Joining forces to make custom graphics

[Ameena]

When I made my DM-style Dragon in the Spore Creature Creator, I uploaded front, side, back, and "attack" views of him. You could always see whether you could mess around with that and put him in a dungeon...

[Crash.]

Okay I see them now. Great work! It does look like this tool can be used to generate a large number of high quality monsters. Is it easy to share the creature files?

Cheers!

[zoom]

now we got lego- and spore dungeon master!!

what would the dragon of Ameena look like when
you apply this filter on it , Crash.? Probably this way,
it is blending all right with the graphics you already did
(of the dm/csb creatures)
all monsters should have the same "style",imho

[Gambit37]

I think Linflas did a bit of work on this spore monster to make it more realistic. Looks very good to me:

http://picasaweb.google.fr/guillaume.ro ... 0465222642

[Gambit37]

If you go to Sporepedia and search on top-rated creatures, there are plenty that look quite realistic, or would do with minimal PhotoShop tweaks. Or throw the keywords "realism" or "realistic" into the search.

I quite like these two:

http://www.bankfotek.pl/image/90637.jpeg
http://www.bankfotek.pl/image/89853.jpeg

Here's a tutorial on making a realistic mantis:

http://www.spore.com/what/screensmovies ... eid=ea1914

[Michoko]

Very nice indeed !

[Ameena]

Crash - yes, it's very easy to share creature files - that's half the point of Spore . If you have the game (or, as it is at the moment, the creature creator) yourself, other people can send you their creatures (file size around 20KB, so not very big at all) and you can load them into the game yourself. Spore will be "Massively Single Player", meaning everyone can upload their content (creaturs, buildings, vehicles, etc) onto the online Sporepedia, and other people can freely browse and download them in order to populate their own world - you play Spore by yourself, but the stuff in your galaxy is/can be stuff that other people have made.

[Crash.]

Perhaps someone could start a thread somewhere here to list their creatures created in the Sporepedia? If we can assemble a collection or horrible monsters, perhaps that would give dungeon creators here a boost in productivity.

I think I'm missing something, but when I try to download a creature from the Sporepedia from Firefox, all I get is a png file. Maybe this has to be done from within the creature creator?

[Crash.]

now we got lego- and spore dungeon master!!

Nooooooo! Well, I was sort of hoping to tone down the cuteness and try to make monsters that are as unpleasant as possible. I don't think that Spore will be a replacement for the kind of art and creativity that people like Cowsmanaut are capable of, but hopefully the creature creator can help fill in the gaps and offer more variety than otherwise might be possible.

what would the dragon of Ameena look like when
you apply this filter on it , Crash.? Probably this way,
it is blending all right with the graphics you already did
(of the dm/csb creatures) all monsters should have the same "style",imho

What filter are you referring to? I'm not sure if the monster updates that I'm working on are of sufficient quality to match what comes out of Spore, other 3D modelers, or artists. All I've done is taken the original DM/CSB and graphics and run them through every filter I could think of to try and smooth them and add some depth. I can't really add any detail.

I do agree that the monsters should have a similar look and feel, although perhaps that will have to be left up to the dungeon creator when they select monsters from the collection.

[linflas]

All I've done is taken the original DM/CSB and graphics and run them through every filter I could think of to try and smooth them and add some depth. I can't really add any detail

you can try with Ameena's dragon or any other monster that any registered Spore user here can kindly grab for you !
For each image, downsize it to what is expected for DM/DM2 original low res. then, you can change one or two details by editing it pixel to pixel (for such a little picture, that is quite easy imho), and finally apply your mysterious filter(s) to double it. that may look like your other monsters. here's a 15 mn example done with Gimp and a mouse :

1. simple resizing of the original cropped image to low res with NO linear or cubic filter


2. on a new layer, edit with pen teeth, nostril and eyelid, few strokes with the eraser and *then*, doublesize it with NO filter as well.


that's almost the final image: i would stop here but you can apply your "über spezial Crash filter" !
note : pink background can be replaced with transparent if you use PNG format in RTC.

EDIT : shadow is a bit more complicated to add, i can write a tutorial if anyone is interested.

[Ameena]

Ooh, nostrils...I'd forgotten those, lol. I could have a look and see whether there's a dragonish enough nose in the creator which I could ploink onto him...
And Crash, yes, that's right, creatures download as a .png file. I think all you need to do with it is put it in the "Creatures" folder (found in the "My Spore Creations" folder, which for me is in "My Documents...put there automatically, not by me), and then presumably you can load it up in the creator as you would with any other creature. All the creature info is apparently hidden embedded inside the .png file - another means of making it easier to share content with other players. You're basically sharing the "genotype" (basic info needed to create the creature), and when that's loaded up, the computer reads that info and builds up the "phenotype" (ie the completed creature).

[zoom]

Crash.: What filter are you referring to?
............................................................................
is it called hqx6??
you know the filter you use all the time to produce
the colourblending / smoothing effect; sorry I cannot be
more specific


Linflas:
shadow is a bit more complicated to add, i can write a
tutorial if anyone is interested.
............................................................................
I would like to know how you do the shadows, since I
found mine out of synch with the dungeon perspective

linflas:
downsize it to what is expected for DM/DM2 original low res

here it would be nice if you were a bit more specific in any
sort of tutorial. I said it before, and i see that it would be
tiresome to always write down the pixel x pixel dimensions,
but I miss an easy reference to these values. Am I alone here,
with this difficulties? Should one simply load an existing creature
into a paint program and use that as the basis for new ones?
otherwise, I like what you showed here , linflas
another thing , which is really helpful for wallsets I found on
linflas site, namely this image:

http://picasaweb.google.fr/guillaume.ro ... 0525615954
here you have a nice overview how to do the walls, and
probably you can add there your creature, and use the bottom
lines for shadow somehow..

[Crash.]

you can try with Ameena's dragon or any other monster that any registered Spore user here can kindly grab for you !
For each image, downsize it to what is expected for DM/DM2 original low res. then, you can change one or two details by editing it pixel to pixel (for such a little picture, that is quite easy imho), and finally apply your mysterious filter(s) to double it. that may look like your other monsters. here's a 15 mn example done with Gimp and a mouse :

I'll be happy to give it a try, although I'm not sure the outcome will be at all similar. To make my updates to the original DM graphics, I used one image processing program/algorithm called hq4x to start with. This smooths out a lot of the blockiness without completely blurring everything. The result looks a bit more hand drawn, but loses some detail from the original graphic.

Then, I decrease the size if the image (hq4x quadruples it) and use a combination of filters at varying settings (plaster, plastic wrap, bas relief, texture, grayscale on colored paper, etc) on multiple layers with various levels of transparency set to multiply, overlay, lighten, darken, color dodge or burn, whatever looks right. Some of the layers are inverted in color, while others have extreme lights or darks removed. I just keep fiddling until I come up with something that appears to have some 3D shading and a wider range of colors. Some turn out better than others, with the magenta worm as an example of one that I was happy with.

I used Paint.net and Photoshop.

2. on a new layer, edit with pen teeth, nostril and eyelid, few strokes with the eraser and *then*, doublesize it with NO filter as well.

I do think that the edits you've made here are quite effective, and probably necessary since I don't see any way to adjust some of the finer bits on Spore creatures. It is a little disappointing that I can't seem to make bodies flatten, only round, and there are no pointy tails or edges to be found, and no forked dragon tongue! Everything looks a little like a balloon animal. They could have easily added the ability to independently control the X and Y axis size of each vertebra and body part by adding a modifier key such as control or shift with the mouse wheel. Everything I've tried to create is way to round - maybe I need the full version?

that's almost the final image: i would stop here but you can apply your "über spezial Crash filter" !

The problem is that since the spore creatures are 3D, they already have the kind of shading and highlights that I was trying to add. Additionally, since they are textured, running them through something like hq4x would blur the textures. I tried running some of the DM2 graphics like the wallset through it, and they did not come out well.

note : pink background can be replaced with transparent if you use PNG format in RTC.

Really? I thought I tried that. Oh well, it is easy enough to change that. I've got about 611 graphic objects right now, but perhaps I can do with with a macro or something.

EDIT : shadow is a bit more complicated to add, i can write a tutorial if anyone is interested.

I wonder if the process for creating a shadow can be setup as a macro?

[Gambit37]

I do think that the edits you've made here are quite effective, and probably necessary since I don't see any way to adjust some of the finer bits on Spore creatures. It is a little disappointing that I can't seem to make bodies flatten, only round, and there are no pointy tails or edges to be found, and no forked dragon tongue! Everything looks a little like a balloon animal. They could have easily added the ability to independently control the X and Y axis size of each vertebra and body part by adding a modifier key such as control or shift with the mouse wheel. Everything I've tried to create is way to round - maybe I need the full version?

I can't run the CC on my crappy computer, but from all the tutorial vids I've watched, it seems like you can do everything you've just described. Perhaps you need to run through some of the tutorials?

Have you looked in detail at Sporepedia? There are loads of creatures that have the properties you describe.

Anyway, this thread has gone a different way than I was expecting. I should have made it clear that I was discussing artists helping each other create HIGHER RESOLUTION custom imagery of NEW CREATURES for their own RTC and DSB scenarios, not re-creating the existing DM creatures.

For example:




Note that these are simply basic wallsets that I ceated in Photoshop and using Linflas' RTCWM. The characters come from another source -- I didn't create them, but have tweaked and drawn over them where necessary.

[Crash.]

Crash.: What filter are you referring to?
............................................................................
is it called hqx6??
you know the filter you use all the time to produce
the colourblending / smoothing effect; sorry I cannot be
more specific

Oh, well unfortunately that was only step one, and seems to be designed for and only works well with low color, simple images. When I put up hq4x monsters here with DM2 dungeon graphics, the feedback I got was that the monsters looked to simple and didn't blend with the more detailed dungeon. Most of the other steps involved trying to fake 3D shading and highlights, so the monsters would fit into the dungeon better. Being 3D, these models wouldn't benefit from the steps I took. Each time I've tried putting something more detailed through HQ4X, the result was just blurry.

here it would be nice if you were a bit more specific in any
sort of tutorial. I said it before, and i see that it would be
tiresome to always write down the pixel x pixel dimensions,
but I miss an easy reference to these values. Am I alone here,
with this difficulties? Should one simply load an existing creature
into a paint program and use that as the basis for new ones?

That's exactly what I did for many of the DMJ monsters I converted. These had been completely re-designed graphics, or were adaptations of the originals - but they were adjusted for a different aspect ratio (maybe 640x400 vs 640x480), resulting in images that were about 15% taller than the original graphics. I could have just reduced all of them by 15%, but I wanted to avoid having to adjust the offsets of every single image since the cropping differed for all of them. Instead, I loaded all the original images, cropped them all to determine the actual dimensions of the monsters, resized the DMJ monster images to the same dimensions, then reloaded all of the original graphics again, and positioned the DMJ graphics over the original graphics to align them as closely as possible.

Of course, if we could get a database of all the graphics in RTC that included their dimensions and offsets, that would simplify all of this work, but that information seems not to be forthcoming. I do at least have a list of the graphic names in case anyone needs it.

There were a few creatures that were completely different, where I had to deal with the dimension and offset changes in RTC, but that's not so bad when there are only a handful of files instead of hundreds.

otherwise, I like what you showed here , linflas
another thing , which is really helpful for wallsets I found on
linflas site, namely this image:
http://picasaweb.google.fr/guillaume.ro ... 0525615954
here you have a nice overview how to do the walls, and
probably you can add there your creature, and use the bottom
lines for shadow somehow..

Is this a tool that allows you to place wall and floor items to discover the correct offsets? Something like that would be extremely useful. Placing switches can be a big pain!

[Gambit37]

Is this a tool that allows you to place wall and floor items to discover the correct offsets? Something like that would be extremely useful. Placing switches can be a big pain!

You should check out this post:
http://www.dungeon-master.com/forum/vie ... hp?t=26465

Look under Editors.

[linflas]

in Spore, mouse wheel controls the size of the body part your mouse is right over, which means that each vertebra can be resized, but also shoulders, elbows, knees.
you can create a sort of tail with a unique centered arm or a leg.

what misses a lot in the trial version are mostly additional details such as wings, horns, eyes, noses.. and extra textures for the skin.

here it would be nice if you were a bit more specific in any
sort of tutorial. I said it before, and i see that it would be
tiresome to always write down the pixel x pixel dimensions,
but I miss an easy reference to these values. Am I alone here,
with this difficulties?

i use RTC editor as a reference for the height of the creature and divide values by 2 if i want low res. for example, the wyvern i made with Spore has been resized to the height of a couatl (shadow included).

about the shadow precisely, i don't think a macro can be used because each monster sprite is different. you don't have to be really accurate with the perspective, unless the monster is a perfect cube or similar..

[Crash.]

I can't run the CC on my crappy computer, but from all the tutorial vids I've watched, it seems like you can do everything you've just described. Perhaps you need to run through some of the tutorials?

I haven't yet, and since I only have the trial version, there isn't a lot I can do yet.

Have you looked in detail at Sporepedia? There are loads of creatures that have the properties you describe.

The images in Sporepedia are not of high enough resolution for me to be able to see too clearly, so I honestly couldn't tell. I was waiting for some clarification on these limitations before giving them my $10

Anyway, this thread has gone a different way than I was expecting. I should have made it clear that I was discussing artists helping each other create HIGHER RESOLUTION custom imagery of NEW CREATURES for their own RTC and DSB scenarios, not re-creating the existing DM creatures.

I think we're using this as an example, since Ameena has created some spore creatures that happen to be based on the DM monsters. I expect that the resolution of the spore creatures can be higher resolution than RTC can use, and would have to be scaled down. I was running the creature creator at 1920x1200. Of course, the whole objective is to find a way to create a collection of new and terrifying monsters to encounter in dungeons. Still, it's okay of a Wizard's Eye or Screamer pops up in the catalog. If I was making a dungeon, I would use them.

Note that these are simply basic wallsets that I ceated in Photoshop and using Linflas' RTCWM. The characters come from another source -- I didn't create them, but have tweaked and drawn over them where necessary.

Very nice work. I want to play already! Where did you get the graphics? I was thinking of games that it might be possible to pull graphics from, but not sure which may to look at. I do have a lot of older games, and for at least some of them, there are tools to extract the graphics and sounds.

[linflas]

oooh ! nice girly warrior, Gambit ! better with a smaller head imho

[Gambit37]

oooh ! nice girly warrior, Gambit ! better with a smaller head imho

Yeah, this is a bit of weird one. The original source has her head that size and I thought it looked too big. So I tried it smaller but it just looked wrong.

Plus working out the relative sizes of humans versus creatures is actually quite hard. You have to make sure that people look right against the size of dungeon walls and items, but if you want a really big monster, like a dragon, you have to compromise. Sometimes a dragon can end up the same size as a person! This is one area where the original game fails IMO.

I've made the decision to have humans shorter than they are in DM/CSB. While this might make them appear too small, it helps the bigger monsters look more menacing!

Where did you get the graphics?

It's a secret!

[Joramun]

They look like warhammer quest figurines or something like that.

[Gambit37]

I think I'm missing something, but when I try to download a creature from the Sporepedia from Firefox, all I get is a png file. Maybe this has to be done from within the creature creator?

The PNG *is* the creature file. See here:

http://nedbatchelder.com/blog/200806/sp ... raphy.html

[Gambit37]

They look like warhammer quest figurines or something like that.

Possibly....

[Crash.]

in Spore, mouse wheel controls the size of the body part your mouse is right over, which means that each vertebra can be resized, but also shoulders, elbows, knees.
you can create a sort of tail with a unique centered arm or a leg.

I did figure that part out. I was mostly complaining that you can't make a body part (vertebra) wider than it is deep as far as I have been able to figure out. I'm sure there is more capability than I am aware of, I just had some ideas that I could not realize because I couldn't make things thin enough, flat enough, or as complicated as I wanted to. Asymmetry also is apparently not possible, which makes some of my more distrubing monster concepts infeasible.

about the shadow precisely, i don't think a macro can be used because each monster sprite is different. you don't have to be really accurate with the perspective, unless the monster is a perfect cube or similar..

I can create a shadow using a standard set of parameters in Paint.net, but it doesn't support automation. I don't know how to use Photoshop well enough to duplicate the 3D rotation that can be performed with Paint.net. I think it should be possible with the right program and/or knowledge.

Cheers!

[Crash.]

The PNG *is* the creature file. See here:
http://nedbatchelder.com/blog/200806/sp ... raphy.html

Nifty! Unfortunately something on my system is not working as intended and creatures were not saving or the files became corrupted.

I also discovered that downloaded creatures made with the full creature creator will not open with the trial version, even just for viewing They are not doing a very good job of convincing me to buy this program.

Also, curiously, if I try to search for "dragon" in Sporepedia, lots of things are found, but nothing shows up. I tried multiple times with two different browsers. There is a conspiracy against Dragons, I tell you!

I'll have to see of someone elsewhere has posted high resolution images of interesting creatures.

[Joramun]

This dragon looks suspiciously like a roasted chicken.

[Crash.]

They look like warhammer quest figurines or something like that.

Possibly....

Okay, well was it a good game? I don't recognize it, so I'm sure I haven't played it. Are you holding out on us?

[Gambit37]

Asymmetry also is apparently not possible, which makes some of my more distrubing monster concepts infeasible.

Apparently it is possible, though tricky:
http://forums.electronicarts.co.uk/spor ... guide.html

Okay, well was it a good game? I don't recognize it, so I'm sure I haven't played it. Are you holding out on us?

Figurines are lead or plastic figures for table top gaming, or simply to be painted for fun. There are thousands of sites out there with some top quality paint jobs shown in high res photos... finding good examples, with all views necessary for RTC, at good enough quality is hard though... and much Photoshop work is required to make them usable...

I also discovered that downloaded creatures made with the full creature creator will not open with the trial version, even just for viewing

I don't think that's unreasonable! The trial is just that -- try it out. If you like it, buy the complete version. It's only like $5 or something isn't it?

[zoom]

Gambit wrote:

with all views necessary for RTC,

I would like to see all views of the knight.
this reminds me of less talk more action! I should get
into gears!

What interests me about creating
critters for dm dungeons:
How to depict the monster to
convey a proper aura /feel of it to the player.
(uh uh this one is aggressive or hmm, this one approaches dodged as if in fear of a blow etc)

I believe the more standard-ish a monster is,
the less special they may look.

If you have a dragon, which is sort of unique, you may freely add more detail to it, like scars or whatever.

A good thing which I am aiming for ,is certainly multiple versions of creatures.
not only colour scheme -wise but weapon-wise and with a slight variation in stance.
Standard monsters could still be seen as belonging to a grouplook, but have only similar movement frames, thus producing
variation that will make up for the neglection of details.

This is probably off topic.. I am sorry for any inconveniences that may cause you

[linflas]

Figurines are lead or plastic figures for table top gaming, or simply to be painted for fun. There are thousands of sites out there with some top quality paint jobs shown in high res photos...

i just hope you and i don't work on the same miniatures ! (i focus on gobs and orcs)