I have an idea...Need an opinion. - VERGE, Free 2d Game Engine

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I have an idea...Need an opinion.

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ltcmdstarbuck	I've been trying to come up with a way to sort of fake FMV's in order to keep a game size down. I had an idea about a function that would take each pixel and vary it a couple shades randomly. What I am hoping this would produce is video noise inherent in most pre-rendered movies. (Just watch a couple FMV's and you'll know what I mean.) Now the trick is would that be to taxing on a system. I have a fairly fast computer and it seems to go fast no matter what I do. Posted on 2001-08-22 12:07:00
invicticide	What, are you planning on adding video noise on top of in-engine scripted sequences? If not, you're still going to have a big game size due to all the image data in a video file. Faking video noise won't compress your images :) If you _really_ want to keep your game size down w/o omitting movies altogether, try these suggestions: 1. Make your movies smaller than the screen. You could do 16:9 cinema aspect ratio (with the black bars) or you could make "postcard" movies (though those kinda suck) 2. Set the video image format to paletted color. 3. You could even create a custom movie player that works off a script. Then you could provide various images with scripted behaviors (all done in Python or VC) from which you can construct a movie. The images are saved as files, but the animations are saved as code. You could save a lot of image data that way. Back to video noise... I don't think your code would be too slow on anything but a first-generation PII. Personally, I think the effect would be cool in conjuntion with a [selective?] palette morph for flashbacks and stuff. That is all. --Invicticide P.S. I'd be interested to see a tech demo when you're through! We don't need better engines, we need better creation tools! Posted on 2001-08-22 15:30:02
JL	"I had an idea about a function that would take each pixel and vary it a couple shades randomly." An easy way to do this would be to have several pre-generated pictures of noise and blit them over the video using a low alpha transparency value. This should be quite a bit faster than individual operations on pixels. (I did something similar with V2's translucency to make the static in the opening screen of Nuclear Defender. I know that at least one person mistook it for FMV.) --- I am a frontrunning eltist. Posted on 2001-08-22 15:50:00
Devon	If you're simulating MPEG-like compression, it isn't just pixel-noise, it has structure to it. The 'noise images' should have visible partitions to them, with some random pixel noise within each partition To get an idea of this, get a colorful JPEG and save a copy of it at the lowest possible quality, and take a look at the result. You should be able to see 8x8 (or thereabout) sections of noise. Of course, actual compression artifacts (that's the term, isn't it?) depend heavily on the actual colors, being very visible in areas of high contrast, and especially intense reds and blues, and being almost absent from areas of uniform color and intensity, but I think that's asking a bit much from such an emulation. Truthfully, I would say that the whole concept was pointless and stupid if I hadn't done it myself. -Devon --- Square's making money. We're making art. Posted on 2001-08-22 23:22:38

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