Gauge editing

[ivormills]

Hi,

I am trying to edit gauge bitmaps for CFS1,  and I have downloaded a couple of gauge bitmap editing programs.
I convert the bitmap to bmp for editing, I edit in photoshop, but my prefered way of working is to convert the bmp's from index to rgb. This way you can work much better in photoshop. My problem is, when I convert back to index, even using the original colour table, the gauge is not recognized in cfg edit, says bitmap cannot be loaded. Any ideas?

Thanks

[Hagar]

Look for a utility named GauBmp2 by Chuck Dome. This is very easy to use & will extract the gauge BMPs for editing & replace them afterwards. It's a long time since I used it but I think it works best if you convert your edited images to the correct 8 bit colour format before replacing them into the gauge. They must use the correct colour palette to display properly. I've never used Photoshop but this should be possible with similar options to PSP.

[ivormills]

Hi,

Thanks for your quick reply Hagar.

Yes I have been using the Chuck Dome utility, I convert my bmps back to index colour using the original colour table from the converted gauge bitmap, but it still no joy! Maybe I am missing something?

[Hagar]

As I mentioned, I have never used Photoshop. If I was doing this in PSP I would increase the color depth of the original 8-bit image to 24-bit before editing. This gives the full range of colours to work with. (The colours display in PSP as RGB by default. I have no idea what Index colour is or what difference it makes.) Then decrease the color depth back to 8-bit before saving the changes.

There are various options for decreasing the color depth in PSP. These are the settings I use. It's always worked for me. I'm sure Photoshop must have similar options & you might need to experiment with the settings.



PS. I reduced the color depth of one of these images from 24-bit (16 million colors) to 8-bit (256 colors) using the above method. Can you you tell which is which?

[ivormills]

Hi,

Thanks for that info Hagar, I will give it a try and let you know.

Thanks

[Padser]

~S~ Ivor

I've tried this in the past myself.

I also used Chuck Dome's GauBMP utility, but found the most effective tool was the built in feature in FS Panel Studio (the payware version of CFGEdit).

http://www.fspanelstudio.com/

It'll cost you $24.99 to download.

Using this I was able to go in and make a proper mess of all sorts of my gauges...  ;) Don't forget to back up first, eh?

Cheers,

Pads

[ivormills]

Hi,

Thanks for your reply Pads, I think you are right, bite the bullet, pay the fee, get something that works! Lol

Ty

[Hagar]

I just tried the method I described to repaint & replace a gauge BMP with GauBmp2. It worked a treat.

PS. My Fox Four colleague Mike Eustace uses the same method for most of the gauges in his excellent CFS1 & CFS2 panels.

[Stratobat]

PS. I reduced the color depth of one of these images from 24-bit (16 million colors) to 8-bit (256 colors) using the above method. Can you you tell which is which?

I'll take a shot at it

The one on the right is in 8 Bit... Am I right ?

[Hagar]

[quote]I'll take a shot at it

The one on the right is in 8 Bit... Am I right ?

[Stratobat]

Lmao

Regards,
Stratobat