldn't save the main skin bigger than 512x512, though. That should work.

I would do that but I'd rather just use the format the engine likes rather than the secondary format. Besides there is absolutely no difference in size or quality so why not just use dds? I'm surprised no one else has tried this before especially with the dreadful quality of dss converter.

[UnkoMan]

Is the file size any smaller?

Honestly, with my own skins on my own computer I have never had a pink problem. On the other hand, people have told me occasionally they have (usually it's due to me missing a refl or glow). But I love keeping my filesize small and actually, after I am finished a skin I save it via GIMP which compresses tgas in some kind of magic way. I think it indexes the colour or something, and I can't use it on anything I'm doing alphas with. Still, I get me some tiny files that way.

I'm all about smallest file sizes while maintaining the highest quality.

[Previsionary]

DDS is much smaller than TGA. I'll need to find IPS's writeup as I'm sure he went on about file sizes as well. In fact...didnt NPI/HQ also have something written up about obtaining smaller file sizes with TGAs as well?
-----------

ETA:

Actually, it was Tommy who did the write up, but IPS was a big part of those DDS convos back in the day. Darn snapshot memory and word associations!

[the_ultimate_evil]

what resolution was she skinned on, it's something i always hated that when i bring a skin back to 512x512 details i added being lost

[AfghanAnt]

I always work in 512X512 or under so and the same with the dds. I haven't noticed a difference in size but I am using alpha layers.

[Podmark]

Anyone remember where to get the DDS plugin?

[AfghanAnt]

Anyone remember where to get the DDS plugin?

http://developer.nvidia.com/object/photoshop_dds_plugins.html

[Podmark]

Anyone remember where to get the DDS plugin?

http://developer.nvidia.com/object/photoshop_dds_plugins.html

Thank you kindly skinner.

[style]

I love the tribute to Matrix! I have something in the works for Webrider!

[Outcast]

Super job on combining all those Xmen elements for the uncanny Matrix!  :cool:

Edit:
I tried saving in 32 bit argb dds format and couldn't tell the difference between the old tga file. Though the file size did get a lot bigger.

Do you need to convert the glow,reflect,lightmaps, and portrait TGA files to DDS format too?

[AfghanAnt]

Actually you need to save in 24 bit for non-alpha layered files and 32 bit is for alpha layers.

You don't need to but I do because I'd rather be safe than sorry. Also you should decrease the size of unnecessary files such as (blacked out glow and refl) to 64 x 64.

[AfghanAnt]

Here's the Impossible Man. This amazing skope is by Johnny Patches. It really is a work of sheer genius.

[JLAfan2001]

OOOHHHH!!!! That looks soooo good. Excellent job to both you and Johnny Patches. The Fantastic Four will be dealing with a little impy nuisance soon.

[electro]

I started ussing DDS a year or so back myself ussing a plugin for Gimp which converts the TGA skins to DDS with no loss of quality for the same reasons you described AA - Sometimes I lend my HDTV & Comp to the local comic store & let his customers watch battles in FFvTTR watchmode - It keeps his customers there a bit longer in which they maybe inclined to buy even more expecially after looking threw the huge cast O characters that are in my game , but i can't have the characters comming up pink while trying to showoff the game - For my troubles he breaks me off a few comics & i get a kick out of seeing peoples reaction to seeing a game that they thought would be impossible to make & yet is - Thanks to this fine community - By the way Impossible man skin & skope are so Rad :blink:

[Podmark]

That Impossible Man is prefect. Very nice AA, and Johnny.

[djfredski]

 :o WOW Impossible! :thumbup:

[Jakew]

 :thumbup:

[Lunarman]

Wow! That is wonderfully done