Camo effects on ToT units – the dirty way

[Mercator]

Originally posted by Catfish
I didn’t invent this figure – I’m sure I read it somewhere. If it’s erroneous, as you say, I’ll correct it in the guide. Originally, I thought it was 16-bit – Harlan Thompson told me that around 4 years ago.

The standard ToT bitmaps seem to be 16-bit. Regular graphics programs can't save bitmaps as 16-bit, so they save as the usual true color, 24-bit images. ToT can also read those, but it reduces its colors.

I said it seems to be 16-bit, because there's one superfluous bit. In the sprite files, this extra bit is used to add a civilization color mask. Plus, 15-bit is a much more intuitive number, because that leaves 5 bits for each of the three colour channels, Red, Green and Blue.

There's one very easy way to demonstrate the 15-bit nature of the graphics...
Have a look at the attached unit. In the top-left corner you'll see the original, as in the units bitmap, the rest is a screenshot of how it actually looks in the game.

Notice especially that the exact transparent magenta shade (#FF00FF) does not appear in the purple gradient.

But I'll have to say, to the graphics creators this really shouldn't matter much at all. The only thing where it makes a difference is when you try using colors close to the transparent colors. The near magenta #FF01FF, for instance, is transparent as well.

Originally posted by Palaiologos
There is a difference. The minute you paste that gfx to a bmp with the 8-bit MGE pallete it looses some of its quality.

Never simply past full color images into paletted images! Use the method Catfish described in steps 1 and 11.

[Catfish]

Modified the procedure to accommodate Mercator's comments. Also added a PSP script to make it easier. So if anyone's copied the old one, please update.