Various questions about unitgraphics

[Malachus]

Hey Duke John, I know that I'm probably making myself one of your least favorite people, but I do have another question. In order for me to make new animation BIF's, you say to put all the BMP's on a root directory for easier access... Now, exactly which BIF's do I have to extract these BMP's from? Are they the BIF's in the textures/men/unitBIFname? If so, do I have to extract all 12 frames for both the normal and high animation?

[VikingHorde]

Hey Duke John, I know that I'm probably making myself one of your least favorite people, but I do have another question. In order for me to make new animation BIF's, you say to put all the BMP's on a root directory for easier access... Now, exactly which BIF's do I have to extract these BMP's from? Are they the BIF's in the textures/men/unitBIFname? If so, do I have to extract all 12 frames for both the normal and high animation?

In the textures/men/ folder there are a lot of different types of unit body. What I did was finding a good "donor" for my new unit. When you have found the right bif for the job, extract all 12 frames from the high animation. When you have finished work on the 12 frames, then you fist make the new high animation bif file. When completed, reduce resolusion from 512x512 to 256x256 on all 12 frames (the bmp's) and make the new normal animation bif file.

Hope this helps

[Malachus]

Though you're not Duke John, I greatly appreciate your help Viking Horde, thanks a lot.

[Duke John]

I'm glad you found out that this community has alot of knowledgeable modders who are kind of to help you. I would appreciate it, if you make the title of your thread like a summary of your question and not like this one. I am not a personal advisor And also avoid titles like: "I need help!"

Plus your questions were related to each other, so it would have been better/clearer if you put this question in your previous thread.

Thanks,
Duke John

[VikingHorde]

Though you're not Duke John, I greatly appreciate your help Viking Horde, thanks a lot.

There are a lot of modder in the forum, so you don't need to write questions specificly to one member. Just write the subject in the titel and someone will try to help you out.

[Duke John]

Great minds thinks alike, VikingHorde

[Malachus]

Well thanks for the advice and help. I'll be sure to have more questions soon enough.

[Malachus]

As I said, I would have more questions soon enough.... ok, well I don't have Paint Shop Pro anymore to edit my BMP's, my trial period ran out... what other programs could I use to edit them?

Also, if I only wanted to change the appearance of a unit and not its actions, could I use BIF reader to edit all 12 frames in the High and normal animation BIF's, and still have the unit function like before?

[VikingHorde]

As I said, I would have more questions soon enough.... ok, well I don't have Paint Shop Pro anymore to edit my BMP's, my trial period ran out... what other programs could I use to edit them?

I use Corel Photo-Paint 9, a rather old program now but it works ok.

Also, if I only wanted to change the appearance of a unit and not its actions, could I use BIF reader to edit all 12 frames in the High and normal animation BIF's, and still have the unit function like before?

I don't think it's a good idea to use BIF reader to edit. It's better to use a program Corel Photo-Paint 9 or Paint Shop Pro. You only need to edit the high animation BIF's, becouse with a program like Coral you can reduce resolution by 50% and get the bmp's for the normal animation. It will save you a lot of time rather than having to make the same work two times.

[Malachus]

Ah, ok thanks.

[Malachus]

Alright, now that I have all 12 frames for the high animation edited, are all of these supposed to go into one BIF file? If so, how do I do that?

[VikingHorde]

Alright, now that I have all 12 frames for the high animation edited, are all of these supposed to go into one BIF file? If so, how do I do that?

Jepp, all needs to go into one file. First open bif-reader and click new bif. Here set it to 512, 512 and 12 frames. You will get an error, but just close the new empty bif and click new bif again (this time no error), import all frames and save the bif.

[Malachus]

ok, thanks a lot Viking.