Finding which software was used for Captive internal graphics

[Lyverbe]

I've got a little mystery that I'd like to be solved. A way of solving it could be to figure out which graphics editor was used by Captive's programmer. Unfortunately, after 19 years, he forgot. So, I'm hoping someone here can answer.

The internal graphics have a header to determine the bitmap type, read counts, size and number of bitplanes. These headers are not used by Captive itself.

For example

04,01,68,01                        ; Graphic header
0007E000                           ;              ******
00600E00                           ;          **         ****
019F8180                           ;        **  ******      **
06FFFC60                           ;      ** **************   **
0FFFFF30                           ;     ********************  **
1F8FF198                           ;    ******   ********   **  **
1FDFFBC8                           ;    ******* ********** ****  *
3F07E1CC                           ;   ******     ******    ***  **
3E8BD0E4                           ;   ***** *   * **** *    ***  *
358DB164                           ;   ** * **   ** ** **   * **  *
378FF5E4                           ;   ** ****   ******** * ****  *
27A7F5E4                           ;   *  **** *  ******* * ****  *
2727EDE4                           ;   *  ***  *  ****** ** ****  *
2727EDE4                           ;   *  ***  *  ****** ** ****  *
2673CCE4                           ;   *  **  ***  ****  **  ***  *

Captive was written in 1989-1990, so it would have to be a pretty old software. Any ideas? I don't think it would just be done by hand because it would've been useless to have a header.

[BippyM]

There's a very good chance he wrote a custom program that converted the gfx to the format he required!

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by bippym

There's a very good chance he wrote a custom program that converted the gfx to the format he required!

Absolutely! Game graphics of this type are often made with programs such as DPaint. At this point you can do one of three things: 1) Write an IFF codec and use this in the game, 2) Write an IFF codec and convert the IFF files beforehand, and finally 3) Use an existing IFF to RAW converter.

[Lyverbe]

I know how the game uses these graphics (see http://captive.atari.org/Technical/I...nternalGfx.php), but I'm just curious about the header because there are things I don't understand about byte 0 and 3. It doesn't matter that much anyway.

[thomas]

Well, it was you who defined that the header consists of "bitmap type, read counts, size and number of bitplanes". Where did you get this information from? Doesn't the source define what those fields mean?

Byte 3 is "number of bitplanes". Its meaning should be quit obvious. "Bitplane" is a common term in Amigaland.

[Lyverbe]

Here's what I wrote in my reverse engineering document:

Apart from the graphic sets of 320 x 200 starting at 0x1f7b0, the remaining graphics use a header of 4 bytes. These headers are not used by the system, but could have been used by the application used to create the graphics.
(b) Bitmap type

01 = Font. The first byte is part of the bitmap and indicates the width of the character.
04 = Standard
08 = Unknown

(b) Number of times to repeat the read operation
(b) Number of bytes to read (excluding this header)
(b) The first 4 bits indicates the number of bitplanes. The 7th bit is unknown and only used at 0x1abe8.


So, I wanted to know what this value of 8 represent in the first byte and what the 7th bit of the last byte means.

Captive's code doesn't use these headers, so it's not possible to know from there.

[Zetr0]

Its highly likely superflious data left over from the editor.

Alas, the only decent pixel pushers of the day would of been DPaint / PPaint that I can think of.... wasn't there a TruePaint package... or was I smoking some skany krack at the time?

[Retro1234]

I thought I saw a thread where the graphics had been ripped with GFXRip?
So once there edited and converted back to RAW with ARTPro maybe you still have to add the header? even though Captive doesnt use it?

[Amiga1992]

Originally Posted by Zetr0

Alas, the only decent pixel pushers of the day would of been DPaint / PPaint that I can think of....

Erm, PPaint is not THAT OLD.

[Zetr0]

@Akira

A good point PPaint wasn't out before 1990 I believe..

Heres a quick scan of my Apps directory - some graphics progs and release dates.

Dpaint     - 1985
DPaint 2   - 1987
DPaint 3   - 1989
Dpaint 4   - 1991
DPaint 4.5 - 1992
DPaint 5   - 1994
DPaint 5.2 - 1995

Deluxe PhotoLab   - 1988
Deluxe PhotoLab 3 - 1988 (DEMO)



Personal Paint v2.0 - 1992
Personal Paint v6.0 - 1994
Personal Paint v6.1 - 1994
Personal Paint v6.3 - 1994
Personal Paint v6.4 - 1995


Photon Paint    - 1987
Photon Paint v2 - 1989