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Gimmick
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Gimmick's News

Posted by Gimmick - December 24th, 2014


It doesn't look like the planned release of ASBoxer on December 25th is going to occur, since there are still quite a few features left to finish:

  • Autoboxing
  • Plugin chains
  • Help topics
  • Uploading many images instead of only one
  • Resizing the boxes after drawing them
  • And many other trivial things that are mostly finished, but cumulatively will take a few days to implement, at least

Thus, I've decided to scrap a few features for now, namely:

  • Autoboxing
  • Plugin Chains
  • Uploading many images instead of only one
  • Resizing the boxes after drawing them

On the plus side, I have finished a few features since:

  • Native menus rather than a custom UI
  • Exporting image sequences
  • Confirmation/dialog/alert boxes

Posted by Gimmick - October 28th, 2014


Update as of 5:56 AM, 11/21/2014: I've not forgotten this project! A lot of progress has occurred in this so far, although that could be due to feature creep, since this project is technically 'finished' :v


So for a few days I've been working on a little hitboxing tool after I saw a post in the flash forum by @PsychoZombii requesting any hitboxing tools. There weren't many apart from Hitboxer, and I saw it as a challenge.

What is a "hitboxing tool"? 

A hitboxing tool is basically an application that allows you to draw hitboxes on any spritesheets that you import, and exports the resulting hitboxes in some file. The one I'm working on has the option of exporting it to XML.

That's really basically it. Sounds simple and yes it is. (Edit: ...although feature creep is slowly, um, creeping in...)


Features so far:

  1. Import spritesheets and split them up into rectangles (frames)
  2. Add/remove hitboxes
  3. Export to XML
  4. Preview animation and step through frames
  5. S̶o̶m̶e̶ ̶s̶o̶r̶t̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶a̶ ̶u̶s̶e̶r̶ ̶i̶n̶t̶e̶r̶f̶a̶c̶e̶  Well it's become better now; I've skinned the buttons to be flat instead of the default beveled style because it's simple and I'm no artist. I may make skins available for that sort of thing if users prefer it in the future, though.
  6. Scroll wheel zoom
  7. Better XML support -- mostly backend stuff that will make it easier in the long run.
  8. Box tags and names. Tags are added as children of the <box> tag, rather than properties of the <box> tag so as to reduce clutter. Names are properties of the <box> tag itself, like so: <box name='foobar'>
  9. Namespaces in the output XML -- if the box tag has children, the property 'xsi:nil' is 'false'. If not, the tag ends with '/>' and has 'xsi:nil' set to 'true'.
  10. Timeline support -- I now have a layer system similar to Flash's layering system, with frames and all. I plan to include multiple layer support as part of the timeline and different nodes for different layers; this could be useful for creating multiple hitboxes for a character, say, for different levels or different 'upgrades' and so on -- use your imagination :p
  11. Ability to dock and undock windows on user input -- much like Flash's and general Adobe's stuff, integrating into the main window or docking into separate windows. Uses a Panel class and a custom NativeWindow class for that. Currently uses a boatload of event listeners, though; will possibly work on reducing that in the future.
  12. Negative framerates and backwards playback.
  13. Import GIF files instead of a spritesheet; uses the as3gif library by Thibault Imbert -- Note: this imports a gif file and then creates another bitmapdata and copies the frames to it, so it will use around 2x the memory it actually requires. Thus, don't import medium to large GIF files (dimensions, that is -- a 100KB gif file is fine if it's less than 200 px * 200 px and / or has less than 30 frames) just yet.
  14. Timeline layering support -- I guess I'd finished this a while ago, just forgot to update. Now for a particular spritesheet, you can have multiple hitboxes (say, for example, powerups -- the hitboxes may change in size, and the different layers can hold differently-sized hitboxes for that purpose. It's a <layer> tag that contains the <frames>. I suppose I could just convert them to an attribute for compact sizing, but idk)
  15. Clipboard support -- now you can copy boxes and paste them.
  16. Pie menu support -- now there's a main context menu that looks kinda like the context menu in Maya and other programs.
  17. Export GIF from spritesheet and export spritesheet from GIF -- This is more like a secondary utility as it does not have anything to do with ASBoxer as such, but is a nifty utility to have. Who knows when it might come in handy? You can export a GIF from a spritesheet only (because what is the point in importing a gif and re-exporting it? If it's corrupted, you can instead export as a spritesheet and then re-import it and re-export it as a GIF, if you want; that'll fix it, most likely) and export a spritesheet from a GIF only (again, because what is the point in importing an image and re-exporting with the same settings, or worse?) The formats exportable from GIF to spritesheet are JPG, JXR and PNG.
  18. Support for JSON exporting -- you can now export to JSON (it's a good thing flash had native JSON support.) The layers have name properties inside them, and to access a layer, or a frame, or a box, you just go by its index; if there are 5 layers, they can be accessed from 1...5; if there are 200 frames, they can be accessed from 1...200. If there are 2 tags in a box, it can be accessed by 1 and 2 respectively. After that, just use .name to get their names.
  19. New! A splash screen akin to Visual Studio 2010's and similar programs.
  20. And some other trivial stuff I don't remember.

Features planned:

  1. Refactoring (really really crappy and tightly coupled code right now)
  2. Resize the boxes after drawing them (seems strange to be able to add and remove them but not resize them)
  3. Upload many images instead of a large spritesheet
  4. Native menus rather than a custom UI
  5. New! Autoboxing: Where you select a spritesheet and it automatically creates boxes based on the shape of the character
  6. New! Select individual rectangles instead of many rectangles of the same size (frame rects)
  7. New! Extensions (using a custom API or some other way, sounds exciting!)
  8. New! Custom skin support for user interface
  9. New! Chroma-keying / background support for non-transparent images (like JPEG and JPG files, and 24 bit PNGs without transparency)
  10. New! Plugin chains like Vegas Pro / Sound Forge / etc.

And after I've completed most features I guess I might put up the project on Github if I feel like it. Suggest any other features you'd like to see!


Screenshots:

Main screen on 10/26/2014:first prototype
(image squashed to show lack of fluid layout in the application)

Main screen on 10/27/2014:second prototype
(image squashed again, but this time there's a fluid layout -- the sidebar doesn't shrink)

Editing screenshot as of 10/29/2014: (I didn't show the main screen since the panel on the right was removed; it was supposed to appear only while editing, so this is more of the actual application. Lookin' good if I may say so myself)third prototype
(fluid layout and checker backgrounds -- the trollface image was the quickest transparent image I could load, hah. The button marked "label" was supposed to be the button marked "apply changes", but I'll change that later.)


My exams are now over! Now for the next set of exams in April :>

In the meantime, I'm working on:

  • #2, Resizing the boxes after drawing them.
  • #4, Native menus rather than a custom UI. (Although I may offer an option of both if people want that) (Special note: This is a rather daunting task because there's so many options to be included. It's made really easy due to Adobe AIR, but there's still a bit left, say anywhere from 35% to 50% remaining)
  • #9, Chroma-keying.

Features Finished

  1. 10/26/2014 and prior -- Most of the basic stuff (features #1 to #5)
  2. 10/28/2014 -- Better XML support
  3. 11/03/2014 -- Box tags and names (updated on 11/05/2014)
  4. 11/20/2014 -- Ability to dock and undock windows
  5. 11/21/2014 -- Timeline support
  6. 11/26/2014 -- Negative framerates and backwards playback
  7. 12/01/2014 -- GIF Support added! Now you can import GIF files and it'll convert them into frames. Thanks to the as3gif library by Thibault Imbert.
  8. 12/02/2014 -- Timeline layering support
  9. 12/04/2014 -- Clipboard
  10. 12/05/2014 -- Pie Menu support
  11. 12/07/2014 -- Export GIF and/or Spritesheet
  12. 12/10/2014 -- Splash Screen
  13. 12/13/2014 -- JSON Support

Features partially / mostly completed

  1. #2, Resizing boxes after drawing them
  2. #4, Native menus rather than a custom UI (well, both right now coexist and I'm not planning to remove that)

Posted by Gimmick - June 11th, 2014


...belated. I think. I'm 16 now. Whee.


Posted by Gimmick - April 28th, 2014


So most of you know yesterday / day before yesterday as Pico Day. There was a livestream and stuff. I missed most of the first half (~6 to ~9 hours missed) but I was present through the rest of the stream, albeit intermittently. During that time, however, I took copious amounts of screenshots; I've uploaded them both on the dumping grounds and the download links are below. They're all widescreen 1366x768 JPGs, although I do have BMPs of all/most of them if required (although they are about 6 to 10 times bigger, as expected)

Differences between this year's and last year's Pico Day

This Pico Day was considerably shorter than the last one. This one lasted only around a day and a half, maximum, whereas last year's Pico Day stretched about 3 or so days, possibly even more. This time it was hosted by Ustream and there was only 1 camera (apart from the monitor cam) whereas last year, there were around 4, 5 cameras in different views.

Highlights of this Pico Day:

I don't have a full list of all the people who attended Pico Day (write in the comments below!); so far, I know that the following have attended:

  1. VicariousE
  2. TomFulp
  3. Emily-Youcis
  4. RicePirate
  5. MysticSkillz
  6. Jaxxy
  7. Knights
  8. Nogfish
  9. Stamper
  10. Fungasm
  11. TomaMoto
  12. Manly-Chicken
  13. Sequenced
  14. (Honorary mentions to the Monsters, Inc. mask and Penicorns)

Oh, and did you know? (You probably do, if you've been to the office. But I haven't)

  • There's a refrigerator in the office with beer, labelled "booty juice".

Download links:

  1. Part 1 (Direct download here)
  2. Part 2 (Direct download here)

Posted by Gimmick - November 30th, 2013


When people say the phrase "rare games", some of them may think about things like cartridges containing games that were not mass-produced, or CDs or thumbsticks containing them. They may or may not be right, but I'm not talking about those types of games here.

I'm talking about games available on the internet for download. Those that were free from the beginning, or have turned from pay-to-download to abandonware (the companies that made these are either not functioning anymore, or are not offering these for sale, AFAIK)

That said, it turns out that I received these games through some odd occurrence, by either getting a CD of it a long, long time ago, or I downloaded it a long, long time ago (and then lost it, and then hunted for it and eventually found it - but now it is not available)

1) Contraption (Eclectic Entertainment) (Ben Retan)

This is a simple (?) game where you have to roll the ball into a box using ramps, accelerators, funnels and PHYSICS! The original site for download can be found here. The website that you are lead to is no longer functioning, and redirects to the same page. No searches for "contraption ben retan" give a download; by luck, I found this setup existing on my computer. (Originally Free)

Edit: Now the download is through 4shared; no need for torrent/fileshare software.


Posted by Gimmick - June 10th, 2013


Wee, I'm 15. Also, 80th news post.


Posted by Gimmick - February 24th, 2013


no wrong answers, only wrong questions


Posted by Gimmick - June 10th, 2012


Wee, I'm 14. Also, 80th news post.


Posted by Gimmick - May 17th, 2012


First of all, let me say I'm still as active as I was before on Newgrounds, but I find that there's not much to do here in terms of the community. The forums may or may not be as active as before but I don't post as much as I used to do (read: spam) and the chat's pretty much out of the equation as, well, it was destined to die eventually. There are now only 7 users or so on the chat and I'm running out of things to do. Most of the time I just go on dilbert.com or something similar.

Flash? What is this "Flash" you talk about? Anyhow, on a more serious note, I just feel bored. I'm making a small animation in flash now but even when I don't have anything much to do I ignore Flash. Anyhow, expect for it to come out sooner or later. My bet being placed mostly on "later", if "later" means "pretty much never, or when the sun swells up and swallows the earth".

Oh, and I made a small vehicle simulator. I'd probably continue that project but for now it's just an ATV simulator and I don't really know what to do about it; tell me what to add or remove about it. If enough people ask (that is, if there are any people around here who actually spend time commenting on this news post; at the current rate at which I get comments [around 3 maximum, so 1 comment should be enough]) about something then I may consider adding it. (It's currently called "Generic ATV" in the title and possibly something else in the main menu and succeeding menus; just ignore that, okay?)

Here's a link to it. I'll keep you guys updated if there are at least 5 comments from each unique user.

Scratch that; 5 people have commented, and so I'll be updating this newspost...sometimes :p
So far I've put the vehicle simulator on hold since I'm currently experimenting with bitmapData and I've got the hang of it...a little. I'm still having problems with setPixel() in that it's not cooperating for some reason, and I don't see any obvious reason since everything looks A-OK to me. Anyhow, I'm making a "shovelware atv game" in my free time and I hope to upload it on Newgrounds after a while. Screen-dumps will be posted...below! There's going to be 24 levels for that, and I'm *hoping* to create a (separate) level editor which I think I'll also be uploading on NG after a while, at least...since I'm still experimenting with bitmapData and the problem I had isn't letting me progress since I'm fairly new to this.

Anyhow, enjoy the screen for now! :3

A small update...I guess...


Posted by Gimmick - May 3rd, 2012


The unofficial non-canon sequel to Truth of Osama 1 has been released. It's based on what happens after Osama has died and transforms into Osama-Soup. Go take a look at Truth of Osama 1 and then watch Truth of Osama 2. You'll slowly begin to understand what happened and just when you get the gist of it, BAM! You get a feeling of Deja Vu in your face.

Go on, I dare you to.

Truth of Osama 1

Then watch

Truth of Osama 2

Here's a screenie from Truth of Osama 2 along with the context menu:

Truth of Osama 2!