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[Kyzrati]

Wow, thanks for reporting this! Tough to encounter something like that since we generally have our audio devices enabled, eh?

Sorry about that; it's caused by the fact that the engine its based on expects to be able to play audio, though I didn't actually use any in REXPaint. I should probably disable that...

[DragonDePlatino]

Man, I've been seeing this thing pop up everywhere from Temple of the Roguelike(?) to TIGsource. Gotta make something with this sometime soon...Maybe a nice ASCII dwarf like the one in the DF intro.

[Kyzrati]

I do tend to promote it wherever it might be useful, which happens to be all the places I hang out Just released a new version after being relatively silent for a few months, so all the threads were updated.

Share your results here if anywhere--I always like to see what people do with it!

[DragonDePlatino]

Hmm....Here's a quick dwarf I whipped up.



Not really liking how this came out. When I used the program it didn't come out nearly as nice as the other examples. I guess that's because I took a pixel art approach and really avoided using most of the characters...I regret giving myself so much to work with. And about that...

When I first popped open the program I was a little overwhelmed with the sheer size of the palette and canvas. I'm a pixel artist used to super-strict restrictions (16px, 16-color) so I wasn't sure how to approach the program. One thing I would suggest would be to include a very limited palette and canvas size as the default. This'll force people to experiment with all the characters as they communicate their idea. Or maybe when you first boot up the program, there's a sample image already loaded showing off tons of different techniques. Or a gallery already full of user-made art.

But aside from the user issues, I think it's an excellent program! I was a little stumbly in the first 30 minutes, but soon I got the hang of color-picking and inverting half-blocks to quickly anti-alias stuff. My only complaint would be the palette box. Sometimes I'll accidentally left-click my foreground color when I meant to right-click, which brings up a humongous palette-editor which I have to escape out of. An easy way to fix this would be an "edit palette" button like ASEprite has. You should check out ASEprite! It has very streamlined GUI and a palette-quantize option! It would be a dream come true if you could import and export palettes between REXPaint and ASEprite. It would make palette-making such an easy process.

[Kyzrati]

Hey, that dwarf already looks pretty awesome! Seriously. I like the style--everyone seems to have their own when it comes to dabbling in ASCII. I've been having an e-mail conversation with ShroomArts about that lately (he's the concept artist who's been playing with RP lately--some of his stuff I showed on the blog).

Thanks for the feedback.

Most casual users will want to just jump right in and play around, and I figure you experienced guys can just create your own, so I went with having a full color palette for the default. The current default palette in REXPaint is actually the base palette I'm using for my game, hence it was the natural choice for me (I'm not using all those colors, but they're the base "named" colors from the engine). Though I can see what you mean by overwhelmed. It's definitely not too useful if you know what you're doing, but then I'm not really experienced enough with color to feel confident deciding on a small palette others should see first (or even trust that inexperienced users will figure out how to switch palettes...).

If you do make a nice balanced palette or two feel free to upload/send me a copy so I can make it available. I've noticed that quite a few people are interested in qbicfeet's palette available on the download/resources page (the one he used for the Zelda RL mockup), so that says something. I was just yesterday thinking of looking around for some interesting palettes to play with... I'll look into importing palettes from ASEprite for a later version. (If you plan on using RP more in the near term, I'll look into it much sooner to help out--I'm happy to add features for artists actively using RP, if I can support them.)

For now you pretty much have to blank the palette and create your own (though I did include a traditional ANSI palette for that crowd--it's in a separate folder).

I'll check out how ASEprite implements its palette editing; I occasionally click on the same cell and accidentally open the palette editor myself, but that's fairly rare for me since as soon as there's some content in the image I almost always right-click on existing cells to copy the color/contents rather than actually use the glyph/palette windows.

I like the idea of including user art with the release, though I'd have to get the actual .xp files from artists, and most users are still of the download-and-run variety. Maybe in the future! Even the image gallery on the blog is much smaller than I'd like it to be right now. Unless you have a better version forthcoming, I'd totally like to add your dwarf.

The next RP version will allow you to set your own blank canvas size in the config file rather than using the viewport size by default. (This happened to be just requested on a separate forum.)


Funny you mention ASEprite, since I've had the installer sitting on my desktop for over a YEAR now... :/ After trying out lots of other pixel art programs in the past, that one seemed like the most promising, but these days I don't have the time to fool around with pixel art.

[DragonDePlatino]

Thanks for the feedback.

No problem! It'd be awesome to have my dwarf included in the download, but I'd need to edit it a bit more. Tis' a bit rushed right now.

My main problem with the large palette was that when I was working with foreground and background colors, there were so many similar colors that it would be trial-and-error until I match the shade I'm looking for. For a nice default tileset, I HIGHLY suggest Dawnbringer's little-known 32-color palette. It strikes a very nice middle ground between "jump right in and play around" and something more experienced artists would appreciate. Here's a quick recolor I did with DawnBringer32:



Pretty nice, eh?

[Kyzrati]

Wow, that is totally nice, and the palette is exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for.

And no rush on the art. You're the first experienced pixel artist I know of who's picked up REXPaint, so it'll be nice to see what you can do with it after some practice. It does take a little getting used to, but is pretty fast after that initial learning curve.

Just curious: Did you recolor it using the palette swap feature? Or by redefining the palette colors? The next unreleased version of RP also has an easy way to perform image-wide color swaps using two colors in the same palette. (I needed that feature a couple days ago while working on a mockup, so I added it ;p) If that would be helpful to you e-mail me and I can send you a copy.

[bhg]

Is there hope for a Linux port?

I've tried it on Windows and like it a lot but i'd love to have it on my native system.

[Kyzrati]

Sorry, probably not going to be a Linux version

Unless one day I can manage to port the Windows-only engine its based on. (It does work in Wine, but that's a non-ideal solution, I know.)

[Kyzrati]

Felt like drawing something. Meet the Organic Mainframe:

[Kyzrati]

For anyone who wants to play with palettes and fonts from legacy systems, those resources are now available for download (compatible with earlier versions of REXPaint--they don't come with the program).

Palettes from Atari 2600, Apple II, Commodore 64, NES, Sega Master System, ZX Spectrum, and more:


Fonts from Aquarius, MSX, Phillips VG 5000, ZX81, and more:


New version of REXPaint coming soon.

[Kyzrati]

New version is ready for download! (R9/beta v0.99)
Notes here.
Download here.

Quite a few improvements:
* NEW: Image-wide single-color swapping (Shift-LMB in palette window)
* NEW: Scroll image up/down with Shift-Wheel
* NEW: Switch between current/previous image with Ctrl-Tab
* NEW: Separate undo history maintained for each image, making simultaneous editing of multiple files easier
* NEW: Expanded undo support to include image resizing and layer manipulation (all possible edit actions can now be undone)
* NEW: Active layer and layer hide states are now stored for inactive images
* NEW: Set default image dimensions and background color in config
* NEW: Optional hex input/output in color picker
* NEW: Palettes/skins/configs can now specify hex color codes (in addition to RGB/HSV/named colors)
* NEW: Duplicate image names are allowed, provided each image is located in a separate subdirectory
* NEW: Images with changes are auto-saved after a certain duration (interval set in config)
* NEW: Left/Right arrows skip to previous/next directory in image browser
* NEW: File browser supports directory collapsing/expanding (click on folder name)
* NEW: Ctrl-Left/Right collapses/expands all subdirectories
* MOD: Cutting from bottom layer auto-fills area with default image background color (used to be transparent)
* MOD: Set-swap palette color command changed to Alt-LMB
* MOD: Grid resolution command changed to Alt-Wheel
* MOD: Image-wide glyph swap command changed to Shift-LMB (to match new color swap command)
* MOD: .xp files now begin with an internal format version number (will retroactively auto-update old files)
* MOD: File browser extends to full window height when config dimensions are greater than default
* MOD: Create image in image browser subdirectory command changed to Shift-LMB
* FIX: Palette color moving works again (borked in R7 by glyph swapping implementation)
* FIX: Failure to load an image could crash file browser
* FIX: Two mixed-line ASCII codes were inversed (only affected flip-paste orientation)
* FIX: Significant optimizations when processing massive images (render performance equivalent to small images)
* FIX: Undo/redo functionality was failing for image-wide glyph replacements in multi-layered images
* FIX: Undo/redo updates image unsaved changes indicator when applicable
* FIX: Copy tool retains transparency of content selected from non-base layers, rather than converting it to black on paste
* FIX: Skipping to previous directory in image browser via key command (Left/Ctrl-Up) selects first contained image rather than last

[Kyzrati]

No new release of REXPaint yet, but I've set up a new discussion board for REXPaint users over on my new forums. They're brand new (just opened with the launch of my new game, Cogmind), so it may take a little while for users to trickle in. Just mentioning as it will become an alternative and more inclusive avenue for discussion in the future. (RP users have been spread out over a lot of different forums...)

[Aklyon]

(RP users have been spread out over a lot of different forums...)

Sounds like a good thing! (and a management problem)

[Kyzrati]

Heh, certainly good in that there are a bunch, though there is generally little interaction so perhaps providing a centralized location could change that... Not that it's super important, since it's just a free tool for public use, but it's nice to see it in action and have a place for users without an associated forum home to discuss any related topics!