UnitSprite Studio

[Thorir]

Theoreticaly can I create separated sheets for each weapon? Frankly speaking my ultimate goal here is to assemble NPC sprites with different arms for Doom...

[bohemond]

Yes, you can. A sprite sheet for a single item will be 256x40. You might also want to take a look at HandOb maker (https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php/topic,8160.0.html), which easies creation of these sprite sheets.

But I'm hardly qualified to help with modding and especially the graphical side of things. If you ask about creating item sprites in the Help section, I'm sure you will get much better advice than I can give.

[Thorir]

That's already more than enough for a solid start. Thank you for your help!

[The Offensive Lemon]

I'm trying to load a spritesheet into the program, attached below (xcom.png), but I get this error:

An error has occured during loading of the file: Index was out of range. Must be non-negative and less than the size of the collection.
Parameter name: index

I'm pretty sure everything checks out, from the size of the image to the exact colors used.  I don't know what I could be doing wrong.

EDIT: In case it helps, the image was saved with paint.net with 8-bit bit depth, Median Cut quantization, dithering level 0, transparency threshold 128, not interlaced.

I also created another image file (fuck.png) with UnitSprite Studio, saved it, and loaded it again without problems.  I did not touch that one with paint.net.

[Alex_D]

I think the image "xcom.png" needs to be reduced to 256 colours.

[The Offensive Lemon]

I think the image "xcom.png" needs to be reduced to 256 colours.

I figured setting the bit depth to 8 bits would do that... fuck.png has the same bit depth, after all.

EDIT: If I change the bit depth to something other than 8, USS tells me:

An error has occured during loading of the file: Unsupported image format!

Also, weirdly enough, if I put in the first attachment (gkjkgjkgkjgkjgkhgk.png), which also has bit depth 8, it works.

[bohemond]

I've identified the problem. The xcom.png image has a palette with only 67 colors, because it's saved with optimized palette. The function that tries to identify the palette expects there to be 255 colors, hence the index out of range error. I did not account for this feature of PNG.

I'm not sure if there is a point in fixing this, as the optimized palette sprite will not work in-game anyway. I'll fix it if I see a simple way to do it.

In the meantime, I've attached your spritesheet saved with UFO Battlescape not-optimized palette.

[The Offensive Lemon]

I've identified the problem. The xcom.png image has a palette with only 67 colors, because it's saved with optimized palette. The function that tries to identify the palette expects there to be 255 colors, hence the index out of range error. I did not account for this feature of PNG.

I'm not sure if there is a point in fixing this, as the optimized palette sprite will not work in-game anyway. I'll fix it if I see a simple way to do it.

In the meantime, I've attached your spritesheet saved with UFO Battlescape not-optimized palette.

Thanks a lot!  If I may ask, how did you un-optimize the palette?  I can't seem to do that in paint.net.

[Meridian]

Don't use paint.net, it can't do it.

There's a long list of image editors that can do it: photoshop, gimp, asesprite, irfanview, and many many more.
See https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php/topic,7781.0.html

[bohemond]

New version is released and on github.

Support for Drawing routines:
2 - XCom HWP
7 - Chryssalid
8 - Celatid
9 - Silacoid

New features:
You can edit the Item sprite directly in the studio
Pixel operations preset for fixing the common problem of left <-> right arm switch
More shortcuts for selecting layer (numbers 1 through 9)
New Single frame sprite can be created with custom size and palette

Bugfixes:
Color shift now works properly for complicated Drawing routines
Loading of non 8 byte aligned images
Item layers are handled with better performance

Notes:
The new drawing routines are not tested in game, please report if you spot any problem.
Only Soldier(0) and Floater(1) drawing routines support display of items, so you have to load up one of those to use item editing.

[gaffer]

Many thanks Bohemond!

[Finnik]

Thank you!

[b]

Has anybody gotten this to work on Linux? 

[efrenespartano]

With Falko's tools down, there is no way to properly create 2x2 units. Cutting them without the aforementioned tool is nearly impossible. God Bohemond, could be possible to add the option to create large units on your tool?

[Solarius Scorch]

With Falko's tools down, there is no way to properly create 2x2 units. Cutting them without the aforementioned tool is nearly impossible. God Bohemond, could be possible to add the option to create large units on your tool?

I wholeheartedly second that wish, if this is within the scope of your program.