This Flash Gordon style rocketship is my first serious attempt at unit making. I managed to get all the way to creating several storyboard animations, but now I hit a snag: I can't seem to make the pallette to work. :blush: And believe me I tried many times.

Is there any kind soul willing to help me out? :D

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/Flash_Demopic.jpg

Maybe some day this could become a full Flash Gordon mod, in black and white as it should be. :D But making this first monochromatic mod work will be a challenge...

Open the storyboard in photoshop (or your paint program)
change the color (saturation, and so on) of all shades of magenta and your civ color (typically blue) to be black.
Now change your storyboard to indexed color
delete 99% of the blacks colors, the difference in black shades can not be seen in game.
Now go through the remaining colors combining nearly identical ones.
Simple method is open the color table
take a screen shot of it (ctrl +alt + print screen)
close the color table, open a new document and past a screen shot of the palette in this new image.
resize the storyboard so you can view the color table and a screen shot of the color table.

Cull out the unneeded colors. Once you get down to 160 colors, use Pedit (or photoshop) to copy the colors into the new storyboard palette.

I also suggest you turn off reflection in your unit. It will play hash with your palette. Generating all sorts of colors you do not need or want at civ scale.
Similarly limit opacity and refraction.
You can use specularity to gain the shiny look you want.

Nice looking rocket, btw.
Maybe add some sparks or flames to the smoke.

Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum FLASH!!!!!
AHHHHHHH!!!!
He"ll Save the Universe, Da Nauh, Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum Dum .........

cool idea

Thanks for the compliments and the tips... :)

Is there any list somewhere of which types of colors (civ color, edge, smoke, semi-transparent,...) go where in the pallette?

Gordon's alive?

Did he ever die? :D

So could anyone please give me that list of which types of colors go where in the palette?

Did he ever die? :D

So could anyone please give me that list of which types of colors go where in the palette?
Here you go
http://www.cdgroup.org/forums/tbs/civ3/viewtopic.php?t=7132

Thanks, I'll give it a try... :)

This is getting quite frustrating... :cry: For two days I have been trying now, but still the edges of the rocket are jagged. As far as I can tell it's from shades of magenta which are not included in the palette, so Photoshop will take the next best thing which is a mix of grey and magenta pixels...

Any suggestions on how to solve this?


This is a little preview of the run animation (without palette): little flames but lots of smoke, like the original... :)

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/Flash_run.gif http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/flashgordonshipside2.jpg

If you're using photoshop, here's what you do when you select your pallet colors, its really great

Select box1, row1 like how I showed in that thread on CDG. Then drag across the entire 1st row so all that is selected. Box1 will be your background color, then select BLACK for the last color in the row. Photoshop will blend them. It should help you out.
If you're really brave you can try and use row2 for some white smoke effects, but that's harder to explain.

For your silver colors, Select column1, row3, and drag down 1-3 rows and select the lightest color on your unit, then black. Photoshop will blend it again for you.

Thank you so much! That was the missing piece... :) I'll still have some work getting the death explosion right, but at least there was progress today... :D

Already have an idea for the next two units:

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/Spacerockets.jpg

and then I'll start working on the Star Trek mod again...

Tin Tin's rocket?

The one and only. ;) Since I live in Belgium, I thought it would be a great Belgian UU...

You may need to redo the smoke color because right now it looks too similar to the actual rocket. Ever think about adding flames and black smoke instead?
For Flash's rocket I mean.

I'll see what I can do... I will need to find a new smoke material for that.

I agree with Wyrmshadow. Some darker smoke or some flames would be good. As I recall the TV one had some small smoke, combined with flames and sparks.

Is this what you had in mind? I must admit it looks better this way...


http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads10/Flashrun.jpg

I agree it does look better. Better color for the smoke. And the flame works well also.

If you're feeling ambitious you can use an opacity (see through in parts) map to make the flame less hard edged. But this can be a pain to get right...

I'm afraid that's still a bit too ambitious for me, this is my very first unit. Maybe I'll remake this unit at a later date to tweak out the final details once I have more experience... :)

OK, it's finished. Thanks for all the help, guys... :)
You can find it here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=126076