Mapconv: Old one works, new one crashes

[Camilo Cienfuegos]

Forgive me if this has been covered before, but it's left me a little stumped and my searches returned little that proved useful, except perhaps a thread that you'll find on the second page of the search results for "trees" (I can't link, I'm too new and I get lots of lovely sql errors when I try!), which at least opened my eyes as to why this problem was happening.

In a nutshell, I've just had a crack at making my first map. I have however run into a few snags, most of which I've thankfully now beaten. However, trees are still giving me a headache. Now I might be wrong, but given that mapconv threw a fit when I tried to pass it the argument for a feature bitmap I surmised that this was superfluous, and omitted it when compiling - so instead of the four files suggested in the tutorial, I simply ran with a texture.bmp, metal.bmp and height.bmp. This compiled happily, and after a few minutes I was archiving the files and loading the map up. However, It seems that somewhere along the line mapconv decided that I should have trees all over my map. Now this is very pretty in the most part, however I didn't really want them and as a side effect, some of the water on my texture map (which has a greenish tinge) is full of trees.

In short, is there a flag I can pass mapconv to not automatically place trees according to my texture file (I assume it automatically generates them based on the texture file anyway, rather than Spring choosing to do this on the fly) and if the feature file has been retired, how then would I place such items?

Many thanks in advance,
Camilo

http://www.ianrstewart.plus.com/tasprin ... atwar3.sd7

[mufdvr222]

Thats strange, I remember the first version of mapconv would place trees wherever the texture was green, but the version your using only places trees via information contained in the feature.bmp
The following info is copied from IceXuick map design help in the wiki.
http://spring.clan-sy.com/wiki/IceXuick_Map_Design_Help
This is about the best guide for beginners because it has all the critically important info in one place.

"The Featuremap:



In the featuremap you can place Geo-vents, Trees, grass, and extra features like rocks, palms, energy spires. You need to have these 'extra' features, later to be compiled within the map. Geo's, tree's and grass will work automatically. For the extra features, you need to get the whole pack, which consists of a couple of maps with files for the model, the texture and the script. Check the "maps" forum for features that were created.



Geo's are represented by GREEN (255), single pixels. Every green (255), pixel will (most likely) be compiled as a geo-vent.

The shades 200-215 of GREEN are different Tree-types. Remember to use 1 single pixel for tree's as well. 200-206 seem to be coniferous tree, 207-215 seem to be decidious.

BLUE represents the ammount of Grass to be placed, where black means none, and BLUE (255) means full spreading of grass)

Than Last but not least, RED, for the Features. In the FS.txt file (that comes with Mothers MapConv, you can list all your features, that you want to use. The first feature that is listed in this file, will be represented as RED 255. The second feature will be RED 254, the third RED 253, and so on. Also features will need only one pixel.

Try to make sure that no one of those pixel are next to each other within 4-5 pixels. This may crash during compiling, or gives strange results in-game."

[Camilo Cienfuegos]

I suppose it's possible I've landed myself an old version of mapconv.

I'll grab a few versions from file universe and see if the results differ at all. As I said, I've got the features.bmp done and in place, but calling it when I run mapconv throws out errors and so I compiled without it.

The more I think about it, the more it really does sound like I've got myself an old version...

[aGorm]

Actully, im pretty sure mothers map conv places the old way if you dont pass in a feature map. Of course if you have an old version it wont understand the feature map arugment and would probablie crash... Who knows indead.

http://www.unknown-files.net/1725/All_Mapping_Tools_V3/

Thats got everything you should need...

aGorm

[Forboding Angel]

The reason mapconv keeps crashing when oyu try to feed it your feature mpa is because you have features too near the edge od the image. You need about a 5pixel wide strip of black on all your edges of your feature.bmp

[Camilo Cienfuegos]

The reason mapconv keeps crashing when oyu try to feed it your feature mpa is because you have features too near the edge od the image. You need about a 5pixel wide strip of black on all your edges of your feature.bmp

I'm pretty sure this isn't the case, as it was a prototype map I was building and as such my feature map was entirely black. The error I received was in the vein of "unknown flag", which lends credence to the idea of my having an older compiler. I'm just about to run through it again with what I hope is a newer version, so I'll let you know.

[Camilo Cienfuegos]

Actully, im pretty sure mothers map conv places the old way if you dont pass in a feature map. Of course if you have an old version it wont understand the feature map arugment and would probablie crash... Who knows indead.

http://www.unknown-files.net/1725/All_Mapping_Tools_V3/

Thats got everything you should need...

aGorm

Using the files you linked I am unable to compile. Mapconv bombs out with the error "Errenous dimensions for heightmap image". Images are 20480x10240 for the Texture, 2561x1281 for the Height, 2561x1281 for the Metal & 2560x1280 for the Feature. It compiled successfully using the (presumably) older compiler.

mapconv.exe -l -i -x 255 -n -20 -m Metal.bmp -a Height.bmp -t Texture.bmp -f Feature.bmp -c .5 -o Worldatwar3.smf

The same thing happens even if I reduce the value of the height flags.

[Forboding Angel]

40x20?

Ok that's bad news when it comes to mapconv. Mapconv gets really shitty around 28x28 and up (square root of your sizes is a little over 30). Also, mapconv will bomb if your texture map is above 600 megs (598 if you wanna be real picky about it).

Try using -x 101 -n 100 for your height ranges, then if it manages to compile change them with SMFED.


BTW quick mapping tip... If you're gonna have a map that big you should use no less than a 600 difference in height range, otherwise, it will be pretty much totally flat and it will look kinda crappy (it also depends on the type of map you are making of course).

[Camilo Cienfuegos]

40x20?

Ok that's bad news when it comes to mapconv. Mapconv gets really shitty around 28x28 and up (square root of your sizes is a little over 30). Also, mapconv will bomb if your texture map is above 600 megs (598 if you wanna be real picky about it).

Try using -x 101 -n 100 for your height ranges, then if it manages to compile change them with SMFED.


BTW quick mapping tip... If you're gonna have a map that big you should use no less than a 600 difference in height range, otherwise, it will be pretty much totally flat and it will look kinda crappy (it also depends on the type of map you are making of course).

Actually it worked pretty well - http://www.ianrstewart.plus.com/tasprin ... atwar3.sd7.

The heightmap & metalmap still need some work, and due to the fact that the newer compiler throws an error where the older one did not, I'm still stuck with trees in the water and geo vents where I do not wish them. However the compiler that I used had no issues at all other than this, and the only problems I encountered trying to create this monstrosity was that I had to change all my gimp settings just to cope with the massive texture file. That said, it's come out at a reasonable 20mb for the finished product.

I would of course still prefer to run this through a later compiler, and be able to select the features I wish. All in all though, it does work. Until I can figure out why the newer mapconv is convinced that my height map is the wrong size where the old one did not, I guess I'm stuck with trees in the water!

[Camilo Cienfuegos]

Just a thank you to those of you who helped me beta test this map, and to the advice given. Problems encountered with the gameplay:

-Metal
Still too much metal. Himalayan mines give out 40 metal, antarctic gives around 30. Should be half this in next version, which with a radius of between 300-500 should balance quite well.

-Sea
Sealevel too low. Tidal generators can be built, but shipyards cannot. Have performed some tweaks to the heightmap to enable me to decrease the lowest level of the map to allow ships.

-Terrain
Too jagged. Tanks really struggle to move around freely even on plains Have performed some tweaks on the heightmap to smooth the overall terrain without overly affecting the mountain ranges.

[Camilo Cienfuegos]

At the suggestion of a kind spring player, I have since altered my images somewhat but with no success. Previously, the Texture.bmp was a 24 bit bitmap 20480x10240, the Heightmap was an 8 bit grayscale 2561x1281 bitmap, the Metalmap was 2561x1281 redscale 8 bit and the feature was 2560x1280 24 bit. They are now all 24 bit images, but the problem remains that the more recent compiler still considers my heightmap to be incorrect.

Just out of curiosity, I also created an exact 1/8th heightmap at 2560x1280 but the same error occurred.

I've also released the third beta of this map. See the original post for the link to download. Any and all feedback appreciated.