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SPRITES 18 Professional sprite designer for VGA high resolution (c) Copyright 1994 D.G. Sureau For AT-286 or more 512 KB & VGA card ┌──────────┐ │ OVERVIEW │ └──────────┘ Sprites 18 is a powerful sprite editor for high resolution with features one find before only on advanced paint package. It includes an automaton assembler to easily make animation. Here, summarized, what you can do with Sprites 18: - drawing 16 or 256 colors sprites for VGA or SVGA. - drawing icons and saving them in standard ICO files for Win- dows, with MegaSprites. - saving sprite in binary or text files. - merging images or parts of images with six logical mode to produce various effects and to assemble objects in more com- plexes ones. - assembling sprites in automatons and viewing animation. - converting sprites from a format to another at the touch of a key. ┌─────────────────────┐ │ THE SPRITE DESIGNER │ └─────────────────────┘ Starting up SPRITES 18 From the DOS prompt, simply type: SPRITES or add to the name of a sprite file or an icon as parameter: Ex: SPRITES example Ex: SPRITES example.ICO If extension is not typed, the program search for a sprite fi- le. In all cases but the present one, Sprites 18 sets itself the extensions for files, that are proper to file type, and the user can't change. Once the sprites loaded, you may type '?' to view them. Features of the designer Produces 16 colors sprites, compressed fast sprites, allows drawing with mouse or keyboard, can change size while editing, use a magnified drawing window with simultaneous real size ima- ge, create palette, has rubber, fill, mirror, replacing a co- lor in the image, insert/delete row or column, merging images with logical modes, cut and paste on the same image or from a sprite to the drawing with logical modes, circular scrolling, stores until 1024 sprites in memory. The screen At top of the screen a row of keys represents most usual func- tions, from left to right: hlp F1 Display version number and help screens. inf F8 Display data on sprite in memory. era e Erase a sprite in memory. rep ! Replace sprite in memory by drawing with the current format. rgb % Create colors. cOl o Change value of the current color. pal p Change the palette. scl F5 Scroll the image. mov m Shift the image in the window. inv \ Invert colors of the drawing. ] [ ] or [ Horizontally reverses the image. u/d ~ Vertically reverses the image. # # Set/Remove the grid. rst y Restore standard preferences. org O Go to the organizer. aut A Go to the assembler. ESC ESC Exit any function. The vertical icon bar shows the most usual drawing commands, from top to bottom: 1) get the sprite in memory. 2) clear the drawing. 3) fill area. 4) undo. 5) change a color in the drawing. 6) cut & paste. 7) insert a row. 8) delete a column. 9) insert a column. 10) delete a row. 11) merge sprite in memory with the drawing. 12) compare sprite in memory and the drawing. The central small window is the window of drawing, that is zoo- med x 4 in the big window. At right are four windows for sprites in memory, but what I name "sprite in memory" is the one that has scroll keys at its left. It can be merged with the drawing. When one creates a sprite from the drawing, it will be shown in this window with green border. The central panel content is that: - the size of the image in memory according to the current sprite format. - width and height of the window for drawing. - sprite number among 1024 when created from current drawing. At left, are indicator-buttons for logical mode to merge ima- ges, that are green but the current selected one that is yel- low: XOR exclusive or. AND logical and. OR inclusive or. OVR put sprite or part over drawing. UND put behind the drawing. CPY copy over the drawing. Below each button is the keyboard command. At the right are indicator for the format the sprite will be made with. 16 format 16 colors. 256 format 256 colors. Z16 format Z-RLE. F16 format F16. EAS format EAS. ICO standard icon. The INSERT, ENTER, and cursor keys serve for mouse in some functions. The EDITOR big button display the function that currently is in execution, with yellow background, drawing being the default mode. At right of the palette is displayed the number of the current color and its value. At bottom is displayed the number of current palette, cursor location on the drawing, indicators for the brush and rubber, and the setting for EAS sprites. The menu bar To access the menu, click on the menu bar or press ALT+letter, letters are underlined on the bar. Use cursor keys to select an option (up/down) or change the sub-menu (left/right). Press ESC to exit a sub-menu, press ESC again to exit the menu. Here are detailed commands in each sub-menu and their shortcut keys. FILE Load sprites l Load a binary library of sprites. Save sprites s Save the library in a binary file. Directory d Open the directory window. Dir mask F6 Set the mask for files to display. Status F7 Display current state. Load icon F4 Load a standard icon file. About... F2 Display the version. Quit q/F3 Return to DOS. SPRITES Get from g Get the sprite in memory. Type select t Change type. Add ENTER Make a sprite from the image. Insert sprite INS Make a sprite and inserts it before the one that is displayed. Replace sp. ! Make a sprite and replaces the one that is displayed. Erase sprite e Erase a sprite in memory. Info F8 Display data on sprite in memory. Display all ? Display the whole library in memory. COLORS Palette sel. p Change palette. Color regist. o Change value of the current color. RGB registers % Change RGB for values of colors. Color > color c Replace a color in the image. Read pal+RGB r Load colors and palette. Write pal+RGB w Save colors and current palette in a file. EAS setting v Set EAS sprites. EDIT Fill area f Fill an area with a color. Ins column CTRL-o Insert a column at cursor. Ins row CTRL-r Insert a line. Del column CTRL-w Delete a column. Del line CTRL-y Delete a line. Move picture m Shift image in the window. Clear DEL Clear the image. Undo u Restore before last act. EFFECTS H-Mirror ], [ Reverse horizontally the image. V-Mirror ~ Reverse vertically the image. Circ. scroll F5 Circular scrolling. Compare = XOR temporally sprite in memory with the drawing. Merge # Merge sprite in memory with the drawing according to current logical mode. Cut & paste / Cut and paste with logical mode. Next mode n Change logical mode. Invert col. ~ XOR drawing with itself. Using the mouse The software can be used either with a mouse or with the key- board. The two mouse buttons equally can be used on menu or on command icons. In other cases, they have not identical effect. Sometimes they have same function but the left button is for a single act while the right button is for continuous act while held down. Inside drawing windows they have not same function at all. Inside the magnified drawing window, one clicks the left mouse button to draw, and the right button to get the color the mouse points out. Inside the real-size window one clicks the right button to set the cursor at a location. The directory Press 'd' to display the current directory. It is displayed in a window having variable size. The window displays filenames in uppercase black letters, and sub-directories in lower case red letters. Click on a sub-directory to display it, click on '..' to return at previous level. Press the drive letter to change drive. Uses cursor keys or lift at right of the window to select a file and to scroll. Note there are two buttons at extremities of the lift than serves to scroll one single line at once. Click on a sprite filename (.SPR) or icon filename (.ICO) to load it. To change the window, press ALT-SPACE or click on borders. Press ESC, or do a mouse click out of the window to close it. File masking The directory display allows use of a combination of masks by file type. Press the 'x' key to open the dialogue box for the selection. The types and extensions are as following: - Work: Sprite files: SPR + WRK extensions. - Screens: PCX, VRT, VGA files. - ICO: Windows' icons. - All files: all files the system recognizes, including these of other programs compatible with this one... - Directories: sub-directories. Click on the 1...5 button or type the number to set/reset a mask. The program says 'YES', when files will be displayed. Press 'f' to restore defaults. Press ENTER to close, or press 'd' to show the directory. Dialog box for loading and saving sprites Loading and saving are done with a dialogue box, opened when one presses 'l' for loading, or 's' for saving (or CTRL-l and CTRL-s to have the addresses in a separated file). There is three fields, one for the drive, the second for the directory or path, and a field for the filename. The dialog box has a built-in line editor: use cursor keys up/- down to change line, backspace or DEL key to delete letters, INS to toggle between insert/copy mode. In this program, only the filename node is read by the program, if an extension is typed the program removes it and replaces it with SPR and WRK extension to save or to load the file. Don't press ENTER when a line is filled, move to another, the program keeps the displayed data. Press ESC to abort or ENTER when all three fields are right, to access the file. If previously, one has loaded sprite by clicking on icon, when one wants to save the file, path and name are already typed in the proper fields, only one has to press ENTER to save. The memory buffer for the table of sprites has variable size, that depends of the available conventional memory, 640 Kb or less. If you frequently change the size of memory by loading resident programs, then avoid fully to fill up the memory buffer or otherwise have a disk with proper configuration and boot the system from it before to run Sprites. The windows Some windows can be moved and have variable size. In this case, there is a button at left on the title bar, with a 3D box insi- de. If the window can be changed, press ALT-SPACE to enter editing mode, and then, use the cursor keys to move and ALT-cursor to change the size. Alternate keys: +, -, <, > Press ENTER or ESC to exit editing mode. When mouse is on the left or top border, the mouse pointer be- comes a four arrows image, if the window can be moved. Press left mouse button and drag to move the window. When mouse is on the right or bottom border, the pointer be- comes a horizontal arrow if size or width can be changed. In the same manner, press left button and drag to change. Press the right mouse button to exit the process, or click on the ESC button at the top of the screen. To change the colors, press ALT-b for the background, ALT-h for the title bar. The palette windows (RGB registers) The % command opens the window for changing RGB, red, green, blue registers that hold components for each value of color in the palette. These RGB registers are affected to each of the 64 VGA regis- ter, that are values for the 16 colors and than one may change with the 'o' command. At start, each color has a value that has same number than the color number: color 0 has value 0, and so on.... However one can change them, and color 0 can take 64 different values as can the other colors. Type r, g or b to decrease an ink, R, G, or B to increase it. Type PAGE UP or PAGE DOWN to change for another value, or click on the Prev. or the Next buttons. Cut & paste Select first the logical mode to paste the part of image. Press '/' or click on the cut & paste icon on the vertical bar, or simply click on the sprite in memory, that does appear an outlined rectangle. To change window, click on the proper one, or press the TAB key. Use left mouse button or the cursor keys to move, right mouse button or keys +, -, <, >, to change the size. Then press EN- TER. Now you are in past mode, the part of the image is reverted over the drawing. Use left mouse button or cursor keys to move it and press ENTER to paste. Making sprites - Press b to make a 256 color sprite. It will only have 16 co- lors but can be displayed on VGA 19 screen or SVGA with 256 co- lors sprite functions. - Press k to make a 16 color sprite. - Press z to make a 16 color compressed sprite. These sprite are bitmapped and are all compatible with VGA 19 and SVGA screens. - One can select any sprite type with the t key, it will be displayed in yellow on row of buttons at the top of the screen, and then to make the sprite with this format, type: ENTER to add it, INSERT to insert it, ! to replace another, into the table in memory. Making icon of sprites in ASCII file. To design an icon you must reduce the window to 32 x 32 pixels. Press 'i' , then type a 8 letters name without extension. It will be saved in a file and a sprite will also be made to further editing. To save a sprite into a text file, press 'j' and give the name. The ASC extension will be added to the name and a file will be made you may include into yours programs. The syntax is for the C language and text may easily be edited to another one. The EAS format Sprite having the EAS format, use the special memory organisa- tion of VGA 18 screen to do animation most easy. The principle is to use two screen pages for the animated sprites, and two screen pages for the scenery sprites. By changing the color of the palette to the appropriate scheme, on can now move anima- tion without erasing the scenery. The 'v' command allows to se- lect either the animation or the background setup for the sprites and the palette. That has effect only for sprites crea- ted with the EAS format. They can have from one to four page. This is displayed at bot- tom right of the screen. The 'V' (uppercase) command reset the setup to standard. Note than a EAS sprite with four pages, is similar to any sprite using bit planes, as F16 for example. More on bit planes and bitmap in the Screen Maker manual. Sprites having 16, 256, Z16 format use bitmap, other use bit planes, that is better for VGA 18 mode. Problems... CUT & PASTE don't seems work. Look at the current logical mode, the yellow button on the vertical row of green buttons. C & P, as the merging function, has different results according to this mode. The OVR default logical mode certainly produces that you wait for... BLACK WINDOWS: If you load a file of a previous version, some locations are filled with zeroes, that now are used for colors of windows. Use ALT-b and ALT-h to fix that and save the file. Summary of the designer's keyboard commands F1 Display help screen. F2 Display the version number. t Change format for sprite. b Make a 256 colors sprite. k Make a 16 colors sprite. z Make a compressed 16 colors sprite. ENTER Make a sprite with current format and add it to the memory buffer. INSERT Make a sprite with current format and insert it into the memory buffer. ! Make a sprite with current format and replace the displayed sprite in memory. u Undo. Erases work or erases the erasing. +-<> Change size. CTRL-o, r, y, w Insert/Delete row. m Shift the drawing in the window. F5 Circular scrolling. # Set/remove the grid. j Set/remove the window's border. PAGES Select a sprite in memory. CTRL-HOME First sprite in memory. CTRL-END Last sprite in memory. ? Display all sprites in the library. F8 Display info on sprite in memory. e Erase a sprite in memory. o Change value of the current color. \ Invert colors of the drawing. r Load palette and RGB registers. w Save palette and RGB registers. % Change the RGB registers. c Change a color in the drawing. p Change the palette. v Settings for EAS sprite. V Restore default EAS settings. f Fill area. / Cut & paste. @ Merge sprite in memory and drawing. n Change logical mode for merging. x Set: sprite XOR drawing -> drawing. & Set: sprite AND drawing -> drawing. | or : Set: sprite OR drawing -> drawing. ( Set: sprite UPON drawing -> drawing. ) Set: drawing UPON sprite -> drawing. * Set: COPY, sprite replace drawing. ][ Horizontally reverses the drawing. ~ Vertically reverses the drawing. y Restore default preferences. A Assemble an automaton. O Organize sprites. q, F3 Quit Sprites 18. ┌─────────────────────────────┐ │ THE ASSEMBLER OF AUTOMATONS │ └─────────────────────────────┘ An automaton is a sequence of sprites that composes an anima- tion. This assembler eases to make automatons and to try them. The board that graphically shows automatons, and that is saved with the sprites, can hold many automatons, that can be easily edited and combined. On this board, an automaton is a sequence of ellipses with num- ber inside them, ordered by arrows. These numbers are numbers of the sprites in memory. Animation can be shown in the window at the middle of the screen, or in full screen with VGA 19. At right of this window, nine symbol represent different available links. At right are shown the sprites in memory. To execute a sequence, press 'i' or 'z' to view it in full screen. The interpreter reads on the board from left to right. It can go up or down, but it respects following priorities if several arrows start of the same ellipse: right, then up, otherwise down. Making and editing automaton One selects a sprite in memory with PAGE UP/DOWN keys, and one presses ENTER to put an ellipse at cursor location, holding its number. The keys to put arrows are these: 0: a horizontal line, the symbol to go right. 5: a vertical line, to go up or down. 1, 3, 7, 9: symbols to change direction. 2, 6, 8: add '>' to the lines, that is for better comprehensi- bility but have no utility for the interpreter. The DEL key erases an ellipse. To save an automaton, move the cursor at the first ellipse and press 'w'. To load it, move the cursor at a location and press 'r'. Using a mouse The mouse pointer becomes a pencil when it is over the board of automatons, it becomes a cross if one selects a link symbol otherwise it holds a sprite number. To get a symbol, click on a displayed symbol in the command pa- nel, and click on the sprite in memory to get the sprite num- ber, or anywhere on the command panel. On the board, click the left mouse button to drop an object, the right button to put only the cursor at a location. The horizontal lift allows to scroll the board of automatons. To change sprite, click on the PAGE UP/DOWN keys at left of sprite in memory, with left button to scroll one at the time, right button to fast scroll. Keyboard commands of the assembler F1 Help screen. PAGES Select a sprite in memory. Cursor keys Move to a location on the board. 0..9 Put a symbol at cursor location. ENTER Put an ellipse on the board. DEL Erase current cursor position x Clear the whole board. i Interpret the automaton and animate it. Move first the cursor at start of the sequence. z Run the automaton in VGA 19, 256 colors. m Execute step by step the automaton. r Read an automaton, displays it starting at current cursor position. w Write an automaton in a file, starting at cursor. # Put/Remove the grid. n Refresh the screen. HOME Go to the start of the board. END Go to the end of the board < Scroll the board 20 columns left. > Scroll the board 20 columns right. + Slow down the animation. - Speed up the animation. p Switch between editor palette or standard one. ALT-b Change panel command color. ALT-j Change board color. ALT-n Change text and line color. ALT-o Change border. O Organiser. q Return to the editor. Automatons are saved in files with the AUT extension, that the program adds to itself. The board is saved into the WRK file. ┌────────────────┐ │ THE ORGANIZER │ └────────────────┘ This utility allows to change order of sprites in memory, de- lete one, convert their format, display their detailed descrip- tion and test integrity. Keyboard commands of the organiser F1 Help screen. PAGES Select a sprite in memory. HOME Go to the first sprite in memory. END Go to the last sprite in memory. m Go to the move mode. Use PAGE UP/DOWN to select a new location, press ENTER to move or ESC to cancel. DEL Delete displayed sprite. t Change current format for converting. ! Convert displayed sprite to current format, and replace it. b Display x 4 a Z-RLE sprite. z Display on VGA 19 screen, if format is compatible. p Switch between editor palette or standard one. A Assembler of automatons. E Return to the editor. Q, ESC Return to the editor. ┌─────────────────────┐ │ FORMATS FOR SPRITES │ └─────────────────────┘ All formats but MS are for displaying sprites from bottom to top of screen. Coordinate of sprite, but special F and EAS, are - 0..639 x 0..479 on VGA 18 and SVGA, - 0..319 x 0..199 on VGA 19. Size is limited only by editors, 80 x 80 with Sprites 18, 320 x 200 with Screen Maker. Encoding use either bitmap: 16, 256, Z16 or bit planes: F16, MS, EAS. Bit planes encoding displays very fast on VGA 18 (or VGA 16-EGA) screen resolution. Bitmap is an universal encoding that displays on MCGA, VGA, SVGA with appropriate functions. Principle of bitmap is to store all bits of a color into a byte of memory, while bit-plane encoding dispatches them in screen planes. The 256 colors format. It's a universal format to display sprites with all VGA and SVGA screen modes. Each pixel is coded with one byte, according to the bitmap encoding. In VGA 19 these sprites can be displayed very fast. Header: Byte 0: height, from 1 to 200. Byte 1: unused Byte 2-3: width from 1 to 320. Byte 4: format code 1. Byte 5: unused The 16 colors format. A universal format for VGA and SVGA. No compressed. The palette number allows on 256 color screen to display the same sprite with different sets of colors. It uses bitmap encoding with a byte holding two pixels. Header: Byte 0: height, from 1 to 200. Byte 1: unused Byte 2-3: width from 1 to 320. Byte 4: format code 5. Byte 5: palette row number. The 16 colors Z-RLE format. A universal format for VGA and SVGA. Image is coded with an RLE compression algorithm that allows a display with same fast speed than no compressed sprite. Compression can divide size by 5 or more, depending of complexity of the image. The palette number allows on 256 color screen to display a same sprite with different sets of colors. Use bitmap encoding. Header: as above, with format code 4. The F16 (fast) format. It is a format for VGA 18, that displays sprites very fast, with no boundary, so horizontal coordinate is in range 0..79 and not 0..639. Use bit planes encoding. Header: Byte 0: height, from 1 to 200. Byte 1: unused Byte 2-3: width from 1 to 80. Byte 4: format code 6. Byte 5: unused. The EAS (Easy) format. This format allows to make sprite with variable number of screen pages, from 1 to 4, and so displaying animation without erasing background. Uses bit planes encoding. Header: Byte 0: height, from 1 to 200. Byte 1: unused Byte 2-3: width from 1 to 80. Byte 4: format code 3. Byte 5: unused. MS Format to display sprites from top to bottom of screen. It uses bit planes encoding. Header: Byte 0: height, from 1 to 200. Byte 1: unused Byte 2-3: width from 1 to 320. Byte 4: format code 2. Byte 5: unused. Icons. When icons are packed in a single file, they use the 256 or 16 colors format or compressed Z-RLE format. They also can be saved into an ICO file with Windows' format. Functions of the library in the registered version that display icons use color 9 as background color and don't put it on the screen, that is for rather display the 0 color that corresponds to the most useful black color. ┌─────────────────┐ │ ABOUT THE FILES │ └─────────────────┘ Extensions are entirely managed by the program. If user gives an extension when asked for a filename, the program removes it and puts the proper extension. Each type of file has its proper extension. SPR Library of sprites. Can hold offset of sprites, or no. WRK Work file, it is created when saving sprites and it holds preferences, palette, board of automatons. ADR Addresses of sprites in the table. Generated by a CTRL-s. VGA Picture file with no header, no compressed. PAL Palette. Bytes 0 to 767 are RGB registers, byte 768 is unused, bytes 769..784 for colors 0..15 of the VGA 18 palette. AUT Automaton. Each sprite number use two bytes. Bytes 0 et 1 of the file hold the number of sprites. ICO Standard Windows' (c) icon file. ASC Sprite saved as ASCII file.