idea for the character commands page...

Myke,

Here is a thought. Would you be receptive to the idea of linking a graphic (perhaps in the form on animated GIF or something) of each character's respective move in the command list?

Sometimes, while studying command/frame data from other characters, I would like to know how that move looks visually, and am not always around a console to verify. By adding a graphic to each move, I think it would greatly convenience casual gamers such as myself, whom do not always have a console on hand...

Of course, I'd be very willing to help out in uploading the necessary graphics, as I'm sure others would. So it could be done pretty quickly I imagine.

What do you think?

Thanks!

 

Good to hear it Myke. I think if we put the thread in a more visible area and openly query member interest, I'm sure we will find some peeps willing to contribute!

Starting with Jacky, I'll try my hand with an old camera, convert to a GIF, and see how the quality turns out. Ideally, I'm guessing it would be best to capture video directly with a video card, but let's give it a shot anyways.

Thanks!

 

Myke, sent you a PM about this, please let me know what you want to do. Thanks!

 

So been playing around with some gifs for Jacky, Myke wants the animations to be under 100kb. Here are two made with my crappy camera:

http://jb.chinet.googlepages.com/jacky_p3.gif
http://jb.chinet.googlepages.com/jacky_7kg.gif

I trimmed the vids down to raw frames, and reduced dimensions considerably for file size. Small, but animations still clear to me.

Myke had an idea of having static images for smaller frame moves, and animations for larger frames. Personally I would like animations for all if possible, that works too though, what do others think?

Should have some time coming up, so I can start capping once format has been decided.

Used microsoft gif animator and virtual dub. I'm not the most experienced with gifs or anything so...any ideas would be helpful. Thanks!

 

I'm willing to capture, I have Direct HD (not the us cable box, lol) capture box.

Tell me what clips you need and the frame size of the video, and I'll do it. If you're gonna use VirtualDub to capture the frames, can you use MP4 video or do you need AVI?

I would do the gifs as well, but right now I only have PhotoShop CS3 with only Photoshop stand alone. Need to get the full package soon.

 

I think the gif's are a bit too small, maybe 100 x 100 and 300k in bytes myke?

/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/thumbs_up.gif

 

ZeroEx, my camera saves in avi, but I think it does not matter for virtualdub.

Myke, if you are short on time to scan the magazine images, another option is to ask for static gif images from members. They could be decent sizes and easily under 10kb, I think.

Resized jacky's 12 frame p from 75x57 to 100x75. 61kb. at this size you will get 5kb~7kb per frame. more frames will exceed 100kb, lest reduce the dimensions again:

http://jb.chinet.googlepages.com/jacky_p4.gif

how did you guys want to handle throws? what if we do something like static images for attacks and animations for throws?

 

You got it Myke. Just found out VirtualDub has this cool little feature that sequences video into image files. Additionally, for JPEG you can choose a quality setting, and this way dictate file size. Neat stuff.

5.87kb



So how do you want to handle throws again?

 

No need to do all that yourself. The holidays are coming up and I will have time to knock a lot of this out. I understand your views on the throws, minimal animation, sounds reasonable.

So, it looks like we have a working format on our hands. Using the pic you provided, let's recap:

1. 180px x 106px
2. under 5kb for static images
3. capture the attack when it is not hitting the opponent
4. image cropped around both characters
5. use minimal frames for throw animations

what about the idea of cropping just around the attacker?

 

So you guys are good then?

 

Zero, I guess you could upload an image or two, and we can compare quality this way. Myke is going by scan, I by camera, and you by direct capture. It can be a good comparison.

So I'm using my roommates camera now, since it is available. Better quality. Did some throw images as well, check them out:

All are 180x106 and under 5kb

6k_g


6p


33k


33p+g


66p+g


I set the cpu to guard, this way I don't have to mess with spacing or worry about the attack hitting. Also, for consistency I'm trying to capture the attacks without his back to the screen (yeah the 33k one is the wrong way).

So how are these? If they suffice in quality and such I can go ahead and start the capping process.

 

I'd say those static, cropped images are just fine. I got a direct capture card and could help for Goh, for example. The stage, however, should feature no walls so it's much clearer what's happening on-screen.

What should the final pic dimension be like?

 

Cool, you could try to upload a couple of pics and see how they compare quality wise.

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">What should the final pic dimension be like? </div></div>

Glad you liked the static images. Myke, do you also like the format of those pics? If so, I could start the capping process maybe this weekend. I just don't want to start capping all this stuff until we agree on format, quality, etc.

 

OK, I'll do some samples pics of a throw, hand attack, and kick this evening. The dimensions you used are weird though (let's round it up or down, or so). I'll know more once I've done the capture process in the evening.

Also, the two fighters in the demo pics should be clearly distinguishable: 1P should wear the standard A costume, the 2P player should be a different char, most optimal with a complementary costume color.

 

The problem is that the game runs in 60 frames but I can only capture in 30 fps with my Pinnacle Dazzle capture card. That's also the reason why taking snapshots of fast moves becomes a kind of blurry endeavor as practically two frames overlay each other in one picture. Anyway, here are the results:

/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/df.gif/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/k.gif

/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/uf.gif/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/k.gif

/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/p.gif+/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/g.gif

/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/b.gif/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/f.gif/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/p.gif

/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/u.gif/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/b.gif/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/d.gif/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/f.gif/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/p.gif+/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/g.gif

I preserved an aspect ratio of 16:9 (180 x 101 px), and sticked to the given file size of 5 - 6 KB. The pics are still a bit dark as I forgot to adjust the brightness/contrast accordingly.

Under the bottom line, someone with an (HD) capture card, capable of recording in 60fps, has the better cards and could capture top-notch static frames from the moves in the given hit phase.