Strange blurring problem

[8-bit_madness]

Hello, it's me again. So I've been playing around with the full version of Graphics Gale. I've figured out how onion skinning works now so I've been busy making some sprites. I've recently come across another problem with GG though. The program works fine during the initial animation process, however when I save and exit the program and return later I find that every frame from the second one becomes really blurry. Basically it's like the current frame also shows the previous frame (except without onion skin so it looks like a real mess) and basically screws up the entire animation sequence. This is extremely annoying when I want to go back and change something later on when I have more time. This only happens when I quit the program.

Also I'm wondering how do I go about making a sprite sheet in GG? I read a guide where it said that you have to save each frame as a png format, then click on custom grid and copy and paste each frame inside the blue squares. However I can only ever get one blue square to appear on the grid which covers the entire thing. (Can you do this with gif?)

Example showing a two-frame walking sequence:

First frame without blur:



Second frame with blur:



I'm really confused and obviously a complete noob. So please help me out!

Er I didn't expect the images to appear so big cos it wasn't like that when I took the screen shot.

[32]

Kind of hard to tell with your example but it sounds like you have your disposal options wrong. In the [...] menu for the frames change disposal to fill with background colour. If you don't do this it will essentially leave whatever was on the last frame and only redraw the pixels on the new frame that are not transparent.

To get a sprite sheet go File>Export. Change type to combined image.

For the grid you want to chose the dimensions of the grid first, say 16x16. And then click the "show custom grid" button, it's a toggle so if you're not seeing the grid it's probably turned off.

Edit: I should say that once this is saved as a .gif with the disposal incorrect it is non recoverable, changing the option on the .gif won't fix it. Always save as .gal while you work to save headaches like this.

[8-bit_madness]

Kind of hard to tell with your example but it sounds like you have your disposal options wrong. In the [...] menu for the frames change disposal to fill with background colour. If you don't do this it will essentially leave whatever was on the last frame and only redraw the pixels on the new frame that are not transparent.

To get a sprite sheet go File>Export. Change type to combined image.

For the grid you want to chose the dimensions of the grid first, say 16x16. And then click the "show custom grid" button, it's a toggle so if you're not seeing the grid it's probably turned off.

Just fixed the images. I was originally working with more frames but it was a pain so I decided to cut them down. I figured that smaller sprites don't need a lot of frames for animation. I will look at the disposal settings and see what it says.

I thought I was doing it correctly cos I was seeing the grid, but only a part of it. I'll have another look though.

Another thing, lets say that I have a sprite showing a two frame walking scene like above. How exactly should I set up the sprite sheet? Both images are 16x16 pixels. And do I need to have snap to grid selected in order for it to work? Thanks.

[32]

If you use the export tool and change it to combined images it will do the work for you. Just set the number of columns to two if you want the images beside one another or 1 if you want them above and below. If you did want to do it by hand then yes the snap tool would help out.

[8-bit_madness]

If you use the export tool and change it to combined images it will do the work for you. Just set the number of columns to two if you want the images beside one another or 1 if you want them above and below. If you did want to do it by hand then yes the snap tool would help out.

I did what you said and the blur seems to have stopped (after some editing). However now I'm getting strange black marks on the second frame. I never put black inside her eye and there's an extra black line near her shoe. Would it matter if I make another edit inside this sprite sheet to remove the black markings?

[32]

Strange, I have no idea what could cause that, possibly something transparency related. Making edits to the sprite sheet directly would be a good way to avoid any problems yes. If you need to preview your changes you can turn the sprite sheet back into an animation in graphicsgale by going file>import from combined image.

[8-bit_madness]

Strange, I have no idea what could cause that, possibly something transparency related. Making edits to the sprite sheet directly would be a good way to avoid any problems yes. If you need to preview your changes you can turn the sprite sheet back into an animation in graphicsgale by going file>import from combined image.

Cool, I'll try that then. Thanks for your help!

[8-bit_madness]

OK this program is officially weird, lol. I removed the extra black lines in the sprite sheet itself and the animations now look exactly like how I wanted them to but now since importing the images, both have been cut in half. WTF? Everything else appears to be working properly. I''l post an image in a minute since I'm not the best at describing stuff.

Image cut in half:



The frames:



I really want to like this program but then it does stuff like this. I have a backup copy thankfully of all my stuff but still... this is annoying and I don't understand why the program would cut up an image like that.

Sorry about the poor image quality. The original images were too big on the forum so I had to downsize them. You should still get the idea of what I'm trying to say though.

[32]

When you do import from combined image you need to tell the software how many images you have in the sheet. So at the bottom of the window under x type the number of frames there are horizontally, and under y the number that there are vertically. Alternately you can change it to "piece size" and type in the dimensions of your sprite.

[8-bit_madness]

When you do import from combined image you need to tell the software how many images you have in the sheet. So at the bottom of the window under x type the number of frames there are horizontally, and under y the number that there are vertically. Alternately you can change it to "piece size" and type in the dimensions of your sprite.

OK I've done that and the sprite sheet has reverted back to the last edit that I made which is good. Are there any benefits to using the piece size option over specifying XY frames? And once you've imported an image how do you get it to show the final animation? cos I want to make sure that the program hasn't added any more strange stuff to my sprite after editing the sprite sheet. Hope that makes sense.