Custom sprites

[Kentaro]

Trying to use character sprites other than the base ones. Mostly for my main characters. I tried using Charas, but it wouldn't accept it. Any advide?

[Anton]

What have you tried in the first place ? I don't know if I'll pinpoint your problem accurately, so here goes...

If it happens that the charset pictures you place directly in the folder are invalid, then it can't work, or if you tried to import a charset with the ressource manager and failed : same thing, invalid file.

What is needed for a charset picture to be valid in the charset folder ?
- Be a .PNG (of 256 colors maximum, could be lower)
- Be of this exact size : 288 x 256 pixels

With paint, files saved as .png don't seem to be valid, (maybe because it goes over the 256 colors requirements)
The safest (but a little degrading) way to import with paint is by saving the pic as .bmp (256 colors) then proceed to import that .bmp

But if you're like me and hate when 256 colors conversion gives data loss, then use a better image editing software.

Character Maker 1999 is my favourite, as it can save PNG directly inside the data folder and be immediately usable. (but more softwares can do that too, but I'm unaware of them)

[Kentaro]

I tried using the Charas generator site. Didn't work though.

I have GIMP on my computer. Would that work? And if not, where do I get this Character Maker program?

[gadesx]

the sprites must have 24x32pc each sprite, all the image with 256 colors and no alpha channel.

[Caethyril]

As Anton said, your problem is either colour depth or image size. GIMP is more than sufficient to fix both these issues (MS Paint also works, but as Anton mentions, it's not very good at the save-as-256-colours thing).

Image size: a single character sprite set comprises facing directions and three-frame motion and is 72 x 128 pixels (3 x 4 grid of 24 x 32). A full charset file comprises 8 characters (some or all of which can be blank) in a grid of 4 columns and 2 rows, and is 288 x 256 pixels.

All you need to do here is expand the borders of your exported character sprite to 288 x 256 and save in 256 colours (or less, as Anton mentions). Lots of programs can do this, but some are better than others. Alternatively, there are charset templates available online (just search "rm2k3 charset template") that show where each character goes; you can then just copy + paste your sprites.

A point to note is that you can use the Resource Manager to set the transparent colour when you import (just click the colour you want to be transparent), so there is no actual requirement to save an image with transparency information if importing in this way.

[prpl_mage]

Post your picture and we can help you better. This could be pretty much anything from file format to you trying to import a charset as a tileset.

[Beria]

Use GIMP and then paint . NET (getpaint.net) for indexing the file.