Any plans for 32bit colour in the near future? Would be very spiffy!
Couldn't see how it would decrease performance, then again what would I know??? ??? :-\
Thanks :)
what can you do with 32 that you cant with 24? CMI was like 256 colors or something rediculously small like that, yet it was a beautiful game.
Edit* I meant 16.
We have 16 now, not 24, 24/32 bit colour would be of use to people who use very fine gradients between similar colours or use very smooth shading, like those people using 3d. I agree that even 256 can look great if you plan your images for the colour depth but I'm also sure many people would find 32 bit useful. I think it's something CJ said he might do in the future, but not very soon.
Also, there's room for an alpha channel, allowing you to use anti-aliased edges to your sprites. But then CJ would have to be able import PNGs or something like that, and probably totally rework internal sprite storage, etc.
Quote from: scotch on Thu 16/10/2003 17:48:17
I think it's something CJ said he might do in the future, but not very soon.
All I wanted to know, thanks :)
CJ mentioned in one of his other releases that he MIGHT, and I highlight MIGHT add 24/32 bit color in ags 2.6
you people need to bug him at mittens ;)
32-bit colour is a possible feature for AGS 2.6 but it will be rather fiddly and time consuming to get it all working, and I feel there are more pressing things to be done first. :)
For me, I see no need for 32-bit color. Save it for later, CJ.
The alpha channel would be nice. But instead of changing the file formats or anything, maybe you could just import two bitmaps -- one normal pic, and the other would be an alpha channel one.
Again, these are really long-term ideas. I can see where the alpha channel stuff would take a while to implement -- and a LOT of work!
I'd love to see alpha channel transparency for sprites - it would particularly help 640x480 hi-colour games.
Currently if you have a lovingly anti-aliased background, there's quite a jarring effect with the non-antialiased character slapped on top.
Not that I'm complaining or anything :) ...but I think that alpha support would open up the creative possibilities. And as GeoffKhan says, the alpha channels could be held in a seperate 'mask' PCX/BMP - so no need to change file formats (in the unlikely event that that's the hard bit)...
t
I've done all my 800x600 backgrounds in flash using many shading methods.
when converted to 16bit using either error diffusion or nearest colour they look absolutely awefull. hence my enthusiasm for 32bit colour support.
Example -
(original)
(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/nearest.png)
(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/ithurts.png)
Might just wait for AGS 2.6 before publishing.
32 bit colour is innevitable! mwoohahaha cough cough
well... i think something should be said and it applies to both high and low colour art
when working with any program you have to take your limitations into account. if all we had was 256 colour support and someone said their room looks terrible in 256 colours [as has happened back in the day] the best anyone can say is "Well, them's the breaks. Shoulda planned ahead."
and until 32bit colour is added this should have been something you planned ahead of time, having to deal with either image degredation through converting or originally planning ahead and working with the limitations instead of against.
eric
Very wise MrColossal,
However I don't beleive this principle applies to me as my style is 100% dependant on the usage of 32bit colour.
I knew before my initial production that this would be a sufficient bump in the road, therefore I recently queried too see how long i'd have to wait before 32bit support became available.
I have still have a good month or two worths of work before i can consider publishing, i'll just have to start another project if 32bit isn't available therefore after.
Cheers ;)
On the one hand Mr Colossal is right - after all, DOTT, The Dig, Sam & Max etc. were 256 colour and looked great.
I do think though that support for higher-colour depth (and particularly alpha support for sprites) may encourage the better artists amongst the community, thus resulting in better-looking AGS games.
I don't mean to do disservice to those of any artistic ability, and I certainly don't want to fuel the 'good graphics aren't important for a good game' debate, but if AGS's profile is to be raised in the games press (which is already starting, and must surely be good for CJ) then anything that enhances front-end presentation has got to be good.
t
Your work is excellent IbeX! That's a really great style you have! But anyway, Diffusion looks pretty good actually, there is little difference from 32-bit
I really don't care about 32 bit colour, but I'd really like to have alpha maps, both for characters and walkbehindes. Just looka at Ibex's images, you can barely see the diffrence between 32 bit and 16bit with diffusion, but you do see a pixelated edge of that house or whatever it is, if the walkbehind area could be antialiased that wouldn't be a problem. Hope that made some sence atleast
You can blatantly see the horrid-ness of diffusion on larger surface areas such as sky, ground etc.
It was a bad example pic for which i apologize...
the jagged edges on the side of the house are due
to the fact that i imported the image as 2 layers
into photoshop, it doesn't look like that in flash...
also keep in mind it's at 200% zoom.
I just think 32bit colour should take a fair bit of priority in the
scheme of AGS improvements.
The fact that people get so highly aggresive towards
my 32bit colour request is somewhat amusing.
Cheers :)
I think putting off releasing a game until a certain feature is met is a bad idea, 32 bit would be nice, but nobody is going to mind a bit of dithering in the mean time. The decrease in graphics quality isn't that bad.. diffusion looks a bit grainier, but it also looks like it has more of a surface texture and nearest looks almost as good as the original IMO. I am sure you will be waiting a fair amount of time before 32 bit support is added.
There are 2 features I would really like (seperate x/y walk speeds, custom properties being changable during play) before I release my game, but I think you have to work within the lmits of what you have, CJ hasn't said 32 bit will be added for certain, and if it does it won't be very soon.
Alpha support on characters would be a really nice thing though.
True scotch...
You could always do a re-release when the features become available, kinda like a 'special edition'!
cliche` mania.
Use AGAST instead, it's more suitable for hires/hicolor games and pretty easy too! AGS is great for the classic low res feel. By the way, that looks amazing! If your entire game will have graphics like that I'm very impressed. If you are interested in working together I'm an animator who would love to make an adventure game! Mail me if you're interested!
EASY SOLUTION:
Have 24-bit color support instead! This way you don't have to deal with alpha channels and you can still have the 16-million colors available.
Is this possible, CJ?
pretty sure cj said it will take a similar amount of effort for 24 and 32.. might be mistaken
There're usually no difference in 24 or 32 bit graphic modes, just that using 32bit modes may be faster for some modern cards because of the alignment of bytes for the pixel data, in 32bit truecolour actually 8bit of data is wasted per pixel. So implementing 32bit colour mode is basically the same thing as 24 bit colour modes.
Sprites with alpha channel, on the other hand, is completely another thing.
Ahh, okay, then that's what I was thinking of, having just 32-bit color and not alpha channels. :)
QuoteUse AGAST instead, it's more suitable for hires/hicolor games and pretty easy too! AGS is great for the classic low res feel.
Well, I believe the only benefits you have from AGAST is that it is faster and that there are anti aliased sprites. Oh, u also have more possibilities, but AGS does everything I want it to do ;)
now now, lets not start an agast vs ags fight :)
I'll check AGAST out, it would have to be pretty damn spiffy to beat AGS though. If for some reason i did use AGAST, could i still post my game on the AGS forums?
8) taa
EDIT -
checked AGAST out, couldn't really figure it out. The editor looked a bit dodgy, so did the demo game (though graphics were supurb). All in all i didn't feel at home with it's interface.
So i say this to CJ...
God of all that is holy,
Creator of wonder and all things that smell of things that don't smell bad... cough
Please amp up AGS's graphical capabilities for your next release.
For you efforts, i will give you verbal praise and an apple core.
A bit off topic... but- that's one fantastic background IbeX! If you find my jaw, please mail it back :)
Quotenow now, lets not start an agast vs ags fight
Ok, I'm sorry. What I meant to say is that both programs are great and each has its own benefits from using. I didn't mean to start a fight about them.
Quotecould i still post my game on the AGS forums?
If you wish to post your agast game in this forum, go to 'General post' section. This forum is more designed for ags users.
Volcan
16-bit conversions from higher colour depths usually look really bad. True-colour modes use 8 bits (one byte) per channel (red, green, blue) , meaning each pixel's intensity for each component will vary from 0 to 255.
In 16-bit mode, 5 bits represent red, 6 represent green and the other 5 left represent blue. That is, the red and blue components vary from 0 to 31, while the green one goes from 0 to 63. This means that for the red and blue components, the precision of 24-bit is 8 times the precision of 16-bit, and for the green component the ratio is 4.
This will be more noticeable when soft colour transitions are made, like in gradients. However, if you use dithering (with pattern, or diffusion, etc) when converting the 24-bit picture to 16-bit, it may not look bad at all. In fact, it might look really good. This depends on the resolution the graphic will be shown at. At low-res (320x200/240) dithering won't look very well. At hi-res (640x400/480) it will be noticeable, but won't look bad. And at higher resolutions, it might even be not noticeable.
I don't think adding true-colour support is urgent, although it would simplify art editing, since dithering and getting the right effect requires a little extra work.
What would be nice is alfa channelling, tough I don't think that's urgent either.
********
By the way, I'm working on a 16-bit, 640x480, semi-LucasArts styled game. As soon as I have something to show, I will.
Bye!
Quote from: IbeX on Thu 30/10/2003 10:01:05
So i say this to CJ...
God of all that is holy,
Creator of wonder and all things that smell of things that don't smell bad... cough
Please amp up AGS's graphical capabilities for your next release.
For you efforts, i will give you verbal praise and an apple core.
\o/ when there's an apple core on offer, how could I refuse?
Seriously though, 32-bit colour is on my to-do list, but it's quite a big addition and so it definately won't be happening in 2003.
Quote
\o/ when there's an apple core on offer, how could I refuse?
Seriously though, 32-bit colour is on my to-do list, but it's quite a big addition and so it definately won't be happening in 2003.
Quote
Thanks! as I said, I don't mind the wait
:D
Hello Everyone,
I just wanted to clarify with everyone what we are really talking about with 16/24/32 bit graphics. A little of it was described a couple of posts ago.
16 bit - Red/Green/Blue takes up 5 bits each - 2 bytes
24 bit - Red/Green/Blue take up 1 byte (8 bits) - 3 bytes, but normally 1 byte wasted due to internal register alignment
32 bit - Red/Green/Blue take up 1 byte (8 bits) plus an alpha channel is included (8 bits) ranging from 0 (transparent) to 255 (opaque).
For backgrounds, where there is (obviously) nothing behind them, 24 bit color works just fine, because the alpha-calculations can be done between the two adjacent colors properly. (Yeah, its a math calculation that I don't particularly want to post here).
Adding the alpha channels to sprites would be a great idea, however, unless native graphic functions are used (and since I am not privy to the code behind AGS), it make increase the time to 'paint' a sprite, because for any pixels with alpha-channel, the calculation must be done.
IMHO, I think that getting at least the color components up to 8bits each (24 bit) would be a big improvement. The sprite alpha channels would be the next greatest imrovement. But I only express this for developers who really would like to developer their games in hi-color.
Yeh, 24bit colour is all you need, not 32 sorry... I'm not up on the technicalities :P