<Poll> @ DWS [Hi-Res Sprites-Doom 2]

[mac53]

Please take the time.



Thank you

[CodeImp]

To be honest I don't care about these kind of projects. But I do have some advice if you like; Don't post something telling everyone it is a failed project and ask something along the lines of "shall we go on anyway?" it doesn't work. Rather revise your goals and methods, rename the project and announce it as the next big thing.

[Maes]

I'm not going to register just to vote, but the inherent limitations of this project are well known.

As someone once put it, "This isn't just some 'lolz I increased the resolution and applied a smooth filter I'm 1337' thing, is it?".

Initially it was something pretty close to that, and the only way it could really make a difference is by editing everything by hand and adding the detail that just isn't there, or take 7 Megapixel photos of the original clay/metal/latex models.

Even then, it's going to be something very port-specific (ZDoom for DECORATE in order to scale things properly, and OpenGL to be able to use true color).

Perhaps CodeImp expressed the same point will less bias than me, but the message should be crystal-clear either way, by now.

[DaniJ]

What I don't get is why you need DECORATE when you are creating a set of hires sprite replacements.

[Hobbs]

For Textures you should just need HIRESTEX, though I think the "approved" method for sprites is to do a new actor in DECORATE. Don't quote that though, I never really payed much attention to the technical bit of ZDoom, it just sortof soaked in or didn't stick.

[mac53]

Yeah...

You all are right... had to find it out on my own.

@CodeImp... Man... you have "tact", don't you?

[Siggi]

They'd be using DECORATE to scale the sprites, or they're retarded.

This whole project has been pretty funny, in that sad sad way.

(Am I the only one who thinks a thread to link to another thread with a poll somewhere else is kinda,, er, stupid?)

[Naked Snake]

I'd like to see some screen before I decide to care or not.

[scwiba]

From what I saw, some of the work looked promising. Most, though, were Photoshop filter abominations, even after you had stated that they wouldn't be precisely that. From the beginning, the way the project seemed headed, I couldn't see it lasting very long. I would like to see high-res sprites (if done well), but I really can't see it happening.

[Naked Snake]

RoneKyakone said:

From what I saw, some of the work looked promising. Most, though, were Photoshop filter abominations, even after you had stated that they wouldn't be precisely that. From the beginning, the way the project seemed headed, I couldn't see it lasting very long. I would like to see high-res sprites (if done well), but I really can't see it happening.

Me either. Sounds like vaporware to me.

[Graf Zahl]

There's no DECORATE needed just to replace some sprites in ZDoom. You can just create a WAD namespace HI_START/HI_END or a Zip subdirectory called HIRES and put the data there and it will automatically replace any pre-existing sprite or texture and be scaled to the correct size.

Anyway, this project is no better than all the other resizing projects. Nobody needs this Photoshop filtered garbage so I really don't care whether it failed or not.

[Maes]

I think the decorate lumps are used to specify the scale of each sprite. E.g. an imp is 56 units tall, a "4x enhanced" hi-res version of it will be 224 units tall, and that must be specified somewhere, somehow, since we don't want it to tower above a Cyberdemon...

I don't know what's the behavior of the HI_START/HI_END lumps though, which I never heard of before. A fixed scale/resolution increase specified or implied somewhere else perhaps? With what source ports?

What made the photoshop resizing worthless anyway was that that sort of resizing and filtering was done by OpenGL ports anyway, and with superior results (plus, with much less memory/disk space requirements).

[Graf Zahl]

Maes said:

I don't know what's the behavior of the HI_START/HI_END lumps though, which I never heard of before. A fixed scale/resolution increase specified or implied somewhere else perhaps? With what source ports?

ZDoom/GZDoom/Skulltag.

What it does is to scale the hires sprite to the same size as the original using any scaling factor that is required to accomplish that

What made the photoshop resizing worthless anyway was that that sort of resizing and filtering was done by OpenGL ports anyway, and with superior results (plus, with much less memory/disk space requirements).

Amazingly enough the amount of people who consider hires a requirement for OpenGL is surprisingly high and many of those would take any shit they could get as long as the graphics size is larger than the original.

[mac53]

Now, if I'm correct on this... most of the pics you guys may have looked at weren't done with filters, unless using the "smudge tool" in PSP is filtering. I had gone through that filtering issue a while back and had learned a hell of a lesson, by doing so.


Edited: img links removed.

[Maes]

OK, those examples go a bit beyond what a run-off-the-mill bicubic or trilinear resampling can do (either precalculated or real-time via OpenGL) but there are spline resampling algorithms which can resize images while preserving the "edginess" of certain details like sharp corners, teeth etc.

The question is still who will edit 2000+ sprites by hand, and if the resampling is done via splining anyway, why not build in such a resampling into a specially modified source port so that it can apply to any loaded sprite as well?

The essence is that none of these methods can actually create new detail where there isn't any. A 2x scaling means that for each original pixel you must generate four. 4x scaling means generating 16...so ANY method involving storing already scaled, precomputed pics will never fly.

If you actually retouch every sprite with a smudge brush and other tools, that's another story, but is this what you will actually do/want to do?

[mac53]

@Maes

First, I do want to compliment you on your intelligence.

Let me ask you about a software I have, "PhotoZoom Pro 2". It's a resizing software that carries these functions.

Resizing methods:

Nearest Neighbour
Bilinear
Hermite
Bell
Mitchell
Catmull-Rom
B-Spline
Bicubic
Lanczos
S-Spline
S-Spline XL

With presets:

Generic
Photo-Soft
Photo-Detail
Graphics
Reduce Noise/Artifacts
Down-size
-------------------------------------------------------------

I'm just wondering that if you have any opinion about? Is it any good for what I was trying to do and taking into consideration the contents of your last post?

[amberleaf]

@ Mac. You cant create detail that wasnt in the original. PSP cant look at your pictures and interpret them to be a monster etc.

Put simply "You can't polish a turd"

[mac53]

@amberleaf

How do I get PSP to do that? I'm am seriously green at this stuff and a some instructions would be appreciated... please!

Edited: Does it have something to do with writing a script?
-------------------------------------------------------------------

Edited: Christ... how stupid... I thought amberleaf said that PSP [could] look at a pic and determine its structure.

[mac53]

You guys need to check this out. Thanks goes out to "Hotwax" over at Zdoom for this.

Edited: img link removed

[leileilol]

but zdoomgl has built-in hq4x'ing

[Maes]

@leileilol: that's exactly my point...anything based on the original lo-res sprites and automatically enchanced with any means, will necessarily be limited in innovation and not worth of storing as a bitmap. You could very well have that processing be done at loading time, and save disk space while gaining in general value.

@mac53: intelligence? Dunno, it's more a fact of common sense in this case. However you proposed a possible solution: starting from figurines and using them as a model (a 3D graphics expert would advocate building detailed 3D models, which if I recall do exist, and generate sprites from them). The question is always WHO will paint/model/take photos for all these sprites.

Edit: The mancubus has 3 pairs of man-tits? :eek:

[SyntherAugustus]

I'd rather see something new at this point of Doom's age.

I'm all for nostalgia in all, but I really want to see new things being used with such talents.

[Erp]

I'd kinda like to see some screenshots of the sprites in action before I can really say anything, are there any? (I mean in an actual PWAD). Are these MD2? I personally don't like MD2 models, I use the Doom64 sprites addon in Doomsday. Maybe if MD2 models could use antialiasing or D3D filtering, I don't know. But something new and classic at the same time would be great but very hard to create.

[Grazza]

mac53 said:

Just think, if anyone could get their hands on all of them, then just maybe there could be a chance.

If you mean if id would provide access to their original clay models, and assuming they are still in a reasonably good state of repair, then yes, this might give such a project a better chance. But the task would still be immense. I notice that on Thomas van der Velden's Making of Harmony page, he describes the manual editing of the digital photographs as "the most time consuming part of making the monsters". And he was making the clay models from scratch and doing his own photography. The photography itself would require some technical expertise if you are looking to get an end product that is better than the originals.

However, I can't imagine id wanting to let anyone near their models, which I would guess must be pretty valuable given how much some collectors are willing to pay for random bits of id memorabilia. Especially considering that you would need to manipulate the models into new shapes, and with them being 14-year-old models this would most likely not be trouble-free. Didn't spidey already lose a leg at some point?

[mac53]

Well, here's one and I also emailed him and asked if he had anymore other than this one... I'm awaitin his response.


Edited: img links were removed.

[Naked Snake]

Those sprites look like crap, so I don't care this project failed.

Maybe if you actually did the work from the ground up, you COULD make some kick-ass hi-res sprites.

[Maes]

mac53 said:

Well, here's one and I also emailed him and asked if he had anymore other than this one... I'm awaitin his response.

Since a pic is worth 1000 words...

http://img297.imageshack.us/my.php?image=whatasweetasslk3.jpg

Check that sweet cybie-ass o'er there. Think this was done by using some kind of "NEW and ENHANCED!" sprites?

No, that's a plain ZDoomGL screenshot. As you can see, it's more than comparable, quality-wise with any resize attempt done so far, and it doesn't use anything more than a standard Doom2 IWAD (Oh, and cybie.wad for the screenshot). No photoshop, no nothing, and it would work with *any* sprite *and* texture the same way.

[mac53]

@Maes

and?

[Maes]

mac53 said:

@Maes

and?

<Captain Obvious>
...and, it proves why all resizing and photoshopping is utterly worthless. None is interested in sprites that look like OpenGL filtering, but having to use more RAM, disk space and an external PWAD to achieve it. Plus, there are no truecolor software rendered ports either, so it's two times useless.
</Captain Obvious>

[mac53]

Not everybody sees it that way, Maes.