Final Fantasy Hacktics

Update 3: After testing with more Type1<->2 conversions, I found that this method although can fix head alignment issues, however, it might not work so well depending on which set of arms you are using. In the above case, it is using Type2 arms.  

With the new ShiShi Editor though, it should be much easier to create a guide for true Type1-> Type2 conversions. Those of you who wish to use this guide, I highly recommend that you use your own judgement when it comes to alignment problems; there are times when moving the body is a much better idea than moving the head, etc. Generally, you want your body and arms to be the same type. If they are different, you should move the body to align with the arms first, and then re-align the head for best results.

I'll get to making a real guide in the future but for now, only use this guide for simple head re-alginment copying a Type1 head into a Type2 body+arms.


Update 2: Added a much more compact and organized "Conversion Sheet (see below)".

Update 1: I think I have gotten all of the ones that have a alignment difference and that ShiShi seems to agree with me -- that my alignments are perfect. There's one more frame that I wasn't so sure (PM me if you want to discuss about that one) but the rest seems fine. Every other head that isn't listed in this post can be directly copied and pasted from TYPE1 to TYPE2 without modifications (so X-0 and Y-0).


(http://img62.imageshack.us/img62/4182/xydifference.png)

What is it?

In addition to slightly different widths and lengths, TYPE1 and TYPE2 sprites have different alignments for Head locations.  Note that the X and Y differences are not consistent (meaning, one head can be X+1 Y+1 while another head can be X-1 Y+0, etc). The same goes for arms.

 
Why is this important?

When working on new sprites, and say if you wanted to use both a Type1 and Type2 sprite as bases together, you will likely need to fix all of these alignment issues manually by hand -- which can be fairly time consuming. Buf if you had the alignment differences between Type1 and Type2 on hand, this process can be much more automated than it should have been; you would be saving a lot of time (though you would still need to use ShiShi and check through the sprite frame by frame later when polishing up). As any experienced spriter will tell you how time consuming the process is, any substantial amount of time saved is a big deal.


How do we find out these alignment differences?

(http://img232.imageshack.us/img232/7541/screenshot20100504at123b.png)

• The front side of the heads should be easier to do, by measuring a Type1 and Type2's XY location of the Eye pixels (usually are consistent).
• The back side of the heads maybe more difficult to do, although comparing a sprite without much hair (like that of a Male Caculator Type2 agains a male Monk Type1) using a similar procedure on the "Face" or "Ear" locations might suffice.
• The arms... they are just really complicated to explain in words, usually it is probably better off to use a set that is natural to your sprite type. For example, if you are making a Type1 sprite, use a set of arms from another Type1 sprite for your arms. Capes / heavy jackets / armor add even more complexity. For these reasons it is probably better off to not discuss about arms in this topic.

TYPE1 to TYPE2 Head Alignment Conversion Chart

(This means moving the Head from TYPE1 into a TYPE2 destination sprite).

(http://img171.imageshack.us/img171/8377/type1type2headalignment.png)

(With respect to 0,0 as top left corner).


[X-1, Y-0] = denotes the pixel translation of Left 1 px.
[X-2, Y-1] = Move Left 2 px, Down 1 px.
[X-1, Y-1] = Move Left 1 px, Down 1 px.
[X-0, Y-2] = Move Down 2 px
[X+1, Y+1] = Move Right 1 px, Up 1 px.
[X+1, Y-0] = Move Right 1 px.

Note: All other heads can be directly copied and pasted over in their original coordinates; they are already in the correct alignment.

For TYPE2 -> TYPE1 conversion, reverse the directions. So [X-2, Y-1] becomes [X+2, Y+1].



(Old Data Collection)

The result of using type 1 arms w/ type 2 body is odd looking i noticed. Looks like arms are floating off of the shoulders in a few animations. This explains it.

Whoa, very ambitious finds, R999. If you can make it easy for us to switch between types, this could be extremely useful for spriters. Again, great work.

Loving this. Great job.

Added a nice compact Conversion Chart (from Type 1 to Type 2, for T2->T1 conversion, reverse the directions.



If you notice that my alignments to be incorrect, or if I made a mistake somewhere, please let me know.

Great work R999, this will be very useful in the futre.

Male and Female

Some of these translations may appear to be off when replacing male over female clothing or vice versa. It's pretty obvious but I should still point it out. Males are also naturally taller because of their slightly longer arm lengths and broader shoulders (generally speaking). You will notice this when mixing male/female bases. Female's arms are generally 1 pixel lower than males, but are also shorter, for example. Even if you manage to place the head correctly, it might not look right because the arms need to be adjusted as well (usually). Anyway... ignore this if I am not making sense. I am sure you'll know what I mean when you work on something like this.


Clothing Alignment

I have tested this somewhat: You can use the same alignment translations in the chart above for when pasting over clothing. Once again, reverse the directions if going from B to A. Use common sense logic here, a lot of stuff can be translated this way, not just limited to heads or clothing.

Great job on completing this. Could this be added as a tutorial on the main page?

I found out that the following 3 frames,

(http://img190.imageshack.us/img190/2964/screenshot20100508at833.png)

all require a translation of [X+2, Y+0] when moving from TYPE1 into TYPE2 (the clothing in green is at TYPE2 coordinates here). So if you happen to have head pieces for those 3, you need to move 2 pixels to the right.

Edit: Please ignore this for now. It might have to do with the fact that I am mixing Gender sprites, Type1 <-> Type2 back and forth that required this. I'll try the same technique on my next sprite to confirm it.

Edit2: Apparently, I have missed the algnments for the "Swing" body frames. There are exactly 8, 4 for front facing, 4 for back facing... and also possibly the "standing talking" animation frames (there 1 for each side). Hopefully I can confirm this on my next male sprite.

This is just too much for me right now. So I guess it's good then.

Update:

This method although can fix head alignment issues, however, it might not work so well depending on which set of arms you are using. In the above case, it is using Type2 arms.  

With the new ShiShi Editor though, it should be much easier to create a guide for true Type1-> Type2 conversions. Those of you who wish to use this guide, I highly recommend that you use your own judgement when it comes to alignment problems; there are times when moving the body is a much better idea than moving the head, etc. Generally, you want your body and arms to be the same type. If they are different, you should move the body to align with the arms first, and then re-align the head for best results.

I'll get to making a real guide in the future but for now, only use this guide for simple head re-alginment copying a Type1 head into a Type2 body+arms.