Strange palette issues

[Sektor 13]

Ok, i tried to make 256 color game, but as palette import doesn't work correctly and all other restrictions a switched to 16-bit.

But.. 1. If i import picture (background) with 255 colors, (pcx - with paint shop pro 9), editor says ther is too much colors and some parts of background become gray (brr ugly), so a reducel colors to 200, and same thing happened, so i went to Photoshop and reduce colors to 200 and save to PCX, editor says again that there are too much colors, but actually changes some other parts to different gray... This is strange as color mode is set to 16-bit, if i change it to 32 bit the same thing happens.... I saved same background to 170 colors and it works fine.. :S ?? (if i save background (in PSP)) to 32 bit pcx image, it is the same effect in game, gray colors.....

[Scummbuddy]

I haven't messed with the palletes in awhile, while some here are experts on it. I believe when you import an image, you must also say to import with exact pallete, or a certain pallete. Are you sure that the pallete you have set in your color selection, are the same colors you are using in your images? You can import more colors as well, I believe.
I'm away from my home comp, so I can't check on what I've just said.

[Sektor 13]

In 16-bit you cannot set any palette. i tried exact palette import (or something similiar, second background import option..) and it doesnt work... i think it s a bug..

[Scummbuddy]

are you sure you switched to  using high-color game?
you were right, you cant do import pics at pallete if you are in high color.

[Sektor 13]

yes i selected 16-bit, is there anything else i must "check" ?

[Scorpiorus]

Well, yes there is no palette in high/true color mode and you should refrain from importing any pcx (paletted) images when working with these modes.

Just re-save your image as a BMP and import it instead.

[Sektor 13]

heh, After restarting computer and AGS this works as it should, background is ok now (i tried with PCX and BMP). But i have another problem, you can import background to use exact palette (that work most of the times ) thats ok, but what about the GUI (in game graphics..). If i import gui , it is slightly different in game, some gray areas become slight greenish and purple, as i don't see any import with exact palette for sprites, what can i do? I tried GUI with 256 Colors and 16-bit one, same....

[Gilbert]

You can import sprites with exact palette (VERY important for palette dependent effects like I ALWAYS use), just uncheck "Remap colours to game palette" when importing a sprite, unless you're using an old old version (prior to V2.53)...

[Sektor 13]

hey thabks, i have 2.61, i will search for that option...

[Sektor 13]

hmm first, i cannot find any "remap colors to game palette" (not in options or when importing sprite, i have just box with "import as 640.."), second, i found out that my color mode was 32 -bit?? WTF? Hmm well GUI was ever the same (greenish) as my room was good, but when i turned back to 16-bit and reimported background as "exact palette" it is still a bit strange, background has 10 500 colors, as 16-bit is aprox. 65 500, so it should have enough slots for my background to stay the same... hmm i think it is time to download new AGS

EDIT: AAha, you can only check those box if you are in 256 color mode....

EDIT 2 :

Ok a DL AGS 2.62 it is the same,...

Look at this:

When i move from SETTING to AREAS (sidebar) the picture changes to less colors (like in game)..

" look at the stargates, gray ring becomes a bit low color...

SETTINGS:


AREAS:

[Gilbert]

uh oh, if it's 32-bit, then there're probably some careless clicking in the palette menu.
If you still want a 256 colour game, the only solution is to change it back, and wish that you don't need to reimport all the graphics in 256 colour mode.

[Sektor 13]

no i wish to have game in 16-bit,, i did that and reimportet backgrounds, they were only 3, sp np biggie, but still bugs me why is that background(who doesn't have more than 170 colors anyways) in low colors, i reimported all in 16bit, but still they look very "low colored"

[Gilbert]

Sorry I didn't read all of your post previously.

The problem is, most probably, because you use 16 bit colour.
You might have asked (which you did): why would a ~10,000 or <256 colour picture won't be displayed properly under 16bit ?
That's because in direct colour modes (15bit onwards) the palettes are fixed, unlike indexed modes (16, 256 colours, etc.) which you can change the colour of each slot to whatever you want. In other words, the palette can't be "managed" in direct colour modes.
So, whenever there're some colours in your original picture which are not in the 16bit palette, they're changed to some other close colours.
So, in some extent, even a 256 colour background can become worse when viewed in 16bit, as in 256 colour indexed modes, each colour slot can be choosen from 2^(6*3)=266,144 base colours (even though only a maximum of 256 can be displayed simultaneously) which is four times the available colours in 16 bit (in 16 bit you have only 65,536 base colours, but they can all be displayed simultaneously).

Normally, when you import a 24bit background in AGS, and the game's set to 16bit the background would be downgraded to 16bit immediately. When you import a 256 coloured background in 16 bit, however, the background will still be stored as 8-bit (to save space). Since the palette info were also stored, in some menus of AGSEdit the background may still look intact (as most people are running their desktop in truecolour which can show all colours, and maybe in some of the menus the editor won't change the display accordingly to 16 bit to reflect the true ingame graphics), but when you run the game in 16bit mode, the colours may look different as now the game is running in a 16bit colour environment.

[Sektor 13]

Hey thanks for the great reply.

Yes i thought so too,.. about 16-bit is fixed, but hopped that import exact pallete for backgrounds can change this.  Hmm well i will live  i guess

But it would be fine if there could be mode with 512 or 1024 colors, you could have custom palette and enought colors to make realy nice games, nicer than 16-bit..

[Gilbert]

There're such modes for some video devices such as some game consoles, etc. But for standard VGA specifications, indexed modes can have only up to 256 simultaneously colours.