Fox-1 / mnx Posted June 2, 2018 Share Posted June 2, 2018 I expected dithering to kick in a bit on the background too but it didn't so at hind sight it was better if I made the background a solid blue, which I didn't. Posting anyways. Input png 640*430 - rc Fox-1_SugarHill.png /h=215 /pal=g2f /brightness=-5 /contrast=2 /init=smart /threads=11 /dither=line2 Altirra screenshot Fox-1_SugarHill.xex 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sheddy Posted June 2, 2018 Share Posted June 2, 2018 It may be an edge case. I really have no idea. Restarting the conversion, with or without switching dither pattern, won't solve it. Sooner or later the lines creep in again but not necessarily at the same scan line(s). Any position with a lot of changing colors per scan line is a potential candidate. It keeps finding the same bad looking solution. That's unfortunate. Have you tried without "smart" colour option? That will randomize things more and hopefully find different solutions Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fox-1 / mnx Posted June 2, 2018 Share Posted June 2, 2018 Tried with "smart" and "less". Lines keeps showing up. Just at other locations. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted June 2, 2018 Share Posted June 2, 2018 Mclaren, number 59. 72 colors. Mclaren59e.xex 13 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RAM Posted June 2, 2018 Share Posted June 2, 2018 WOW! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted June 2, 2018 Share Posted June 2, 2018 (edited) Tried with "smart" and "less". Lines keeps showing up. Just at other locations. Try playing with the contrast more, don't be afraid to crank it up. If your last effort the contrast was left at zero, try increasing in increments of 15. From my experience I usually adjust contrast to 15 as my default, and often find I have to go up from there. I would guess a majority of my images had contrast set between 30-50. Also, I highly recommend resizing and or cropping your source image to 320x240 or as close to 240 as you can get, and then "sharpen" the image. You'll get more detail in the final 160x240 output if you do. Edited June 2, 2018 by Gunstar 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fox-1 / mnx Posted June 2, 2018 Share Posted June 2, 2018 My default contrast setting is somewhere around 20, sometimes up to 60, depending on the image. A value of zero or below rarely worked for me. Usually also brightness is slightly adjusted, depending on the chosen palette. I always prepare the source image in such way that it looks good in 640x480 png. Sometimes less than 480 height because, well, the image just hasn't enough lines to show. Prior to starting the conversion I also make two 50% versions (320x240) of the same image. One resized as "smart", the other with a plain pixel resize. I check all three versions with chess dithering to see which one works best. Most of the time it's the 640x480 version which gives the best result. As for sharpen the image... I experienced the opposite. A very tiny gaussian blur will usually return a better result. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rybags Posted June 3, 2018 Share Posted June 3, 2018 The image blur comes out really well on that pic. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted June 3, 2018 Share Posted June 3, 2018 (edited) The image blur comes out really well on that pic. Yes, there are one or two spots on the car I'm not 100% happy with, but the overall picture turned out so well I decided to overlook a couple small details. It's something that is just a fact with Rastaconverter; you can get some great conversions, but there will ALWAYS be some bit somewhere that could be better. But you fix it and another pops up that you cause from adjustments to fix the other bit. That's where G2F comes in for some, but I just like trying to get the best out of Rastaconverter without pictorial changes. Edited June 3, 2018 by Gunstar Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fox-1 / mnx Posted June 3, 2018 Share Posted June 3, 2018 An example of where the banding actually is an advantage :-) 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted June 3, 2018 Share Posted June 3, 2018 Electric (can you tell?) F1. 43 colors. ElectricF1.xex 10 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fox-1 / mnx Posted June 3, 2018 Share Posted June 3, 2018 The daily driver. A bit too saturated. Oh well... Source png - Stats rc Fox-1_FordCortinaMK2.png /height=205 /pal=olivierp /brightness=6 /contrast=36 /threads=11 /dither=knoll /dither_val=0.3 /dither_rand=1.6 /init=smart - Altirra Fox-1_FordCortinaMK2.xex 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
a8isa1 Posted June 4, 2018 Share Posted June 4, 2018 The daily driver. A bit too saturated. Oh well... Fox-1_FordCortinaMK2-source.png Source png - Fox-1_FordCortinaMK2-stats.png Stats rc Fox-1_FordCortinaMK2.png /height=205 /pal=olivierp /brightness=6 /contrast=36 /threads=11 /dither=knoll /dither_val=0.3 /dither_rand=1.6 /init=smart - Fox-1_FordCortinaMK2-Altirra.png Altirra Fox-1_FordCortinaMK2.xex too many pixels! about 38400 too many! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted June 4, 2018 Share Posted June 4, 2018 Ferrari F1 2016. 58 colors. F1Ferrari2016.xex 7 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fox-1 / mnx Posted June 4, 2018 Share Posted June 4, 2018 And the former daily driver. The blue colors often causing troubles, at least for me. No matter the chosen palette. input png - stats rc Fox-1_CadillacZ90.png /height=186 /pal=olivierp /brightness=-10 /contrast=16 /threads=11 /dither=jarvis /dither_val=0.7 /dither_rand=2.4 /init=smart - Altirra Fox-1_CadillacZ90.xex 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ivop Posted June 4, 2018 Share Posted June 4, 2018 Lol, driving a hearse as daily driver. Reminds me of Claire from Six Feet Under Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted June 5, 2018 Share Posted June 5, 2018 There's nothing like the roominess of a Cadillac! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted June 5, 2018 Share Posted June 5, 2018 Mig-29. 37 colors. Splinter 5. 44 colors. F-22 Raptor. 27 colors. Mig29.xex Splinter5.xex F-22Raptor.xex 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fox-1 / mnx Posted June 7, 2018 Share Posted June 7, 2018 Something without dithering. The M.A.R.V, GDI's epic unit in the game "Command & Conquer 3 - Kane's Wrath" stats rc Fox-1_CnC3MARV2.png /height=192 /s=600 /pal=olivierp /brightness=6 /contrast=22 /threads=11 /dither_val=1.2 /dither_rand=2.6 (dither parameters are bogus in here) Altirra screenshot Fox-1_CnC3MARV.xex 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted June 7, 2018 Share Posted June 7, 2018 (edited) Very nice. Do you check out your own conversions on real hardware Fox-1? I ask because I just loaded it on my 1200XL and a black line-segment-error appeared on the top gun barrel. Fortunately the spot doesn't effect the picture much. There's a real technical name for the error, I forget and just call it line-segment error. It only appears on real hardware. Sometimes when it happens to me I start over or if it's sort of out of the way in the picture, and small, I don't worry about it. This is not the usual line issues inherent with Rastaconverter, like commented on with my Mclaren image. These errors usually pop-up on an image loaded on a real machine, many times you see it happen before your eyes after the image is displayed for a few seconds. Sorry if you already know what I'm referring too, my intention is not to patronize. I just want to make sure I'm understood with my self-made layman's term. I can take a screen shot if you would like. Edited June 7, 2018 by Gunstar Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fox-1 / mnx Posted June 7, 2018 Share Posted June 7, 2018 No, I wasn't aware of possible issues with the real deal vs. Altirra. Good to know. Unfortunately I don't have a real set-up at hand right now. Since I need to move it's all packed up. Well, sort of. It should be but not connected nevertheless. A real torture because I can't get used to work with an emulator like Altirra. Despite it's near-perfect emulation it'll always "just" be a substitute, admitted the Black-Box hard disk emulation is a real neat feature, which I didn't even knew about until a week ago. I let the MARV conversion run for a few days and when I finally checked it some bright white lines crawled in at (coincidence?) the top of the barrel. This was over 20,000,000,000 evals so lot's of wasted CPU time. I restarted the conversion with the same settings to stop it at 1,000,000,000 evals and this is how it turned out. Exactly the same as the first try but without the disturbing lines. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted June 7, 2018 Share Posted June 7, 2018 (edited) Here is a screen shot. The error, is the black line segments on the top gun barrel, when compared to your Altirra screen shot. It popped up on me a few seconds after loading on my Atari. They tend to crop up a lot more often on real Atari's, on images that where left to run over 100,000,000 evaluations, from my experience. Otherwise I'd let my images run far, far longer than I do. Because of these errors I adjust Rasta and keep re-running images until I get a good image in under 100,000,000. Sometimes it happens under that amount. Like the Rainbow Atari Fuji I did recently, it has a bright green line-segment error off in the sold blue area when viewed on a real Atari, I just ignored it instead of redoing the image. Edited June 7, 2018 by Gunstar 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fox-1 / mnx Posted June 7, 2018 Share Posted June 7, 2018 (edited) Besides the line issue, it's funny to see the green "blob" at the front of the vehicle on a real screen, which is actually right but turned out grey on my Altirra config. Must be a PAL/NTSC/Palette/Artifact/whatever difference. edit: the black scan line on real system doesn't match the white line I initially got, which was a few lines up. So, not related... Edited June 7, 2018 by Fox-1 / mnx 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted June 7, 2018 Share Posted June 7, 2018 (edited) Colors are often much different on a real Atari than Altirra or even the output .png image. I've started over with different palettes before after seeing the first test-.xex on a real Atari and the color changes. My 1200XL is PAL though, which most Rasta palettes are made for. But as a matter of fact, another "bug" is many gray shades when viewing the output.png or through Altirra become blues and greens up on real Atari's. Edited June 7, 2018 by Gunstar Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted June 7, 2018 Share Posted June 7, 2018 More dragons! Rhaegal (Game of Thrones). 47 colors. Ruby dragon. 50 colors. Sand dragon. 49 colors. Rhaegal.xex RubyDragon.xex SandDragon.xex 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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