SainT Posted June 18, 2020 Share Posted June 18, 2020 The LynxGD has a very nice built-it screenshot viewing feature, you can access it by pressing PAUSE on the menu screen. The screenshots are stored as 16 colour 160x102 BMP files, so it's easy to add more to existing sets or create your own for any games you have. A game can have one or more screenshots associated with it. It can either be one BMP file named the same as the ROM, but with a .BMP extension, or a folder with that name containing BMP's named in order from 1.BMP to as many as you want for that game. When the menu looks for preview screenshots it first looks in the same directory as the ROM, if it's not found there, it looks in a folder called screenshots.bmp in the root directory of your memory card. This allow you flexibility in arranging your ROM's and preview screenshots. To get you started and to show how it works, @neo_rg has very kindly created a screenshot library largely consisting of the screenshots here on AtariAge. Thanks to @Albert for creating and curating these images in the first place, and allowing their use here. screenshots_v1.0.zip 6 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Retroluzzer Posted July 2, 2020 Share Posted July 2, 2020 Thank you very much for this nice touch. I tried to add some screenshots to my library, followed the rules above in size, colour and file Format, but when I want to see them, I only get "bad image file". When I compare them, everything is the same. I'm using GraphicConverter on Mac to create the images. Did I forget something? Thanks in advance for your help! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SainT Posted July 3, 2020 Author Share Posted July 3, 2020 15 hours ago, Retroluzzer said: Thank you very much for this nice touch. I tried to add some screenshots to my library, followed the rules above in size, colour and file Format, but when I want to see them, I only get "bad image file". When I compare them, everything is the same. I'm using GraphicConverter on Mac to create the images. Did I forget something? Thanks in advance for your help! There will be a problem with the BMP format in some way. I'm not sure if you have an option for "Windows Bitmap"? If you send me the BMP files over I'll take a look. I expect it will be a simple change to support any additional / different header types. The underlying compression and image format should be the same otherwise. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Retroluzzer Posted July 3, 2020 Share Posted July 3, 2020 OK, so here are my files. I just found out that they are bigger than the others (49kb), but I don't find a way to get them smaller... maybe that's the problem? Screenshots.zip Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SainT Posted July 6, 2020 Author Share Posted July 6, 2020 Those BMP's are 24bit (16-million) colour, the Lynx requires 16 colour indexed format images. The resolution is fine, though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Retroluzzer Posted July 7, 2020 Share Posted July 7, 2020 Hmm... weird. I set a palette of 16 colours. But I see the profile is still 16,7 Million... How can I change that in GC9 on Mac? Or is there another program that can do the trick? Or could you help me with that? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fadest Posted July 7, 2020 Share Posted July 7, 2020 Nice feature, but when I see feature like this, I immediately think it would be great to use it to create/display new games instructions/manuals in Lynx resolution in order to have them on the go And then, I think I don't want to take time for another great project that wouldimply to postpone some other stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SainT Posted July 9, 2020 Author Share Posted July 9, 2020 On 7/7/2020 at 3:49 PM, Fadest said: Nice feature, but when I see feature like this, I immediately think it would be great to use it to create/display new games instructions/manuals in Lynx resolution in order to have them on the go And then, I think I don't want to take time for another great project that wouldimply to postpone some other stuff. I have already thought that would be a good idea. You can certainly do that as it stands just using lots of single images, or I could add the feature of scrolling through a larger 160xN image. I would love to see this. Make it so! ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neo_rg Posted July 9, 2020 Share Posted July 9, 2020 Would need some sort of GUI where you input text and a 160x(whatever) bmp is created with the text converted to a picture. Hmmmm.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+skr Posted July 23, 2020 Share Posted July 23, 2020 Easy to do with ImageMagick, GUI can be done with XCode or Visual Studio for example. Will take a look into it, did something similar a few years ago. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Retroluzzer Posted July 23, 2020 Share Posted July 23, 2020 Hi Buddy, thank you, but it's ok now, I found an old Version of the software I use and that one still has the Feature to reduce the Palette, so the screenshots are good now Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
power Posted July 31, 2020 Share Posted July 31, 2020 (edited) I had no idea how good these would be, thanks so much for sharing them, i thoroughly recommend anyone grab this it's a must. Edited July 31, 2020 by power 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greg2600 Posted September 22, 2020 Share Posted September 22, 2020 What's the best tool to use to convert a bitmap to work on the Lynx? I can get the palette to 16 colors via Indexed mode in Photoshop but that program doesn't allow you to save the image as 4-bit, only 8-bit. That results in a bad image error on the Game Drive. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greg2600 Posted September 24, 2020 Share Posted September 24, 2020 (edited) Someone on AA Discord suggested I use good 'ol Irfanview so I did, and was able to batch convert to 4-bit and that worked. So I've created BMP folders for most of the common prototypes using screen shots from the AA site. Most have roms available though not all. I did a few homebrew as well. In the case where there was no cartridge image I left the 1.bmp off, but since the roms aren't distributed no one will use those anyway I guess. I did not test the screenshots when I didn't have a rom though, just FYI. I also replaced the Telegames #1 bmp with cart scans from the 2018-ish re-release that had better labels. I broke the folders up, but obviously you should put all BMP folders into a single screenshots.bmp folder on the microSD card. screenshots_v1.1.zip Edited September 24, 2020 by Greg2600 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cleeg Posted October 6, 2020 Share Posted October 6, 2020 (edited) I've done a few of these as well, I love the setup. My direction was to make a generic Lynx banner with a simple title card approach for each game's first screen, followed by another card with genre, dev and release year. After those two screens I did the title screen, and one screenshot with extras where I thought it necessary. This gives a nice unified GUI like appearance whilst keeping it all streamlined. I used Jasc PSP 7. These are an example, but if anyone likes them and would like any more posting, just ;let me know; though I only have a few games, like twelve or something! By the way, would it be possible to have the browser default to this type of game selection method? I prefer it to the list view and think it would be nice (if possible) to go straight to the pictures. 1.bmp 2.bmp 3.bmp 4.bmp 5.bmp 6.bmp Edited October 6, 2020 by cleeg Extra text added. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrekMD Posted October 6, 2020 Share Posted October 6, 2020 I missed this thread the first time around. Very cool! Thank you! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cleeg Posted October 7, 2020 Share Posted October 7, 2020 You're welcome sir. I'm no ace at these things, but enjoy doing them and reckon they fit the aesthetic quite well. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billkendrick Posted November 27, 2020 Share Posted November 27, 2020 On 6/17/2020 at 11:50 PM, SainT said: The LynxGD has a very nice built-it screenshot viewing feature, you can access it by pressing PAUSE on the menu screen. The screenshots are stored as 16 colour 160x102 BMP files, so it's easy to add more to existing sets or create your own for any games you have. I just fetched the latest firmware and tested this out (using Super Asteroids & Missile Command -- I had to rename the "xxx.bmp" directory to match the "xxx.lnx" filename for the ROM). It appears to work, but after paging through a couple of the screenshots, I get a mostly black screen (info bar at the bottom), and my Lynx locks up. Sometimes it happens after paging 1->2->3->4, but I also got it to happen going 1->2->1. So it doesn't seem to be an issue with the BMP files themselves. This is a Lynx II with a BenVenn LCD mod (if that matters in any way). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manic23 Posted May 20, 2021 Share Posted May 20, 2021 Can I ask for some help here? I have all the screenshots in a folder called screenshots.bmp (so screenshots.bmp/zxy.bmp/1.bmp) for example, but i cannot understand how to view them, the manual is not great if I am honest, it states they can be viewed here, but I am not sure how, if I hold down A (or is it B I forget now) then it says PS / Screenshot what is PS and what do I press to see then preview? Thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greg2600 Posted May 21, 2021 Share Posted May 21, 2021 10 hours ago, manic23 said: Can I ask for some help here? I have all the screenshots in a folder called screenshots.bmp (so screenshots.bmp/zxy.bmp/1.bmp) for example, but i cannot understand how to view them, the manual is not great if I am honest, it states they can be viewed here, but I am not sure how, if I hold down A (or is it B I forget now) then it says PS / Screenshot what is PS and what do I press to see then preview? Thanks. You just hit the middle "II" button that's between Option 1 and 2. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manic23 Posted May 21, 2021 Share Posted May 21, 2021 4 hours ago, Greg2600 said: You just hit the middle "II" button that's between Option 1 and 2. Thanks Greg, yes I was being a bit thick there, got it sorted now thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
homerdalors31 Posted March 9, 2022 Share Posted March 9, 2022 Hello, The file screenshots_v1.0.zip is unavailable. Is there a way to download it ? Thanks for your help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
homerdalors31 Posted March 9, 2022 Share Posted March 9, 2022 Sorry when connected it's ok... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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