[aldo_14]

I personally have been using DDS for everything.  I keep the fully layered PSD files as backup, though, so it's not an issue if I need to have TGA quality........

[Omniscaper]

Do VP's get priority over eff's? I'me trying to make new explosions and I followed DabRain's instructions to the "t" with no success. Are the eff and dds files suppose to be in the same folder?

[BlackDove]

Originally posted by DaBrain

 

Oh I ****ing hate you.

GIVE THAT TO ME!

[taylor]

Originally posted by Omniscaper
Do VP's get priority over eff's?

Two different things so this isn't an issue.  EFFs on the disk get priority over EFFs in a VP though.

Are the eff and dds files suppose to be in the same folder?

Yes.  They also should be in the data/effects/ folder, either on disk on in a VP, to work properly.

[Omniscaper]

Is there a tutorial on EFF's creation, besides DaBrains. Cuz now I'm just getting frustrated.

My steps:

Opened notepad, put in
$Type: DDS
$Frames: 67
$FPS: 25

Saved the file as a text document with the name ABexp05.eff.

Made 67 frames in PS named ABexp05_0000 - ABexp05_0066 in DDS format DXT1 settings. No alpha.

Put ALL files in data/effects folder.

Changed the fireballs.tbl to use that file. (Because naming all the files after the original exp05.ani didn't do anything)

I get this error:

Error: Could not load abexp05 anim file

File:E:\Languages\Visual Studio Projects\Visual C++\fs2_open\code\Fireball\FireBalls.cpp
Line: 559

Call stack:
------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------


What am I missing here. I'm using an official build. Is there a launcher setting I'm forgetting?

[Bobboau]

I should change that to
"Error: Could not load abexp05 anim file, good luck finding out why, cause I'm certanly not telling you"

[taylor]

Originally posted by Omniscaper
Made 67 frames in PS named ABexp05_0000 - ABexp05_0066 in DDS format DXT1 settings. No alpha.

The frame filenames have the .dds extention, right?  It will add that (when loading DDS) when it tries to load the individual frames so it may not be finding them.  And you are sure that Notepad didn't put a txt extension on the .eff file when you saved it?  It will do that and then WinXP may not show the txt extension later unless you uncheck "Hide extensions for known file types" in folder options.  The bmpman code will strip off all extensions and try it's own but CFILE will have issues finding it in the first place if  it has a txt extension.  And I assume that you are running at least 3.6.5 since EFF wasn't officially supported until then (you said "official build" so I wanted to make sure).

Everything else looks fine.  If it's still not working post a link to the files and I'll take a look.  Also, if you run a debug build it will put info on whether or not it's processing an EFF properly in the log.  You can take a look at that and maybe it will give some clues as to what's going on.  DaBrains tutorial is dead on and has all the info needed to make a working EFF.  No launcher setting is needed unless you are using TGA or JPG files for the EFF.  In that case you have to use -jpgtga just like normal.  I keep joking that I made the thing too simple since no one can figure it out.

[Kie99]

EDIT: Crap, wrong topic

[Omniscaper]

SON OF A *^%(*&^%(&

Wasted 1 hour of my LIFE!!!!

THANKS TAYLOR!!!!

[taylor]

Originally posted by Omniscaper
Wasted 1 hour of my LIFE!!!!

Which problem was it?  We need to get that mentioned in the tutorial so no further LIFE is wasted.

[Omniscaper]

EVIL WINDOWS NOTEPAD SPAWN!!!!

I'm turning off extension hiding now. XP *****. $#*%&(@*^!@!#&%@)#*%#(*&

::calm::

Vodka anyone?

[WMCoolmon]

Yeah, extension hiding is one of the first goddamn things I turn off when using XP and doing any sort of file browsing.

[Grug]

lol.

Tis always the obvious problems that catch people.

Still 67+ files in the effects directory is still a bastard for clutter. Isn't there someway we could store all the files as one?
Aka one file with many layers, or maybe a zip containing all the files?

[WMCoolmon]

you mean like a VP file?

[Grug]

Even in vp files it would be cluttered. Unless you had one for each animation... which is a bit redundant, but could work I guess...

[taylor]

Originally posted by Grug
Still 67+ files in the effects directory is still a bastard for clutter. Isn't there someway we could store all the files as one?

It's been debated, I'm against it at this point though.  It would make things nicer but it's not really a big deal when the files get in a VP.  With the frames as separate files all of the existing image loading code can be used.  If they were in a single, large file then we'd need new/modified loaders for every file type.  The EFF stuff was meant to give the most flexibility possible since ANI was so restrictive.  Having them in separate files makes them easy to use later for editing or adding/deleting frames.  Another reason is that, like you say, it's a lot of files in one place.  It's a deterant from making really large effects.  An EFF can take up considerably more memory than an ANI and the more frames you have the more it hurts in game.  I think that some of the current ANI glowmaps are using way too many frames and therefore using too much memory.  They look good but could probably be cleaned up some to save everyone a bit of RAM.

[Grug]

Can we use eff's for everything that .ani's were used for?

Including techroom stuff and particle, explosion animations?

How do you put the data in to tell it to loop / bounce back / single play etc.?

[taylor]

Originally posted by Grug
Can we use eff's for everything that .ani's were used for?

Nope.  Particle effects, weapon effects, explosions & ship textures.  Can't be used for talking head animations, anything briefing related, anything interface related (buttons, mainhall), or techroom stuff.  If it could we would imposing more restrictions on what you can do with it.  That's where the problems with ANI came in and what EFF is trying to avoid.  There will be another format just for those things which isn't well suited for effects but great for the big movie type animations.

How do you put the data in to tell it to loop / bounce back / single play etc.?

You don't with EFF.  It's up the particular code using it to decide what to do.  It's that way with ANIs now too so that's not new.  Particle stuff and ship textures and some weapon effects get looped, other weapon effects and explosions play once.  Since the code doesn't care what you tell the EFF to do (except the FPS) it's useless to include that info in the format.

[Grug]

Ah k.

So what plans are there to replace .ani for the usually larger mini-movies etc?
Some type of open source movie format?
Would it still exclude sound?

[taylor]

Originally posted by Grug
So what plans are there to replace .ani for the usually larger mini-movies etc?
Some type of open source movie format?
Would it still exclude sound?

The replacement is pretty much like ANI but a series of JPG images instead.  JPG has a quality problem obviously but it's a big saver on space so mods that use it will be much easier to download.  It's going to be based partially on the smjpeg format but modified to be much closer to ANI.  That way it will properly support ping_pong and reverse play.  It still isn't going to have sound.  I've debated that one with myself but not having sound means it's a *lot* easier to use as a replacment for ANI.

I've got the format mostly worked out and the code partially implemented already.  When I'm done it will go up for discussion before going in CVS so if it's decided to change it then I'll do so.  I don't know that everyone is going to be completely happy with what I have in mind but it plugs into the current code without big rewrites of anything or special case handling and addresses the two problems people want fixed: more colors, smaller disk footprint (easier to download).