I have already tried posting this on another group, but the replies I got were “already exists”. Please, if you’ve got nothing to say, try and conjure up something constructive:
I’m thinking about developing a sprite maker. This would include tiling, and previewing such tiles next to each other, animating and previewing animations etc… But my question is - would 2D game developers use such software? I’d like to hear opinions. Thanks in advance.
I’ve seen some decent paid ones, only about $20. Haven’t tried them though. I usually painfully draw each frame, test, tweak, repeat But then I stick to around 4-6 frames.
I could see it being a useful plugin to the SDK. The ability to combine images into one tiled image with customizable dimensions would be great.
I’ve been developing some ideas, so since the first description was vague, I will post them here too. Basically, the sprite maker will be more focused on drawing sprites, rather than rendering. I like to think of my idea as GIMP made for spriting.
Some features I’m thinking about implementing:
Previewing tiling horizontally, vertically and in a box.
Executing effects, or rotation, on a selection, whole canvas or at a pixel point.
Previewing animations in real-time while editting.
I love the idea of making a full-leged SDK with every tools on board … but It’s hard to replace GIMP or (crazy expensive) PTS.
Also I don’t want to say that there’s few Java Image Editor and you can expand if you need. They also have layers, brush texture, filters… and easily to expand to become an ImageTextureEditor or SpriteEditor of MapEditor.
Personally, in Gameloft (i’m an artist of GL), we use a tool called AuroraGT, which manage .sprite file and make sprite animation just like those vector in Flash. It’s definitely a home-grow software but it’s enough for our need as a big company (??).
So, may be you get my point… But, here is the opensource java paint tool you can take and modify.
Thanks atomix. I’ll take a look at how they work, but since I plan on making it expansive through simple codes, I think I’ll have to start from scratch. I don’t want to replace GIMP. I just want to make a tool that would be useful for 2D Game Developers. The people I’ve talked to couldn’t give me a free, real existing sprite-editor. Some linked me to a product on kickstarter, which needs a lot of funding, so I guess it’s going to be quite expensive. Others linked me to something which I guess is a sprite-editor, but it’s not free and it’s only available for Mac. Others said they use software such as Paint.Net and GIMP, which are not built for spriting. These don’t have certain features. For example one of the features I’ve never seen is to tile tiles next to each other so that the user would get the idea of how they look. Or for example, the animation keeps playing while you edit, showing updates in real-time.
But then I stick to around 4-6 frames.