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NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 09:17
by one billion daleks
This GRF replaces the default green oneway arrows with white arrows.
These arrows are drawn to match the UK Roadset.

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 09:35
by Zephyris
Nice little grf, something i have wanted to do for some time! The perspective on the arrow does look slightly off though, anc could be a bit brighter...

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 09:49
by one billion daleks
Cheers Zephyris! :)

Yes, it was darned tricky trying to align the arrowhead with the centre-line!

There's only 3 pixels to play with when creating the point of the arrow, and I'm no graphic artist I'm afraid!
If I aligned the arrowhead correctly, then it ended up out-of-alignment with the 'stem' of the arrow.
Otherwise it ends up slightly above or slightly below the centre-line ... bugger!
You tend to see the same effect with those radioactive green blobs used by the game ;)

But if someone with superior graphics skills would like to volunteer at having go at improving on my attempt, I'm happy to post the PCX file.

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 09:51
by LordAzamath
Yes the angle is wrong...
On the other hand.. nice grf.. (You still don't use png's for screenies :P)

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 10:03
by one billion daleks
Yes you're right lordazamath, the angle could be better ... but I was working with an area of about 6x8 pixels - if I changed the angle the whole arrow got narrower and longer and just stopped looking like an arrow.
Hey, that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it! ;) ;) ;)

And I did create a PNG image, but it was 27kb - so the JPG was actually smaller for a change! :)

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 10:08
by Zephyris
even if the file size is larger png is better for reviewing gfx.

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 10:16
by LordAzamath
.. and file size isn't larger.. I guess you used some funky program :P.. This is w/o compressing made with GIMP.. A png screenshot..
But I agree, you should add more contrast if you want it to be used on other road types too..

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 10:42
by FooBar
one billion daleks wrote:And I did create a PNG image, but it was 27kb - so the JPG was actually smaller for a change! :)
Try saving to png-8 with indexed colours, instead of the unindexed png-24 (which I think you're using).

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 10:56
by one billion daleks
Yes lordazamath, I am using a cruddy freeware download that apparently inflates PNG files!

Thanks for that isometric arrow Zephyris ... that's just a simple inverted pyramid with a stem sticking out of it. So you'd think that would be pretty easy to duplicate, but when I create one (with a 5-pixel base), once it's scaled down it just looks askew! This is the same problem I had with my arrows ... I expect it's dead easy to fix if you know how, but I'm totally ignorant on this graphic design stuff!

EDIT: OK, I think I just figured it out ... fingers crossed!

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 11:14
by Zephyris
Thats better, but please use pngs, its so much easier to see whats going on, even if the file size is larger...

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 11:32
by one billion daleks
OK, thanks for that isometric arrow Zephyris ... I've now implemented that one in the GRF on post #1.
I think the grayscales may need a bit of work, but the basic idea looks better with that arrow :)

Yes, I will use PNGs when I've found a compact freeware graphics program that handles them ... I will also have to find a new screengrabber, as I currently use ScreenHunter, and that only creates JPGs or BMPs unfortunately.

Thank Q!

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 11:43
by LordAzamath
You can use Gimp for example.. Irfanview can convert between bmp and png.. And I don't know of older paints, are they capable of making pngs but the one what came vith vista, can do it..

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 15 Jan 2008 11:44
by Zephyris
I reccomend paint.net (with a pcx plugin) or ms paint...

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 20 Jan 2008 15:31
by glx
one billion daleks wrote:I will also have to find a new screengrabber, as I currently use ScreenHunter, and that only creates JPGs or BMPs unfortunately.
Try pressing ctrl-S in OpenTTD :)

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 21 Jan 2008 00:06
by one billion daleks
Thanks for that tip glx :) ... it's great to see developers provide helpful advice using a High-Level Language like plain English!

Though actually, I am already familiar with Ctrl-S ... what I was looking for was a utility that would let me grab just the relevent portion of the screenshot, like the JPG grab in post #1.

I've since discovered some freeware called EasyCapture, which creates PNG grabs ... plus it provides tools to add cursors, arrows and, transparent speech-bubbles to your grabs too! So I shall be having some fun with that in due course ;)

Cheers though! :)

Re: NewGRF: Oneway Roads UK

Posted: 27 Jan 2008 14:34
by glx
You can crop the ctrl-s screenshot with any image editor. You can also add arrows, or anything with the editor.