7800 Character and sprite mapper now test ready.

[peteym5]

Has there been any new updates for this program? It would be nice to have an editor for the 7800 sprites?

[Mord]

I highly doubt it given that Gorf left the 7800 scene years ago.

[DracIsBack]

I highly doubt it given that Gorf left the 7800 scene years ago.

 

Is he still even on Atariage?

[Shawn]

 

Is he still even on Atariage?

 

No he's banned.

[+darryl1970]

Are there any 7800 graphic editors that accommodate taller sprites?

Wider is nice, but I need taller too!

[Ecernosoft]

On 11/18/2008 at 6:32 AM, Gorf said:

Beta 11-18-2008 test release version.

 

CharMapper78Beta11_08_2008.zip 31.88 kB · 706 downloads

 

The read me will explain it's use. You will know what the mouse clicks do

for each function as the app will display a quick summary of its functions

on the center left side of the screen. Some buttons have several fucntions

depending on the mouse click.

 

Its a pretty feature rich editor. It will output asm code maps for sprites

up to 8 bytes in width x 16 rasters high. It will output asm code for palette

setup and even for palette EQU's.

You can lable the sprites and palette EQU's as you go along.

 

Careful though, there is currently no checks for duplicates labels

and if you have a dupe, you will get asm errors(just edit the label

to something different, via the app or by hand for now)

 

It will also allow the import and export of single sprites as raw data

or text data for use in other systems homebrews that use similar 2bpp

mode graphics, such as Vic-20 and C-64 and others.

 

It will also output data in raw file format for single sprites. Will eventually

add a feature to output an entire map of raw data for the entire block of

sprites.

 

Included is a sample '.spr', 'example.spr' sprite/character block mapfile.

 

Please let me know if anone has crashes or problems.

 

I hope you all find this a useful tool for creating 7800 graphics.

 

Most of all...enjoy it and please make some more excellent 7800

apps for us 7800 fans to play!

 

 

EDIT: It seems a release version of this on my OS(win2k) crashes

when trying to use the mouse. I'd appreciate anyone else with win2k

to report any issues that they might have using this. The debug build

does not crash and I could post that version as well for those that cant

seem to get it to work right on Win2k.

 

Let me know folks,

 

Thanks,

 

Gorf

OMG THANKS!!!

A lot could be improved, but I'll take ANYTHING over making gfx by hand or using the CLI.

[Ecernosoft]

On 2/1/2015 at 8:23 PM, Shawn said:

 

No he's banned.

; BUT WHY??????

[philipj]

It's a long story... let's just sometimes, all isn't always well in the Atari community... some people have to go their separate ways for their own good.

[Ecernosoft]

6 hours ago, philipj said:

It's a long story... let's just sometimes, all isn't always well in the Atari community... some people have to go their separate ways for their own good.

Yeah....................

However, I'm glad AL didn't delete this post, as now I don't need to deal with the nightmare that is gfx-by-hand-on-7800.

[+Karl G]

I'm curious what other 7800 ASM devs use to create image data. My first thought would be to make a Python script to convert an ASCII representation into the needed format for the graphics mode. Alternately I would try to extract 7800Basic's ability to convert indexed PNGs into the appropriate data format. 

[+splendidnut]

For the Congo Bongo graphics demo, I wrote a C program that could process a list of files.  For each, it would read in an image file, process the palette/colors (remap), and spit out ASM byte statements for the graphics.  It also had the ability to "tileize" a big image into a tileset + tilemap.

[Ecernosoft]

33 minutes ago, splendidnut said:

For the Congo Bongo graphics demo, I wrote a C program that could process a list of files.  For each, it would read in an image file, process the palette/colors (remap), and spit out ASM byte statements for the graphics.  It also had the ability to "tileize" a big image into a tileset + tilemap.

That's nice! However, for someone like me who can't get the hang of the CLI, this is quite nice.

(Sure, the interface isn't that great, but it's something, and something is better than nothing.)

[+splendidnut]

14 minutes ago, Ecernosoft said:

That's nice! However, for someone like me who can't get the hang of the CLI, this is quite nice.

(Sure, the interface isn't that great, but it's something, and something is better than nothing.)

My program does have a GUI... but it's in development and buried in a bit of feature creep.

 

If you have a goal of getting a job in the field of software development OR information technology, then I would highly recommend learning to use command line interfaces.

[Ecernosoft]

1 minute ago, splendidnut said:

 

If you have a goal of getting a job in the field of software development OR information technology, then I would highly recommend learning to use command line interfaces.

Yeah, you are right. And I've been planning to do that for quite some time.

[Mord]

Personally I use an old copy of Paint Shop Pro 6 I've had for over a decade.  I set it up so that it shows a grid where each byte (or double-byte) of sprite data would start and end and figured out how to cut down the palette to the proper sizes.

 

Sadly that doesn't make me a better sprite artist but at least makes it easier to convert whatever I make into proper png files.

[Ecernosoft]

12 minutes ago, Mord said:

Personally I use an old copy of Paint Shop Pro 6 I've had for over a decade.  I set it up so that it shows a grid where each byte (or double-byte) of sprite data would start and end and figured out how to cut down the palette to the proper sizes.

 

Sadly that doesn't make me a better sprite artist but at least makes it easier to convert whatever I make into proper png files.

Nice! (Says that since I have no idea what that is)

I'm not a great artist either, but I can make video game graphics that are... well... graphics.

[Ecernosoft]

On 1/24/2015 at 10:11 AM, peteym5 said:

Has there been any new updates for this program? It would be nice to have an editor for the 7800 sprites?

*Editor existing*