BluepointVance's Forum Posts

  • Cool, thank you. It's nice to understand this stuff!

    I'll just do it with variables instead. Shouldn't be a problem.

    Thanks again.

  • I completely understand that... But even if the RED variable is set somewhere in the middle, you can subtract from it, but not add. Here is a simple CAP to show my problem:

    RGB FILTER PROBLEM EXAMPLE CAP DOWNLOAD LINK

    <img src="http://i232.photobucket.com/albums/ee215/JDoejoe/RGBFilter_zpsb867a279.jpg" border="0">

    Am I just be missing something simple here?

    Thanks!

  • Okay, I've gotten a little futher on this -- but have run into a possible bug... I am changing the color filter on my nebula sprite over time. This expression:

    Sprite.NebulaBlue Set Color filter to: rgb((getred(NebulaBlue.filter)-10*timedelta),getgreen((NebulaBlue.Filter)-10*timedelta),255)

    Works great. I can get it to drop both the red and green values for the sprite's color filter down to 0.... But trying to do the opposite (adding TimeDelta instead of subtracting):

    Sprite Set Color filter to: rgb((getred(NebulaBlue.filter)+10*timedelta),getgreen((NebulaBlue.Filter)+10*timedelta),255)

    Doesn't seem to do anything, the red and green values stay the same. Anyone have any idea what I am missing?

    Thanks.

  • Working on a new level for my game, here is a Photoshop of what I'm looking for:

    <img src="http://i232.photobucket.com/albums/ee215/JDoejoe/Target_zps74af5c6f.jpg" border="0">

    The two "Nebula Lightning" looking things are what I'm after. I want them to randomly connect to the center object... Animate for a few seconds, then go away.

    I looked at this thread:

    achieve this lighning effect

    Which had a nice looking version of lightning by Oppenheimer on the last page. I played around with it a bit, it's hard to adjust to what I'm looking for... It seems to be quite load heavy.

    I was wondering if there might be a plasma version that might work for me. I'm investigating that now, but I was looking for any more ideas to achieve a good looking version of this effect.

    Any thoughts? Thanks!

  • For completeness sake... I got a sort-of, kind-of version of this working. I'll upload in case anyone is curious:

    Sort-of Swirling Clouds

    I'm not too happy with it, but my meager construct skills are the limiting factor, I think. This level will have to wait until I get better!

    Thanks!

  • This is the closest I've gotten. I create 20 sprites and orbit them around a center object... Decreasing the orbit distance constantly. When a sprite overlaps the center object, it gets destroyed:

    Cloud Spiral Testing

    My problem is, I want to create a NEW sprite at the end of the chain to replace every sprite that gets destroyed. I can't figure out how to pick the last sprite in the chain, get it's location, orbit step, etc... and tack a new sprite on right behind it.

    Any suggestions?

  • Okay, one more -- this one is getting closer... I just feel like I'm being VERY inefficient with this. For instance, I'm rotating the entire layer just to get it to look right. I keep thinking there would be a way to do this with our old friend math.

    Star Spiral 3

    Also, I think it would be better if the stars would actually disappear when they reached the center of the spiral -- then new stars could form at the far end and the process could loop forever...

  • I think I understand that idea: Actually animate one of the curved clouds as a sprite with multiple frames... Then rotate several instances of that around the center object..?

    I can try that -- doubt my animating skills are up to the task!

    I've played around with the blob shader as well. I guess I could rotate several blob sprites in a kind of chain? Is that the idea?

    I keep thinking the Orbiter Behavior will somehow save me. I just don't feel like I understand the math! Here are a few attempts that produce fun results (but not really what I'm hoping for):

    Spiral Stars

    Spiral Stars 1

    Spiral Stars 2

    These are just tests. I was thinking I could reduce the number of objects and make them larger "whispy cloud" sprites instead.

    Maybe I should skip the Orbiter behavior and try Gravitation?

  • I'm trying to crate an animated background for the game I'm doing that looks like a spiraling galaxy. Sort of like this:

    Or like this photo (but in motion):

    <img src="http://i232.photobucket.com/albums/ee215/JDoejoe/SpaceSwirl_zps1ffe9ad4.jpg" border="0">

    I can use the orbiter behavior to create rotating star fields, and they look good. But I was trying to create the CLOUDS that appear to be endlessly spiraling into the center of the image (into the sun or black hole or whatever) and I'm having no luck.

    Is there a trick to animating an endless loop like that? Should I be trying to animate this as a sprite and paste it into the background? (That'd be a BIG sprite, the game runs at 1920 x 1200).

    Any suggestions appreciated! Thanks!

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  • Found the fluid plug-in by Lucid, so I re-hosted and added links to the end of the original thread:

    Fluid Plugin Thread by Lucid

    In case anyone else was having trouble finding them.

  • Original links are all dead. Was difficult to find them again, so I re-hosted them here:

    FluidAlpha.rar

    FluidExample.cap

    TBB.RAR

  • Yes, I was very interested in checking out that Fluid Plug-In, but the link was broken. I'll mail Lucid and see if he can send it. It'd be nice to rehost some of these things since all the old links are dead... I realize most people have moved on to Construct2 -- but for my needs, that just won't work.

    I'll try playing around with custom movement. I've never been very good with it, but it's worth a shot.

    Thanks!

  • Okay,

    So I got a version of a "space cloud" working. The CAP is here:

    BlobTest4

    There are really two problems with it:

    1) The way it's set up, I can't really make the cloud all that big. The underlying sprite that controls the movement by having a Physics behavior attached stops working as expected if I try to make it larger. (currently 20x20) -- and if I try to increase the number of sprites beyond 125, it just crashes. Which brings me to point 2:

    2) I know already this is total overkill for what I'm looking for. This is 100 Physics objects on the screen all for this little wispy effect that in no way effects game play.

    It looks cool, though!

    Again, any suggestions for alternative methods greatly appreciated. Thanks!

  • Actually, the erase effect (which I had never used before) does do a little of what I was hoping for.

    It looks a bit like it's kind of "smearing" the underlying "space cloud" sprite... It's seems to want to smear the player sprite at well. I can try to offset it by a few pixels, see if that helps... But at least it give me something new to play around with. Thanks!

    Any other thoughts greatly appreciated!

  • So, I have this overhead space shooter game I've been working on, on and off, for just over 2 millenia. In it, I have these "space clouds" that orbit the "black hole" at the center of the playfield. See pic:

    <img src="http://i232.photobucket.com/albums/ee215/JDoejoe/SpaceWarp_zps75325fe5.jpg" border="0">

    EDIT: The cloud is pretty hard to see in this pic, but it's there. Trust me!

    I was HOPING to add an effect where anytime a player flew through one of these clouds, they'd leave a kind of furrow -- like a car driving through snow.

    I thought this might disappear after a moment or two, as the gas of the cloud filled in the gap.

    I've tried dropping sprites whenever a ship was overlapping the cloud, and having those sprites inherit the cloud motion... Then adding a FADE behavior so they slowly wink out of existence leaving only the cloud sprite... It doesn't look to great, perhaps it's the sprite I'm choosing?

    I also tried playing around with a quazi blob type setup where the "blob" sprites all had a physics component and were tied to an invisible object that made it seem like they were drifing along. Then when the player's ship moves through -- they'd move aside, etc... This looks okay. But not at all like the "furrows in the snow" look I was hoping for. Here is a CAP for that:

    https://www.dropbox.com/s/0orlinpcnmam28r/BlobTest3.cap

    That one is using the BlobTest effect from Tulamide that I found on the boards here somewhere, but will now rehost here:

    Fluid.rar

    Anyway, that's as far as I've gotten. I was hoping someone might have a suggestion as to another way of achieving this kind of effect.

    Any help greatly appreciated--

    BluepointVance