Eyecatcher image using DATLib - Page 1

Hi,

I've just staring playing with DATLib and I was trying to display my own eyecatcher image on boot. If I'm correct, I have to place the chars used for the imagen at the position stated in _EYE_CATCHER_TILES, but I think that because BuildChar eliminates the tiles "not used" and the logo needs to in a mostly consecutive order, I'm getting a scrambled image. Is there a way to disable the optimization for specific images in chardata.xml? Can someone point me to a better alternative? Thanks!

The first "picture" image in the chardata.xml is used as eyecatcher image.
But the tile order is a bit out of place because tile number 29 and 44 are not used for an unknown reason. Also the palette is completely messed up.
Another problem is, as you wrote already, that if multiple tiles look the same (empty tiles for instance) they will be removed by DATlib during the optimization process.

Here is the eyecatcher image I have made for Hypernoid:



You can see the result here:

There's nothing really planned for this in the tools, considering logo tilemap and palette is coming from the bios and you have no control over it.

Solution is to use a starting_tile value of 256 and manually cook your logo (or use some other tool) in tiles 0-255 space.

NeoHomeBrew:But the tile order is a bit out of place because tile number 29 and 44 are not used for an unknown reason.

Yep, I noticed that too, weird. Thanks for the example, it's a cool logo, but I need to have several transparent tiles.

NeoHomeBrew:Also the palette is completely messed up.

You can find the final palette used for the catcher at the NeoGeo Dev wiki.

@HPMAN

Thanks, it's a super useful tool anyways, much easier to start!

In the end what I did is to manually make a properly-sorted image in PCX, convert it to C rom data using PCXNG (that don't eliminate unused tiles) and copy/pasting the data in the space reserved for the logo tiles. A bit of a pain in the ass, but it worked xD

Do you know any tool for cutting and sorting an imagen in tiles and for doing the binary copying and pasting so I could automate this? Thanks!

I'm not aware of logo specific tools as of now.

You can avoid all the binary files manipulations by using a proper mame driver. (load both logo tiles and other tiles at their correct place from driver)

HPMAN :You can avoid all the binary files manipulations by using a proper mame driver.

Sorry, I'm not familiar with mame drivers modification, but I guess that won't help for making it run on real hardware. If I find another solution I'll post it, thnx!

You should be able to handle most operations with romwak and copy

What I've done in the end is to write a super small tool that can copy a certain amount of tiles/bytes from a binary C rom and paste it on a certain position in another binary file, so I can use PCXNG output and place it whenever I need in the final rom.

Now I need some command line program to cut the source logo in tiles and build the final pcx image with those tiles # 29 and 44 holes... ImageMagick seems like a good bet.

I'm very sad no one mentioning NGFX, easy job with this tool.

There are 3(!) solution with the NGFX-Tools:
- import image with NGFX and cut/paste parts around (tricky)
- cut your image into 4 rows and import these separately into NGFX
- use separate NGFX-Image-grid-tool to modify your image per drag'n'drop before you import it into NGFX (or whatever)

the mysteriously 'empty' tiles $1c and $2b are not 'empty', they are just unused in 'normal' logo. eyecatcher <>0 will use a map for a slightly larger logo using this tiles... most noticable in UNIBIOS screen.. not in the wiki yet!?

eyecatcher <> 0

00, 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09, 0A, 0B, 0C, 0D, 07
0E, 0F, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 1A, 1B, 1C
1D, 1E, 1F, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 2A, 2B
2C, 2D, 2E, 2F, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 07

eyecatcher = 0

00, 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09, 0A, 0B, 0C, 0D
0E, 0F, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 1A, 1B
1D, 1E, 1F, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 2A
2C, 2D, 2E, 2F, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39

blastar :not in the wiki yet!?

As far as I know it's not. Thank you, I had no idea!

I tried your tool this morning and it's very nice, definitely doable with the methods you commented.

Great instructions Blastar - thanks a lot
(I had in my mind that your NGFX tool could be useful for this task but was lacking of time to try it out before suggesting it ...)

Hi NaN,

Thanks so much for starting this thread! I have been intending on bugging these guys about this topic! I'm really glad you beat me to it!

Hi NeoHomeBrew,

Thanks so much for the formatting info! I have been bugged by my garbled gfx when I load the uni-bios to view my projects. It makes you feel all official and stuff to see your own logo appear!
Now I can make an attempt you rock!

Hi HPMAN!

Do you think you would consider adding a couple of additional xml tags to the char list?

Possibly....

<Do Not Optimize> - Optimize routine does not run on the specified picture.
<Bios Logo> - The tiles that are blank at the bottom of row 5 are not included in the build.

Probably dumb idea's...I am just trying to make a simplified DATlib project that will correctly build the intended logo data at compile time.

Hi Blastar,

Thanks for the additional info on the 2 tiles! Your NGFX tools are awesome! I have used them extensively and have done some things I hope you guys will think are cool.
I want to show them but am waiting for the project to be a bit more mature. Since I have your attention I will start a thread with a few NGFX questions.