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Arg! I really couldn't imagine winning so much contests in a row and missed 3 days!!!    Well, it was a Miami trip, after all.

Anyway, speech these pictures up a little...

[The point was:]

So, yes...

The point was:

   
• Participants will draw a comicstrip following the given theme and rules.   
• You are allowed to use any technique in your drawing. But if you use computer you are not allowed to copy and paste ready pictures.   
• Each competition will last 15 days.   
• The starter of each competition will decide the winner. 
• The winner will decide the theme for the next competition.
  

This half-month's theme is:

Pets!

Yes, pets and other cute small animals make superb material for cartoons and comics.

Think Garfield. Think Tom and Jerry. Think... even Mickey Mouse... You get the point.

It doesn't really have to be a pet, use an animal you wish and which suits better with your idea and story.

I make no other ways to limit the theme, except it could be funny. I can't really imagine a serious cartoon about animals... Just let your creation flow and put some funny animals into some funny situation.

Thank you for your time. Now get working! You have time until 16th July!

Original size:


2X:


Soo... here's a nightclub. A simple one.
What I would need, is some designing ideas, like stuff to add everywhere to make place nicer and cozier (sp?).

The stuff on the left is a DJ-station and 2 speakers - unfinished since some parts will be added as animated objects, such as speaker parts and a DJ himself
Also, wires and cables are missing yet...

The bar counter has lack of detail aswell, but besides bar stools, I have no more ideas what to use to make it more "populated'.

Also, the place will be swarming with dancing NPC's
I planned to try to make these lights (above bar counter) flash with different colors and sending light rays towards dance zone, but I'm sure it'll be helluva scriptage again until I get it to work. Large objects and hardcore transparency use, etc...

So, help me think!

Well, sounds simple, but I can't figure it out... 

How to simply make a moment, where screen fades out, a text message appears, like "10 minutes later..." and screen fades in again? Fading room out also fades whole palette so displaying speech won't work here.

Should I make a new room for this and change simply the room?
This wouldn't be too simple, because when returning, many room variables will be reset...?
Em - then again... I could just check what room game was before in "before fadein" event and reset variables only if --

Well, just tell me if there's any simpler way! 

Ah, here's a sprite I've been working on last few days.
It's supposed to be a patrolling policeman. A bit dumb one, by game story

I'm about statisfied with this one, though I feel that I missed something... Maybe there's way to give him dumber look or some similar points I missed?

To be totally sure, I post it for C&C:


2x:



(that yellow thingy is a neon yellow vest that Estonian patrols usually wear, though I didn't try to 100% make it same)

[very much idiots]

Welcome to the thread which will most definetly have ZERO replies.
Read for fun.

Sony. You know, the corporation.  Makes hi-tech electronics and stuff. Widely known. Made a beast named DCR-HC14E. A MiniDV camcorder.

The story started like that:

Once, there was an idiot (me) who thought that making movies with crappy digital photocamera is pointless, due 320x200 resolution, 50-second clips, only 15 fps and USB streaming. But videomaking is so fun and interesting!

So, one day, this idiot, took his hard-earned money and invested it in MiniDV Handycam. To be next Spielberg/Hitchcock/etc... The cam was quite expensive, but so what? It's a Sony, after all.

Right, the camera came along with very pointless USB drivers only and some made-in-flash crap named "Picture Package" which was very likely made by 9-year old blind and slightly retarded asian child slave (and which also served ZERO purpose and wasn't most likely related to camera in any way), but so what? It's a Sony, after all.

Well, things were good for awhile. But new problem arised it's ugly head, USB streaming made many precious frames to be dropped and videos were very jumpy. So what did the idiot do?

He went to store, and spent another load of money in buying FireWire cable and IEE1934 card.
Now, the new surprise came out from camera: The Windows XP Professional WON'T recognize the camera. After SUPER long muddling with IRQ ports, Device Manager, all cables atatched to machine, etc, etc, the idiot got 3 different programs to recognize the camera nad first high-quality 0-dropped-frames movie was loaded into computer! Hurrah!

The next day there wasn't anything worthwhile to stream into PC. And not next week, and month. After few months of acting, filming parties and interesting events/friends/ideas/etc there was again much stuff to stream.

But Win XP didn't think so, once again.

TeH idiot wasn't SO much of an idiot to start crying and randomly begging for help everywhere. He blamed himself in causing the problem, and once again, went through everything adjustable (and not so adjustable) in both hardware and software. It did not help.

So, the idiot chose internet to get aid. He tried about 100 different keywords and combed through many-many video-related forums.

Then the truth came.
He was not alone.
There was very much idiots. Some, much more desperate.

The idiot found same problem in numerous forums, and always the helpers gave unprofessional suggestions, such as "check your cables", "install SP1", "install SP2", "See manufacturer", "Burn Sony HQ" and so on. But also, there was some posts where some of the idiots got rid of the problem. But there never was any working solutions. The Happy Ones rarely knew how they managed to fix the problem. Usually just some lucky cases, like "Oh, tried everything, then I rebooted and it suddenly got working!!!". Neither they knew was it a permanent fix.

So, this is the point where story is right now. How will it end, no-one knows.

...
Some facts:

* The Sony homepage clearly shows that there's no need for any other drivers than universal USB driver at all. This is also all they've got for download. This is already quite weird.

* The camcorder's manual says ZERO words about streaming

* Camcorder has NO firewire or any other streaming-related options in it's LCD-built-in-menu, only "USB Stream".

* Windows XP makes at about 50% of cases "something attached" sound when Firewire is inserted/plugged out, but no choices or new drives/unknown hardware/etc appears.

* My problem is faaar from unique. There's hundreds of similar (and 100% same) descriptions all around the net.

* I GOT it to work, ONCE. Therefore, the camera, IEEE card or cable are NOT faulty.

* Yes, I tried cable in different IEEE ports

* Yes, I tried inserting IEEE card to different PCI slot

* Yes, I tried uninstalling IEEE drivers so windows could detect them again

* And yes, I tried EVERYTHING simpler. I have messed with junk for half of my life, I do know what to do when some piece of electronic shit doesn't want to work. This time,  well, the problem proves to be VERY challenging, but hey -  It's a Sony, after all.

* I... recall... having... some random weird Sony driver installed... which helped... Was it a dream or truth? I really don't remember. Anyone has/knows any drivers (which are probably not USB ones) for Sony video cameras?

Anyone?
...
No?

I was afraid of that, yes.

Is there a way to check if a game is saved into a slot?

I want my game to auto-save in (not selectable) slot when user quits and the game can be played on from "continue" selection from main menu. But I want "continue" option to be disabled when game is not played at all yet. How to check it?

[game]

Well, for $2 a month I have 1GB free webspace and a domain name with .pri.ee ending. 100Mbit connection, and works fine.
No ads, no lag, no problems.
I really don't need that much...

Now, seeing many unlucky AGSers using insane crap like freewebs and geocities, etc, I thought that if anyone needs a host for a game, I could happily host it. Hm... Let's say - as long as its size doesn't exceed 50MB (unless there's a good reason for it ).

You may always make homepage to game wherever, but downloading should be reliable and fast. This is where I think I can help...

Only problem is how to upload it?
I'm restricted to only 1 FTP client, so I can't make extra user to domain.

Also, I couldn't find any free & working PHP scripts to make such upload page as 2dadventure has... and I'm way too lousy when it comes to php/MySQL coding to make one myself.

So if anyone could give a hand with uploading script, I could spare some space.

If anyone needs it, after all.

It sounds extremely noob... 

AGS has made large improvements, and I haven't been able to track all of them.
So, my event coding still goes like that:

* Create and define new GlobalInt
* Write it's use down somewhere, so I could hack through the mess when I have too many Globalints
* Use it, constantly checking what the hell was it used for

Does AGS has any simpler ways to make fast user-defined variables for local (room) and global use?

Also, I still have no idea, what the "properties" are.

With expanding of AGS, manual has also grown to confusing size...

Here again, I'm trying something way over my head... 

Problem itself is simple, yet I'm unsure if it belongs to beginner's tech. Move it if needed.

Right. Let's say I have a sliding door. Now, while it plays slowly opening animation, I want to tint regions elsewhere on background to imitate volumetric light coming from door. Simple!

But...
The regions should go along with animation! The animation itsself should block game activity during it's play also.
An image to describe the situation:



The door is shown here. Problem is that I can't think of a way to synchronize regions to get correct RGB values as door animation frames progress further. Of course, I could just play door animation and tint regions AFTER that, but what if character stands at some of regions at the time? it would look weird. Also, since animation is quite short, I don't want player to wander around during it - it should be blocking.

How to do it?
But how to do it simply?

Well, it does.
I may be an amateur animator, but walkcycles are my weak point.

I got Henri walking, but there's still something missing 

Any help, guys?



2x:

I'm afraid that this has been asked before, but since I couldn't find similar thread, I'll just ask.

Current light/region system needs very much manual work if I'd want to light character continously, gradient-like. So I came to this idea:

An extra lightning layer, which is in grayscale and specifies characters/objects light amount, like it is in many 3D-modelling programs. Basically a gray layer, where gray is default, darker spots darken character and lighter ones lighten. Just like transparency/transcluency/bump/etc maps in 3D graphics.

The opacity of layer could be set from AGS also...

Wouldn't it be easier and faster for lighting system instead of using many regions?

I believe that this can be done even now, just by covering BG with object of same size and using alpha, but this sounds somewhat... slow. Or not?

Turning on/off or changing the mask in game (animating?) could also serve purpose, for switchable lights, shadows, etc...

Also, partial character lighting would be always possible, like making volumetric lights, light rays, - spots, etc. And shadows!

Anyway, engine could support such thing. Sorry if such idea has been explained 100 times beforeÃ,  ...

[5 seconds per frame]

Well, yeah.
I got this crappy GF 5700LE card.
Well, it works, and I can get most out from games, since it's 128MB card and my system is not the worst neither...
But!

There's damned weird thing: In some cases and places, everything is EXTREMELY slow and laggy. Cases are:

* The main menu screen in Rise of Nations - There's some background picture/animation/intro with people fighting and stuff. Well, with old Riva TNT2 card, it moved smoothly, but now... 5 spf.... no, I didn't make a term mistake -  it's a 5 seconds per frame. I'm unable to move mouse correctly over menu items, I can't click them correctly, everything feels like I'm trying this on ancient 286.
Yet, the game itsself runs at all high display options and stuff and super fine. It's just the main menu that my card doesn't like.

* Main menu screen in Empire Earth 2 - There, ANY kind of clicking and selecting is absolutely impossible. I wasted 20 minutes and finally got to start new game, which itself ran very well, once again. Mouse cursor is frozen! Interesting fact that music plays very fine in the background, it isn't CPU lag... But in main menu... huh. I move mouse, wait 15 seconds and then the cursor finally jumps 100 pixels away. Then I try to move it again, wait, it makes jump, etc.

* The main menu comes up extremely slowly in numerous other games, such as Delta Force BHD. It seems like the problem relies not in menu itself: These main menu screens have always some big image for background and that's what loads so long. In some games, all kind of boundary images, menus, etc come up instantly, but this stupid image stays black for awhile.

---
And I'm absolutely positive that games aren't damaged or just in need of need reinstall. They ran well with much older and shittier card...

Of course I have latest patches to these games installed, DirectX (9.0c), Latest NVidia drivers. I even tried to downgrade drivers, because I've heard that it's advisable to use latest drivers with card's serial number, like 56.xx for 5700 card and so on. Tried reinstalling DirectX, everything!

This didn't help a bit - instead, some games that didn't have problems started to fool around aswell.

Everything else works fine! CPU runs fine at 1,8GHz, I have 512 megs of ram and there's no problems neither with modern 3D games that kick hell out from video card or applications. But just... some... games...

This is sooo bad. I paid for card and for game and can't use neither correctly.

Any ideas? Similar problems? Advice? Explanation?

Another unfinished piece here.
This time, the key point is the building on the left, which happens to be a gang hideout. Now, I made the building... but I don't know how to fill the rest of the bg. The gate should lead to another property and possibly some residental house in the garden far back.

But the lot at the foreground looks very empty and I need some ideas to fill that.

Point is - this definetly isn't the centre of the city, the hideout should be in less-populated residental area. A quiet place.
So drawing traffic lights, etc is pointless. What should I do?
My back-up plan is just to turn this asphalt into a parking lot, but maybe someone has better idea... And some additional suggestions? Like for fence, background and building itself?
And - of course - all kind of crits und comments are welcome too.

Thanks.

Well, after seeing what magic Andail and many others do with a wacom, I decided to get one of these to myself.
But!

* I don't know much about tablets. In matter fact, I've never seen or used such things at all!
* I've heard that anything other than a Wacom is a waste of money
* The prices of wacoms here range from $60  to $3770, and this scares me. Why so huge difference?

I was thinking about this one: Wacom CTE-430/B1 Wacom Graphire3 Studio, Pen set/ Steel Blue, A6, USB, at the price of about $145 (Which is close to maximum I could spend unless I want my parents to start to worry about my sense(less): Even this will be the buy they will never understand)

Is such tablet okay?
Or there's no much difference between cheaper and more expensive ones, just some design/extra button ones, which won't actually change much, so I could buy cheaper one instead?


Any tips on buying?
What are the specialities/extra stuff/characteristics I need to keep in mind/ ask for?

Well, I planned to give my old tractor a little boost.
Currently, there's shitty 256 MB of RAM sitting inside, 133Mhz.
I plan to buy 400Mhz chip with 512 MB.

Can they be both inside? Will it make it even faster?
Or will be there some conflicts/speeddown?

Well, once again, I've bought some technology that I can not operate.

This time, it's...

Portable mp3 player!

Yes. Not the one with memory card or hard-disk(omgexpensiveugh), but a sexy thing that has FM radio, audio CD-playing capability, plus "plays mp3s from CD" - one.

Well, happily home, I started to burn my music onto a CD.
Furiously, 40 minutes later, I threw third wasted effort out from my window, nearly hitting a passing car.

The thing won't play! So I googled and googled... Closest thing I found was a word "finalizing CD" and Ahead Nero 5 - which I used for burning - was able to perform such action. Not that it helped any way, of course. I made also an audio CD, it played perfectly.
But no, not the mp3 one.

From manual, I see that player supports playing mp3-s even if they're scattered around folders on CD. I just burned them all into root directory of the CD. What really happens is --

* It doesn't detect any more tracks than track 1.
* It starts playing the track 1 but no sound is heard: just some very quiet "sssh" sounds very randomly, which are NOT very quietly playing song, but more like an untuned radio.

So how should I format and name the mp3s to get this thing to play them? Which program should I use? What's the trick?

Does anyone have any advice?

[Here it is.]

Well, I usually don't use vanishing point system.
With this case, I decided to give it a try... did I get the perspective right? *sigh*
Any other suggestions, and C&C is also welcome.

Here it is.


Scaled version too


I'm especially clueless what to do about striped wall far back: the intensity of stripes is the same that the wall in foreground has, yet it's wrong. But resolution restricts me to change this.

Pic needs plenty of extra details, but main part is ready.

Well, today I came to a point where I started looking for sound effects.  A simple task, especially if you happen to be connected to the Internet....

Or is it?

After 3 hours of resultless searching I understood that this time could be wasted to something much more productive... like a MAGS game making or something. Another 3 goes to elimination of all teh ad-, spy-, crap- and nonsense-ware all these pointless "Get free samples here!!11" pages installed.

What I do need is 3-5 different tree chopping sounds.
Some swordfight ones. Some cavalry voices, like horses galloping and making noise. A catapult launch and hit sounds. A bow shooting (and hitting) sounds.

I also noticed that I don't have any games left where I could rip some.

This is impossible.

If anyone would know how to change my mind, I'd be grateful.

Well, there's another suggestion - if it's not suggested or improved (I'm sticking to 2.62 yet)...

Currently, the antialiasing of characters messes with whole character. Can it be done with outlines only, i mean anitaliasing the last pixel(s) before transparent color? Nowadays, 3D games do that... 

+ Amount of anti-aliasing process reduces, which may save some CPU
+ It looks better in many games

- Probably more difficult to do