¾ Colours ² by · Axl of Exodus For some of you beginner coders out there,you may have some problem following HEX and the copper list.First lets take alook at a copper list line. ¾ dc.w $3401,$fffe,$180,$fff ² The main things to know here are that 34 is the vertical position of the screen,01 is the horizontal position of the screen,$fffe you dont need to know for the moment,$180 is the background colour,or rather the section where the colour will be and finally $fff is the actual colour of the screen. ¾ $fff is white in colour,so lets take a closer look at colour on the amiga and its graphic modes.For the moment stick to Lo-Res. ² A lo-res screen consists of 320 pixels wide by 256 pixels deep (PAL,NTSC would be 200).The easiest thing to do to get a a better understanding of colour is to load up deluxe paint and go into the palette and look at the R (Red) G (Green) B (Blue) and by using these 3 base colours you can utilise up to 4096 (HAM) colours.Defining a copper list is treated exactly the same as a palette in deluxe paint.Lets say you wanted to have the colour RED. · The copperlist colour would be $F00. ² This would give you the brightest red and it would be the equilavent of having R set to 15, G set to 0, B set to 0,in deluxe paint. Or lets say you wanted to have a dark grey,it would be in the copperlist as follows.. ¾ $333 ² Which would be the the same as having R=3,G=3,B=3 in deluxe paint.Simple huh?,what you still dont understand,well maybe its the HEX,read my article on number systems elsewhere,but the simplist way to remember hex is as follows. Hex is 1-9 and after 9 it goes from A-F and each letter is represented by a number. ¾ Eg.Decimal = 10 : HEX = A ² Simple isnt it,so now you should know how to utilise the amiga`s palette to the fullest. The above also comes in handy for using AMOS.Ever wonder how a pic is faded onto the screen,well here`s how to do it in AMOS. Draw your picture in dpaint and load it into an IFF convertor that generates a HEX palette.Now note down carefully each colour in the same order as it is on the screen,once you`ve done that boot AMOS. Pack your picture in the normal way and unpack it,but have the following line. ¾ Unpack 4 to 0:Palette $0,$0,$0,$0 ² This would be for a picture with 4 colours. Now using the fade command type, · Fade 1,$0,$dde,$1ea,$fff:Wait 50 ¾ This would fade in your picture,to the colours in HEX,which would be your pic`s colours. ² This method is the easiest way,because you have full control over the enitire palette,and there is no need to go back to dpain,to change a clour a tint or two,you can do it from the program itself.A very handy method,i think you`ll agree. · Whatever language you code in,remember nothing comes easy. ¾ End.
