Reskinning Step 1 : Duplicating game objects

[Zyxpsilon]

Kay, for the Titan Armor bug -- didn't know.

 

You wouldn't happen to know the exact "proportion" ( In pixels or % estimates) of that UV re-scaling flaw for Armors cloth stuff. Cuz, mentioning Height only is not nearly enough to produce anything with some relatively important (as intended, that is) precision. It might be more obvious with any circular inserts (which are pretty common for South & Central-America countries, if anything) but *ALL* images would then have to suffer from such re-calibrations too.

I'd hazard a guess that it might be something like 15-20% that needs to be added to the correct source width in order to put any oval'istic regions back into Japan-like perfectly re-shaped circles... but i'd prefer if you could confirm my assumption.

 

((( Bof... Never mind, i'll just test some of those values myself. )))

 

Yet... it's weird that Canada, Brazil, India, Israel (etc) *DIDN'T* receive such corrections from Firaxis Art staff for the Flags_DIF file. I have to wonder why. :smile:

 

I'm actually all done with the 94 extras (@256x128) strategic files. I'll have to apply the same process for the EW 31 (( Blank at spot #31 is obviously useless! )) defaults as well, later on this evening.

 

What gave me the most troubles (as expected) were the African diagonals (on 4x3) stuff, had to adjust a few somehow but they still rendered on a sharp tilt angle. I think they're alright visually for gameplay purposes though. Too bad Jamaica (yeah i know, one more X into the gang) or Barbados (Neptune Scepter) didn't get selected, btw. They have such great images for the UI.

 

Dunno why, but my favorite is still that cool Macedonia. Must be some Artistic inclinations. :wink:

 

http://s29.postimg.org/4zx6z1uo7/Macedonia.png

 

Greenland, Seychelles are fun to look at, also!!

 

PS; If the beautiful sky-blue United Nations is in...

Wouldn't it be nice to have another organization such as European Union (heck, even the Red Cross! )?

Yes, i understand many of these countries are already there. Dunno -- such Yellow Stars in a circle on a marine blue backdrop could open up some storyline gimmicks with the Council. :wink:

Edited November 25, 2014 by Zyxpsilon

[XMarksTheSpot]

You wouldn't happen to know the exact "proportion" ( In pixels or % estimates) of that UV re-scaling flaw for Armors cloth stuff.

The UV space and the texture dimensions are strictly 2:1, though the aspect ratio of the actual flag mesh is more like 8:5 (measured by looking at the male kevlar armor, might look different on other armors), i.e. the flag texture is squashed to about 80% of its width on the actual model. So to counteract that you'd need to stretch the flag images to about 125% in order to make them look proper in-game, I suppose.

 

In terms of pixels, design the flag as a ~205x128 px image before stretching it to 256x128 in a final step.

Edited November 25, 2014 by XMarksTheSpot

[Zyxpsilon]

Gotcha, X!

Will do my best to compensate accordingly.

But - to prevent filtering "flaws" upon re-scaling, a better width design_value could be 208 or 204, no? Cuz, odds&evens do have significant impacts overall. As i understand how these plugin methods act on images - though. Might be wrong or pushing the envelope a bit too hard towards perfective wishes - about all of that correct approach. :wink:

 

PS; Although, a few flags only use "Horizontal" designs (Russia, Germany, etc) -- so they wouldn't be impacted by such vertical calibration needs. Less tasks to perform means faster development results. :D I can already predict Algeria and/or Turkey will give me the most "troubling" edits!

Edited November 25, 2014 by Zyxpsilon

[XMarksTheSpot]

But - to prevent filtering "flaws" upon re-scaling, a better width design_value could be 208 or 204, no? Cuz, odds&evens do have significant impacts overall. As i understand how these plugin methods act on images - though. Might be wrong or pushing the envelope a bit too hard towards perfective wishes - about all of that correct approach. :wink:

Ideally you should be working with vector images in programs like InkScape for the basic cropping and scaling operations before doing a final rasterization and cloth overlay pass, so 'pixel considerations' like that should not be necessary.

[Zyxpsilon]

True, InkScape does MUCH better edits via SVG rescaling. I'll use that instead.

 

Yet, i was still incredulous about this whole UI "flaw" for having never really paid any attention to such details. But i just verified the stuff straight into a test gameplay. Took a snapshot of South-Africa (which i feel is the best schema to prove it) rendering and voila... it's actually the "Taller" height which is somehow problematic.

 

http://s27.postimg.org/6nuqhusyb/Proof_South_Africa.png

 

I'll basicly consider that fact as my parametric source from now on. Even then, that specific South-Africa image would NEVER render with the actual true flag proportions for good reasons; Japan has just empty white all-around the central red circle!!! We're simply witnessing an illusion. So... if we'd put two strips of "black" up & down (on most if not all other flags)... it could approximately be Okay, i think.

 

256 x 128 (20%=25.6 pixels)... necessary calibration of pictures then should become... 256x102 for initial image (appearance) to be resized back @ 256x128 for Flags_DIF insertion in their respective UV slots (as they will be defined by Amineri's code).

 

Although my rational comment about this whole need to 'fix' these textures would be; Why even bother? :confused:

I know... while we're at it - might as well go for perfected assets. When & if possible, though. :ninja:

Edited November 26, 2014 by Zyxpsilon

[Zyxpsilon]

Gosh... X... if i were to hand over all of my source 256x128 final strategy versions to you (via an eMail to JL, that is). Could, you, maybe, solve all of our problems, with your skills, for proper SVG rescaling results??

[Zyxpsilon]

Alright people... here's what i'll do for now.

 

I've created every 256x128 Strategy Flags (Names were picked straight from the list of Amineri's server files). I've also added the regular set of EW-32's (with slight adjustements) and a few more personal choices which i think could be considered as well. The previous design for my XCom version (including the flip alternative) are included too.

 

Since, i'm not even sure how the special Armor Flag_Types could be "adapted" correctly to that "flaw" mentioned earlier... i went ahead and dropped my Cloth effect layer (while correcting Brightness and/or Saturation for clarity in some instances) on a few samples so that JL can inspect them and offer his opinion. If these are deemed good enough, i'll make the rest by following similar principles and general image "visual intensity".

 

In total... there's 134 unique Flags plus the secondary XCom(Flip).

 

I'm just going to zip them all and send those resulting files via eMail. Thus, will be waiting for confirmation - or denial! :wink:

Edited November 26, 2014 by Zyxpsilon

[Zyxpsilon]

Bof -- why not.

 

I've just given the Canadian flag(s) a test ride with corrective re-scalings. Finally, the 208x128 *TO* 256x128 would do the job fine, AFAIC

See below for proof of concept samples.

 

Unedited with cloth.... Re-scaled (( correctly enough, i hope! )) to adapt...

 

http://s27.postimg.org/6jwdhcmmr/16_Canada_A.png---http://s3.postimg.org/olrtmpbj7/16_Canada_AC.png

 

Simple 24 pixels crop from left and right sides does the trick.

 

I then can deduct that the only Flags that would really require such adapted edits are those that actually have a Glyph symbol dead smack in the middle of the "Strategic" file versions -- only.

:wink:

 

PS; Btw, Japan was most probably "Ovalized" by Firaxis using a 184x128 source image.

Edited November 26, 2014 by Zyxpsilon

[Amineri]

I've got most of the actionscript changes done, as well as the basic imagepath configuration in UScript done. Currently the flags are correctly scaled/positioned in the soldier list (although a little bit bigger than vanilla), but I'm having difficulties getting the image positioned correctly in the detailed soldier view in the barracks.

 

Here's what the soldier list view looks like, using the re-scaled 256x128 pixel flags :

 

http://cloud-4.steampowered.com/ugc/49867075352990926/396E42C8463BF191DC7E8F191BE628DEB1FC8ED1/

 

 

And yes, I realize the class icons are broken. We've been doing some separate work to allow configuration of the class icons (including different icons for the Long War subclasses). The class icons and flags are both defined in the GFX embedded file XComIcons, and each required resizing, so I had to merge them together, but this build doesn't have all of the class icon stuff added.

[Zyxpsilon]

Wow... that's some friggin' cool results ya got there, Amineri.

Let them flags be slightly bigger in the Barracks list... it's a key component of the UI "concept" and it deserves whatever special designs this LW project and its masters wish & develop for.

 

I'm pleasantly surprised as well to learn that you'll be considering alternate Classes (and possibly Ranks -- cross-fingers-and-toes) Icons too. As you may recall i had done some personal custom work (( http://forums.nexusmods.com/index.php?/topic/2027234-miscellaneous-graphic-assets/?p=18019804 )) for that kind of stuff back in August/September. Let's hope that feature will perform as good as what the team has been producing steadily over the last months.

Although i have nearly zero doubt anything you gals & guys can mustard should be just fine and miraculously fun to play with! :wink:

 

Please take Note of this "Preview"...

http://s1.postimg.org/rj48e6szj/Preview_MEC_Ranks.png

:laugh:

Edited November 26, 2014 by Zyxpsilon