AMOS Sprite Designer ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Introduction ------------ This editor is designed for drawing AMOS Bobs & Sprites. It can also be used to design Icons, by designing them as bobs and then using the Icon_Conv.Amos program to convert them to icons. All the functions in this editor refer to both sprites and bobs. The only difference in AMOS being in the way the bitplanes are stored, and that sprites are only up to 16 colours. So all references in this document are to sprites rather than sprites/bobs. The Sprite editor is almost completely icon driven, except for 2 keyboard controls to load and save banks. To load an AMOS sprite bank, press the "L" key. A file selector will appear for you to select a sprite bank. To save press "S" and again a file selector is used to select where to save the bank. The editor will only allow you to save/load .ABK Sprite banks. Controls -------- The Icons are split into 5 rows of 10 icons in the icon window (the top half of the screen) and the edit window has 2 edit boxes. The zoomed view of the sprite in the left edit box, and the actual sprite in the right box. To the right of these boxes is the colour palette. Drawing ------- To draw a sprite simply use the mouse to draw in the zoomed edit box with either the left or right mouse buttons. To change colours, click with either the left or right mouse button on the palette. This system enables you to have 2 colours to draw with at the same time. If you draw with both buttons held down, the colour drawn will randomise between the 2 colours. Drawing Icons (3rd and 4th rows down) ------------------------------------- Plot Draws single points at the mouse position. Draw As plot, but while the button is held down the points are connected. Line Use the left button to select the start point, drag the line to the required length/angle and then the line is used as a brush. Airbrush The airbrush randomly places points around the cursor. When selected, click the left button and drag to size. The airbrush flow rate is set in the NICENESS option page. Box As with Line, use the left button to drag the box to size, and then it is used as a brush. Bar Filled box (see box). Ellipse See Box Text Allows you to use the currently defined font to add text to a sprite. Use the keyboard to enter text, Backspace is used to change it. Fill Fills in shapes. If the left button is pressed, it fills in until it reaches a different colour (a normal flood fill). If the right button is pressed, it fills until it reaches the same colour as you are filling with (or the edge of the sprite). The Bar and Fill functions use the currently defined fill patterns. With Box,Bar,Ellipse,Line,Text and Airbrush, clicking the right button allows you to resize the brush. Cut/Paste --------- The 2 icons to the top left of the screen allow you to cut out an area from the zoomed sprite, and then paste it elsewhere in the sprite. When Cut is selected, click on the zoomed area and drag the cut area to size. The program will then use this cut area as a brush. Clicking on Paste will allow you to go back to using this brush while you are in the editor. The next icon to the right lets you set the transparency of the brush. When transparent, all areas of the brush in colour zero will become transparent. The next batch of icons allow you to change the handle of the brush. Hot-Spot -------- Below the Cut/Paste icons are the hot spot controls. In Amos the hot spot is used when calculating where on the screen the sprite is to be placed. If the hot spot is at the centre of the sprite and the sprite is placed at co-ordinates 23,40, then the centre of the sprite will be at 23,40. The first 7 hot spot icons place it in preset positions (TL,TM,TR,BL,BM,BR,Centre), the 8th one allows you to position the hot spot anywhere on the sprite. Whenever the cursor is over the hot spot icons, or when you are in hot spot place mode, the current hot spot will be hilighted. Sprite Sizing ------------- To the top right of the screen are 4 icons which allow you to change the format of the sprite. The first, with the inscription "See as Sprite" shows you the image, as it would be displayed by the SPRITE command. (Sprites are faster, but limited to 16 colours and have other screen limitations. See the AMOS manual for details). The other 3 icons are: Scrunch The image is moved as far to the top left of the sprite as it will go. Optimise Does a scrunch, and then shrinks the sprite size to the minimum required for the image (saves memory). Re-Size Brings up a cursor pad, which then allows you to change the size of the sprite. The zoom factor of the edit box automatically changes to the optimum for the size. Click with the right button to get out of this mode. The size of the sprite can also be changed by clicking on the display area with the left mouse button then press the right button when the sprite is the required size. Note: If a sprite is within 32 pixels size in both dimensions, it will be displayed in full at x4 magnification. Above this size, a window of 32x32 pixels will be displayed at x4. The displayed area can be changed with the cursor keys. The area you are editing is shown by the two marker bars on the sprite display area. Other Editing functions ----------------------- To the right of the draw icons are several usefull functions for changing the image: CLR Clears the image to the current fill pattern/colours. H/V Flip Flips the image over horizontally or vertically. Rotate Rotates the image 90 degrees clockwise. Scroll Allows you to scroll the image around within the edit window (right button exits) Zoom Lets you reduce or enlarge the image. In this mode, clicking on the display box with the left button re-sizes the image. Clicking with the right button fixes it at this size. Select any other drawing mode to finish REZ Enables you to change the screen resolution and number of colours to to work in. The editor currently supports these resolution/colour sets: Low Rez: 8,16,32 & 64(EHB) modes Hi Rez : 2,4,8 & 16 Modes Grabbing Sprites ---------------- The series of icons at the bottom of the screen let you move sprites to and from the sprite bank. To the left of these is the RGB button, which allows you to change the values of the colours being used. After the RGB button, the grabber icons go in this order: Insert Sprite Creates a space and then puts the sprite into the bank Put Sprite Puts the current image directly into the sprite bank, overwriting the sprite that was there previously Get Sprite Gets a sprite from the bank and lets you edit it Delete Sprite Removes a sprite from the sprite bank (No Undo!) Erase Bank Deletes ALL of the sprites in the bank (No Undo!) To view the sprites in the bank, there are 5 icons on the bottom right of the icon window. There are 4 arrow buttons to allow you to move between the sprites, and an icon with the current sprite number in it. While the cursor is over any of these icons, the sprite selected will be displayed in the display window. It will not overwrite the sprite you are editing. To go to view mode, click on the numbered icon. This will enable you to see 3 sprites at once. To exit this mode simply move the cursor off the bottom of the icon area. Other Icons ----------- UNDO Undoes the last bit of drawing/zooming/rotating/flipping etc. QUIT Exits the program. NICENESS Allows you to change the border colours of the edit window, and "ping" sound and volume when you click on an icon. The niceness box also lets you change the airbrush flow speed. Keyboard Shortcuts ------------------ As with the STOS sprite editor, the AMOS sprite editor uses the cursor keys to store sprites in the bank. By pressing the cursor keys with the shift key held down, you can do the following: Shift Up Store the image in the current location in the bank (The same as the PUT button) Shift Down Get the current sprite from the bank (As the GET button). Shift Left Store the image in the current location, then get the previous sprite from the bank. Shift Right Store the image in the current location, then get the next sprite from the bank. The function keys give you fast access to the next 10 sprites in the bank. They are offset from the sprite you are working on. So if the sprite pointer was at sprite 5 in the bank, F1 would access sprite 5, F2 sprite 6 etc. to F10 which would access sprite 14. To store a sprite in the bank, press shift and a function key. To retrieve it press the function key on its own. This makes it easier to work on an animation sequence. Credits ------- Programming: Aaron Fothergill Graphics : Adam Fothergill