-R e i Posted April 2, 2011 Report Posted April 2, 2011 (edited) I want this to be my 700th post. :) Reference: [here] I wonder if that's okay @_@ | Credits to: vi These are the things that you most likely need/should have: -Photoshop ( Any version, the version I use is CS5 extended ) or you can use Gale -actOR to edit your .act files. (You can choose actOR or actOR2) -SPRconview to convert your .bmp files to .spr files and vice versa. At this point, you should have the artwork for your headgear done. This is what I'll be using as an example for this guide, Garden Keeper Rucksack: << Note: I made that using Happy's rucksacks as base. Depending on your headgear, you can have one to fifteen frames (if this isn't an animated headgear). In this case, since it's a rucksack, it'll only have 3 frames. What determines how many frames you have is the .act you choose to work off of for your headgear. I don't know how to create an .act from scratch, I typically pick a headgear closest/most similar to the hat I have done. The .act file holds the positioning information for your headgear, it references the .spr file for the images. What does the .spr file do? The .spr file holds all the visual information for your headgear. The .act and .spr files work hand in hand. Let's get started. Time to slice your original artwork into its individual frames. Make sure all of the frames of your headgear are the correct size. If the size you choose is too large, you will encounter problems when you create your .spr file. It will do things such as distort or repeat itself in the frame. Happy's .spr file consist of 5 .bmp files. The first .bmp is a blank image, since you won't see anything in front. And the last image, the fifth one, contains the credits whoever made, recolored, based on.. blah. So slice up your artwork. I've picked the size 40x38 for the Garden Keeper Rucksack. You have to save each of your frame files as an indexed .bmp. In Photoshop, you must go to Image > Mode > Indexed Color... It will ask you to Flatten Layers, click OK. This window will pop up: Now you want to go to the drop down menu where it says "Exact" and select Custom. (Make sure that before you select Custom, the drop down menu is already set to Exact. If not, select Exact and then go to Custom.) A second window will pop-up and you will see all of the colors used in your headgear. This step is critical, or else your headgear will show up with crazy colors when you convert it in SPRConview. Now, you have to denote what color is going to be transparent. In this second window, which is called the Color Table, the first box is the color which tells the .spr file what to make transparent. I've chosen this cloudy whitish green color. So click the first box and the color picker will pop up. Simply click your background color. Now you want to save out your Color Table. Click save on the right hand of the color table. This is also indeed an .act file, but don't be confused! This is different from your file to be used with RO. I've saved my palette file out as "palette_gkeeper.act" Now that you have all of the color information done, save your file. Save it as an 8-bit .bmp file. naming convention in ragnarok online, each gender has their own set of spr/act files. If you dig through the sprite files in your data folder, you'll notice ¿© and ³² as a suffix for your file names. ¿© denotes female, while ³² denotes male. Generally, I save my files as headgearname00xx.bmp. So continuing saving your frames out. Remember to check if your headgear's color palette is loaded into each frame. You can load your color palette by going to the "Custom" drop down menu and clicking "Load..." on the right hand side to select your palette file. Well, since not all frames have the same color, I usually do "Exact > Custom > Pick the color that I want ot be transparent" to each frame. After you finish, your folder should look something like this: (the color table .act file is optional) Now go into your sprite data folder and pick a headgear that you feel is closest to the headgear you're working on. For the Garden Keeper Rucksack, I've chosen Drops Rucksack. So copy and paste the .act/.spr files of the headgear into the folder of the headgear you are working on. Now open up SPRconview. Now go to Convert > Bmp to Spr. You will get another pop up window. Add all of the frames of your headgear and make sure that they're in numerical order. Under where it says Sprite, hit Browse and browse to where you saved the .spr file of the headgear you chose. Remember, I chose the Drops Rucksack. After you've done that, click Convert. Done with your .spr file! Notice that 'Encode' check box is checked, sometimes having this enabled destroys your .spr file so if this ever happen untick it and try again: Now check if everything's okay, the transparency, if that's how you want it to become... blah. That's it for your .spr file. Now go back to your folder and open up the .act file that you had copy and pasted for your headgear with actOR. ---------------============= This is the part where I'm going to use the images in the reference link. ================---------- Now look to the right. Under reference, check the box next to "head." You'll see that the head shows up, but the hat is behind the head! So look to the left where it says "Change priority ref. spr..." A window pops up. Underneath "head" hit the bubble for back. The hat is now in front of the head. Look: You can change the reference head anytime you want by replacing the ref_head act/spr files in the location where you installed actOR. Simply replace those files. Now, we have to edit the .act file. But first, here is a quick diagram explaining the basics of actOR. 01 action This refers to each of the acts that correspond with an action in Ragnarok. In the drop down menu, there are 13 acts, going from 0-12. Act 00 is the act for standing, act 01 is for walking, act 02 is for sitting, etc. You have to check every single act and every single direction to make sure that the hat sits on the head properly. This is where most of the labor comes from. 02 direction clicking through this scrolls through all of the angles of the head and hat. 03 scroll bar for each pose/angle, there are several frames. this scroll bar scrolls through all of them. You must check through all of these to make sure that the hat sits on the head properly. 04 reference this is simply where you turn the reference head and body on and off via the boxes, x is on and a blank box is off. 05 x offs this is the x-coordinate of the headgear. You can edit this value by clicking and dragging the headgear by hand, or tap-tap double clicking the value under Xoffs with a certain timing to change it numerically. 06 y offs this is they-coordinate of the headgear. You can edit this value by clicking and dragging the headgear by hand, or tap-tap double clicking the value under Yoffs with a certain timing to change it numerically. 07 EXT this simply refers to the reference head sprite/hairstyle. 08 x offs this is the x-coordinate of the head. You can edit this value by clicking and dragging the headgear by hand, or tap-tap double clicking the value under Xoffs with a certain timing to change it numerically. 09 y offs this is the y-coordinate of the head. You can edit this value by clicking and dragging the headgear by hand, or tap-tap double clicking the value under Xoffs with a certain timing to change it numerically. That is basically all you need to know of actOR to get the job done. Personally, I don't know what everything else does! Now you must go through all the .act's angles and frames to make sure the hat sits correctly on the character's head. Once you are done, simply save your file. And you're done! You now have the .act and .spr file of your headgear. 1 sprite this main folder is where your sprites reside. under this folder is two other folders. a. ¾ÆÀÌÅÛ holds the .spr/.act of the thumbnail of your headgear. b. ¾Ç¼¼»ç¸® where your headgears reside. Underneath this folder are two other folders. c. ¿© the female folder d. ³² the male folder 2 texture this main folder is where your .bmp images for your items reside. under this folder is two other folders. a. À¯ÀúÀÎÅÍÆäÀ̽º this folder holds two other folders under it. b. collection this is where the artwork for your headgear resides as a 75 x 100 bitmap image. c. item this is where the .bmp thumbnail of your image resides; the image is the same as the .spr thumbnail of your headgear and is 24 x 24 in size. I generally work with the female .act/.spr files first. Afterwards, I simply copy and paste those files over to the male folder and paste, afterwards, I rename them. A lot of the time, the female .act will not suffice for the male .act since the male hairstyles tend to be smaller than the females. You will have to go back and edit the male .act file after copying and pasting. The way you position your headgear might not work across all hairstyles as well. You want to choose a position that can be workable across most hairstyles. ====================END======================================= Okay, delete this if it's not a good thing. Telll me if there's something missing, what you want me to add. ANd so on. So long for my 700th post. :))) Sorry, nines. === Edit: wtf. it isn't my 700th post but my 640th! Edited April 2, 2011 by -R e i
Secret Posted April 2, 2011 Report Posted April 2, 2011 Thank you very for this ive been finding this kind of tutorial for months
Ita Posted April 2, 2011 Report Posted April 2, 2011 Pro <3 Ty for the guide. Nao I'm gonna make random headgears and stuffs. x3
Drax Posted April 4, 2011 Report Posted April 4, 2011 Nice guide even though seems pretty much copy pasted from your reference...
nines Posted April 4, 2011 Report Posted April 4, 2011 x.x was hoping youd make your own guide. like 1. heres how i drew this on sheet then scan it load to computer 2. photoshop once there yada yada yada 3. actor 4. yada yada yada theres not many of guides from the whole process mostly they're using examples and that doesn't help people who follow step my step really.
-R e i Posted April 4, 2011 Author Report Posted April 4, 2011 Nice guide even though seems pretty much copy pasted from your reference... Yeah, sorry 'bout that. But I thought I should do that because that guide will soon be gone. :T x.x was hoping youd make your own guide. like 1. heres how i drew this on sheet then scan it load to computer 2. photoshop once there yada yada yada 3. actor 4. yada yada yada theres not many of guides from the whole process mostly they're using examples and that doesn't help people who follow step my step really. That's why I said sorry, T_T. I didn't really had much time to do it, and I don't draw the sprite on a sheet of paper then scan it :< I'll do that later, now that you've said it. Sorry, really sorry to disappoint you.
