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Colors! v1.05 is ready for download.

http://www.collectingsmiles.com/colors

Colors! is a simplistic digital application for Nintendo DS based on modern painting-techniques developed for drawing tablets in programs like Photoshop. By taking advantage of the pressure sensitivity of the DS touch-screen it becomes a perfect portable digital sketch-book.

Major updates for this version are:
* Compability update - Should solve a lot of save corruptions and lock-ups
* New user-interface by Ernst (madwurmz.com)
* Full opacity brush option
* Border around canvas to allow more panning

Enjoy!

Last edited by Jesse on Fri Aug 03, 2007 12:46 pm; edited 1 time in total

madwurmz.com wrote:

I still prefer Jesse spending time on the line-thickness by pressure control above all other suggestions :) For me that would make it complete.

Yes, that and general brush precision will be my top priority for v1.06.
Also I intend to get the "pressure controls brush-size" brush in there.
After that I think I'm pretty happy with stage 1 of the offline feature-set. :)

KeithE wrote:

Jesse - I'd be willing to donate a DS motion sensor to you if you would add some motion-sensing features to colors - it would be fun.

That would be lovely to fool around with and I'm very flattered for the offer. The blowing feature is an awsome idea and I love the addition of merging that with the motion-sensing feature. Still, there are other features I would prefer spending time on until I get that far down the todo-list, so I'll get back to you in a month or so. :)

But if anyone has one of those DS-cameras, let me know. ;)

Last edited by Jesse on Fri Aug 03, 2007 12:04 pm; edited 1 time in total

x999x wrote:

Would it be possible to have the L/R buttons control the playback speed?

I've moved the playback to the top screen in v1.05 and I intend to have some playback controls on the touch-screen instead, so control of playback speed seems like a good idea there.

I was just going to ask about a rewind and forward feature in the playback thing because some creations just have playbacks that takes hours to watch and I you can't return without resetting my DS.
And on top of that if I'd like to see how a part is made in a image then I need to watch the whole playback. So a rewind and forward feature would be greatly appreciated.

That's about all I have to say except for the fact that I love this app! But I think everyone does so I don't bother mentioning it for real.

laurens wrote:

I was just going to ask about a rewind and forward feature in the playback thing because some creations just have playbacks that takes hours to watch and I you can't return without resetting my DS.
And on top of that if I'd like to see how a part is made in a image then I need to watch the whole playback. So a rewind and forward feature would be greatly appreciated.

Sorry for the shameful plug yet again, but Jesse talks about this specific feature in the interview he did with us.
Radio Ninty 4

Anyway, well done on another awesome update, lovely UI!

laurens wrote:

I was just going to ask about a rewind and forward feature in the playback thing because some creations just have playbacks that takes hours to watch

I understand the need, but there is no way for me to do a rewind since the information I store for the playback only allow it to play in one direction.

Still, it would be possible to store a key location that you can skip back to to replay from there, and that is something I will consider.

is it just me or does Colors! 1.05 not work on the SuperCard Lite? ive tried sclt.dldi, moonshell dldi, and no dldi and all i get is a white screen....it seems to freeze there...

am i doing anything wrong? v1.04 was fine except for the saving...

Great stuff!!!

The full opacity brush in combi with bigger brush size is going to be a very usefull one!

Got this from some local forums (translated to english):

Quote:

I dont know what was added to the newst version, but on my m3 perf. it doesnt work. with or without DLDI. Old versions were working fine.

_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

so that makes it m3 and SuperCard Lite.... oh well a few bumps on the road are expected...

keep it up jesse! really looking forward to try the new features

Actually, I've got the same problem with two white screns on a Supercard CF (patched with regular Supercard CF DLDI). Seems to be a problem with all Supercards, not only the lite...

yes! Its working now on my supercard sd rumble! Saving and nice!

Quote:

The full opacity brush in combi with bigger brush size is going to be a very usefull one!

woot ! the bigger size give the soft brush true power and the full opacity allows fine strokes.
The labels on the UI are back and it's much appreciated too.
On my M3lite/DSlite I have to launch the soft by pressing "start" now ("a" doesn't work at all) and everything is ok. I don't need to patch the rom with DLDI though.
Really nice work Jesse. thanks a lot.

Could anyone who had the previous version working but are having troubles with the new one email me if they would like to help out.

Yay JESSE!

It works for my super card lite rumble. Thanks so much! I really appreciate all the effort you put into this program. It works great!

dy wrote:

so that makes it m3 and SuperCard Lite.... oh well a few bumps on the road are expected...

keep it up jesse! really looking forward to try the new features

On M3DS Simply it works the same as previous version: Just great!

hello jesse,

the previous version did work for me without any hassle. I don't know how I could be of help for you (I'm a simple user, no programmer at all), but anyways, I just mailed you, so feel free to contact me!

Jesse wrote:

Could anyone who had the previous version working but are having troubles with the new one email me if they would like to help out.

I can confirm. Jesse have helped me and now Colrors work fine on my SuperCard SD (now i can SAVE)
Thanks a lot and wait for some pics form me :)

Thanks for 1.05 Jesse!

That circle around the brush-size really helps me out. Also, I didn't even realize I wanted a completely opaque brush, but that comes in handy quite often too!

I like the pan/color pick cursors.. they also remove some of momentary confusion about what button does what when I've rotated the DS.

Hell, all the improvements are great, the panning border helps too.. I don't know if it might be slowing things down a bit though with the larger surface size.

-Ersatzyak
_________________
DSL Onyx w/ R4 & 1GB Kingston SD. FlashMe'd v.7

Jesse wrote:

Could anyone who had the previous version working but are having troubles with the new one email me if they would like to help out.

I confirm. Jesse have helped me and now Colors work fine on my SuperCard SD (now i can SAVE)
Thanks a lot and wait for some pics from me :)

Alright. Thanks to Christian and Giuseppe I found out what was causing the problem. I've updated executable in the v1.05-archive with a version that should work for everyone, including SuperCard (and hopefully the M3 perfect as well).

Let me know if there still are problems!

Wow thank you a lot, now it works perfectly on Supercard Lite using the usual DLDI patch.
Maybe I'll be able to draw something worth showing, someday... Anyway it will stay on my card.

Cool!!!

_____________________________________

Recommendations for version 1.06:

- Higher resolution (why not? is it limited by RAM?)

- Playback controls... : play(>), pause(||), speed:x0.5(}), x1(>), x2(>>), exit playback(X)

- When you press the eyedroper button, the cursor should appear on the same place it got the color the last time

- MORE SAVE SLOTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

- Colors! playback viewer... PC edition (yay) (it would be too difficult to export the animation as a GIF or Flash animation so I'm not asking for that :) )

- Better pressure callibration: START>callibrate>"Are you using a DS lite with even callibration?" if yes, goto simple callibration, else, "DS fat" goto advanced calibration. "no"> drag hard from here to here, then from here to here and to here and to here.... Touch soft here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here. Calibration Complete. Voila, perfect callibration :P

- etc. etc.

Joaqo

The SELECT button is being lazy... it should be used for something :)

Joaqo

If there was a PC playback viewer, why would it be so hard to go from animation to animated GIF? You just capture each frame of the animation, then put it into a GIF animation sequence, or even just capture each frame to a folder and use something like Gimp to make the animation.
_________________
DS Firmware 1, Datel Games n' Music card / Chism's FW hacked GBA MP v2 CF

There's no place like 127.0.0.1.

Joaqo wrote:

- Higher resolution (why not? is it limited by RAM?)

Yepp. It's limited by RAM. I could probably cram out a little bit more resolution since I've got a few hundred kb's free in v1.05, but that could change as I implement new features.

Quote:

- When you press the eyedroper button, the cursor should appear on the same place it got the color the last time

That makes sense.

Quote:

- MORE SAVE SLOTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I know, I know.

Quote:

- Colors! playback viewer... PC edition (yay) (it would be too difficult to export the animation as a GIF or Flash animation so I'm not asking for that :) )

This functionalty is something I hope to be able to do through the Wifi support and improved online gallery.

Quote:

- Better pressure callibration

Yepp. Still working on that.

Thanks for the feedback!

Hello,

I would like to thank you for this really great application. I recently bought a DS and got Colors!1.05 today after having searched for a stuff like this. I really enjoy it.

you can see my first try here : :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyZWiNJY4FY

THANKS A LOT

from france

best regards

(I have "Supercard One" and I can't save, but I'm not really experienced with the system, how to patch etc.. I will find ;-)

Joaqo wrote:

- Colors! playback viewer... PC edition (yay) (it would be too difficult to export the animation as a GIF or Flash animation so I'm not asking for that :) )

I put together a Java application/applet that can playback Colors! .drw files. It does not support more recent Colors! features (Y flip and soft brush) and does not produce correct renders but allows quick and easy viewing.
edit: It would be easy enough to produce an animation of the playback as, as calcprogrammer1 said, the app could save a picture per playback frame.

Joaqo wrote:

- Better pressure callibration: START>callibrate>"Are you using a DS lite with even callibration?" if yes, goto simple callibration, else, "DS fat" goto advanced calibration. "no"> drag hard from here to here, then from here to here and to here and to here.... Touch soft here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here. Calibration Complete. Voila, perfect callibration :P

The problem with pressure at the side of the screen for newer DSs, I believe, is the result of the DS construction and therefore mechanical. Correcting in software may not give good results (there will not be a large difference between light and heavy touch).
The ability of pan the non zoomed paint canvas in version 1.05 is a good solution. The addition of the hand icon is excellent, giving visual feed back as to which mode you are in.

I found a small bug in the event-recording of Colors! v1.05. It didn't remember the default color selection (the red brush) correctly, so anything you paint with that brush will be broken during playback. I've updated the v1.05 archive with a fix for that.

I really like the new version! The interface is even more refined than before (and that's saying something, Colors! has always had an excellent interface), the opaque brush mode is great for making backgrounds and solid colors without having to scratch your DS screen by pressing hard, and the brush size, icons, improved pan mode, it's all great :)
_________________
DS Firmware 1, Datel Games n' Music card / Chism's FW hacked GBA MP v2 CF

There's no place like 127.0.0.1.

I'm curious how the gallery image removal system is set up. Is it a single-click? I just find it strange that mine was dropped since it was so neutral (bridge, not horrid, not great, just bland).
_________________
DSL Onyx w/ R4 & 1GB Kingston SD. FlashMe'd v.7

edit: ...A second one just disappeared :/
edit update: they reappeared :)

Last edited by madwurmz.com on Sun Aug 05, 2007 10:31 am; edited 1 time in total

masscat wrote:

- The ability of pan the non zoomed paint canvas in version 1.05 is a good solution.

For my DS it's not a complete solution >:(

there is also a little portion in the middle of the screen of my fat DS which senses a little less pressure than it should...

______________________

Another idea for C! '06

- You added a brush which paints only with a 100% alpha stoke. Sometimes you need a regular pressure thoughout a stroke (at 50% alpha, for example) but you can't get it because your screen won't cooperate... Thats why I'm proposing a pressure slider next to the set pressure button :d

Quote:

- When you press the eyedropper button, the cursor should appear on the same place it got the color the last time

- It does appear on the same place... unless you use the pan tool... the eyedropper cursor appears where the hand cursor was.

Don't worry about your pictures disappearing. I believe jetboy has set it up so that a picture with a few clicks is quarantined until he is able to review it himself.

Hey Jesse,

Could we possibly get a way to skip the replay of a drawing once we start it. For some of the longer drawings I find I want to skip to the end. Could we press a button or tap the screen so skip? If there is a way I couldn't find it. Thanks.

Also I know it was mentioned before but I didn't see the answer. Is there a way we could stop a drawing part way through replay and continue drawing from the point we stopped? This would of course kill off the remaining drawing from the playback but could allow people to redo sections of a drawing that they feel they could do better.

Cheers

manbitesdog wrote:

Don't worry about your pictures disappearing. I believe jetboy has set it up so that a picture with a few clicks is quarantined until he is able to review it himself.

That is correct.
It seems someone was "having fun".
Fear not. If your picture gets quarntined, but it is ok, it will be back as soon as i approve it.
Please note, that if i have any doubts about any picture, lack of drw file judges it to not be brought back.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

Hay all, I am an artist who is used to photoshop, so some of these suggestions may be quite a bit advanced.
Let that be my first suggestion, an "advanced" switch that lets you activate some advanced tools.
I'd like to be able to shut off the animation feature.
Also I would like to have a tool that lets me "define a brush". Also known as cloneing, where I would select an area and paint with that, and save the brush.
I would also like to have access to a layer system, yes I know that's a tall order.
Thanks for taking the time to make a great app for the ds!

Hi there,

Thanx for this very nice tool.

same suggestions here...

- multiple Layers (I don't know if this is feasible)

- select button as an Undo last stroke

- custom brush (create our own brush)

- and as was said a pause during the playback and start drawing from this point (I think if this is possible why not create a slider to move backward and then redraw from a specific point, that way it could replace a multiple undo...)

anyway keep going :)

frosted wrote:

I'd like to be able to shut off the animation feature.

Do you mean playback feature, that lets you see how the image was paintend?
Dude - the whole idea of this program is based on that feature.
But if that feature was turned off, would it help you in any way? You can save pictures, and you dont have to share drw files, thought the idea of this program is to share drw files, so people can watch them and learn from them, not to mention that watching them is fun.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

frosted wrote:

Hay all, I am an artist who is used to photoshop, so some of these suggestions may be quite a bit advanced.
Let that be my first suggestion, an "advanced" switch that lets you activate some advanced tools.
I'd like to be able to shut off the animation feature.
Also I would like to have a tool that lets me "define a brush". Also known as cloneing, where I would select an area and paint with that, and save the brush.
I would also like to have access to a layer system, yes I know that's a tall order.
Thanks for taking the time to make a great app for the ds!

Hehe...

We're all advanced photoshop users, if you haven't noticed :P

The changes you're asking for would really degrade the entire application.

This isn't photoshop-DS, it's Colors!

Woohoo! v1.05 is pure win. I like the snazzy new interface, and it appears the saving and loading issues with the SCLite have been banished. I even managed to salvage a neat doodle my buddy did on my DSLite sometime back in v1.02 (it gave me an error while trying to load the save and resulted in a blank canvas, but the playback option redrew the entire image nonetheless).

I second the request for an opacity slider, especially since once I'm past the blocking stages, I tend to use semi-transparent brushes to refine. For the time being I work around this by messing with the calibration (pressing extra hard on the hard setting), but as that's hardly convenient in the long run, an opacity slider would be ace. :)

Hi

I love your Colors ! it's very simple to use and we can draw great things !
Thank you so much

Well, I'm no Photoshop user (*curses proprietary software*) I use Gimp! :P

Anyways, Colors isn't DS-Photoshop or DS-Gimp, it's Colors, it's designed to be simple but powerful. Layers isn't important, it needs an interface that anyone can use (I was confused with Layers on Gimp at first, now I use them all the time). The playback function is cool, and should NOT be turned off :)
_________________
DS Firmware 1, Datel Games n' Music card / Chism's FW hacked GBA MP v2 CF

There's no place like 127.0.0.1.

calcprogrammer1 wrote:

Anyways, Colors isn't DS-Photoshop or DS-Gimp, it's Colors, it's designed to be simple but powerful. Layers isn't important, it needs an interface that anyone can use (I was confused with Layers on Gimp at first, now I use them all the time). The playback function is cool, and should NOT be turned off :)

heh Normally you sound a bit smarter, but saying that about layers doesn't make you look good :/
Anyone can make a drawing, just put a pencil to the screen and create some lines. When filling that drawing with a bit of color a layer is pretty much a necessary... In Colors! It would increase the usability that still anyone can use, attract 'professional' users, but it wouldn't hurt the 'unprofessional' users, they still will enjoy themselves with the playback option :)

calcprogrammer1 wrote:

I was confused with Layers on Gimp at first, now I use them all the time

So you see how important they are and easy they can be?

Without a layer Colors! is like DS-Paint..
But with pressure control and the compact and portable aspect of the DS, Jesse is building something much more then just Paint.

I've too suggested Jesse the Creator to add one extra layer..
Call the extra layer the 'Colors! Coloring layer', place layer on top / on bottom and for full benefit add an eraser.
Wouldn't that be amazing?

Colors! is already an incredible tool. The devil is in the details...

jetboy wrote:

frosted wrote:

I'd like to be able to shut off the animation feature.

Do you mean playback feature, that lets you see how the image was paintend?
Dude - the whole idea of this program is based on that feature.
But if that feature was turned off, would it help you in any way? You can save pictures, and you dont have to share drw files, thought the idea of this program is to share drw files, so people can watch them and learn from them, not to mention that watching them is fun.

I think that frosted meant to exit playback....

Well... It's the time for ultra-biased posting (woohoo)*

*I am not responsable for anything I type in the rest of this post :)

________________________

Pro-Jesse
The program is supposed to be simplistic!
The RAM in the DS can't handle layers... Why would you want layers anyway??? you don't use layers when drawing on a sketchbook (do you?)

"Colors! [...] simplistic [...] application for Nintendo DS [...] perfect
portable digital sketch-book."

If you can't do it on a sketchbook, you can't do it in colors. (Payback is the only exception)

Idea: If you want something less simplistic, program it yourselves.

Pro-Photoshop
The rubber-stamp tool would be an excellent addition to this program. Even though layers can't be handled, the "cloning" or copying of a portion of the picture into another place in the canvas would be cool.
Also levels, and some filters.

"Colors! ... digital application for Nintendo DS based ... in programs like Photoshop. ...
advantage of the pressure sensitivity of the DS touch-screen ..."

A blur tool would be also good for making the depth of field in a painting shallower.

Idea: Develop a new application called Colorshop! which has every single feature in Photoshop even if it makes the DS explode.

_______________________

Yay, super biased

Joaqo

I do see your point, maybe layers might help, here's a reason I might like it:

I usually use layers in Gimp for pasting in details onto a background, say, a layer of text over a background image, or an icon or something, without the pasting function, layers would still be useful for drawing a background, then drawing a foreground (if you mess up, you won't ruin the background erasing it). I've had this happen a few times, where I couldn't get the colors to blend right after erasing part of something I drew on top of a background. An Undo function would be nice, and I guess if it used layers it wouldn't be too hard, just have the latest brush stroke be the top layer, and the rest of the image be the bottom. If you don't undo the latest stroke (erasing the top layer), then the top layer could merge with the bottom layer, and the new stroke could be drawn on the top layer.
_________________
DS Firmware 1, Datel Games n' Music card / Chism's FW hacked GBA MP v2 CF

There's no place like 127.0.0.1.

I'd love an extra layer to, but wouldn't that double the ram requirements in the worst case scenario? I think Jesse mentioned he was running low as it is.

Yea, it would be useful to have the option to load an image as a background, then you could draw over it and use the eraser tool (which also has an alpha defined by pressure) to erase something on the upper layer...

Would RAM support 2 layers? one modifyable and one locked????

Joaqo

PS: MORE SAVE SLOTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Color me bad, but I just don't like these "photoshop-esque" suggestions being made here. It saddens me.

Colors =/= Photoshop.

The power of Colors has been self evident since the first release. If you want PhotoshopDS then why not ask Tassu to add layers and such to Phideas where it's far more cohesive?

Please don't forget about the charm this program brings to the DS by turning into YET ANOTHER PHOTOSHOP CLONE... Look at the little community this Colors application has spawned all on it's own. The appeal of this program at it's core is very pure, and it's attracted us all here without undo states, filters, or layers...

That has to strike a chord with the artist in all of you, look at what you've done without the "cruise control buttons" from photoshop. Doesn't that make you proud? Doesn't it make you confident in your own ability?

Colors reminds us all that our inner artist is not dead, but that they've only gotten lazy thanks to Photoshop...

x999x wrote:

Color me bad, but I just don't like these "photoshop-esque" suggestions being made here. It saddens me.

Colors =/= Photoshop.

The power of Colors has been self evident since the first release. If you want PhotoshopDS then why not ask Tassu to add layers and such to Phideas where it's far more cohesive?

Please don't forget about the charm this program brings to the DS by turning into YET ANOTHER PHOTOSHOP CLONE... Look at the little community this Colors application has spawned all on it's own. The appeal of this program at it's core is very pure, and it's attracted us all here without undo states, filters, or layers...

That has to strike a chord with the artist in all of you, look at what you've done without the "cruise control buttons" from photoshop. Doesn't that make you proud? Doesn't it make you confident in your own ability?

Colors reminds us all that our inner artist is not dead, but that they've only gotten lazy thanks to Photoshop...

Hear hear!!!

Couldn't agree with you more on this.
The sheer joy of using Colors is mainly down to its "basicness", and I mean that in the most complementary way possible.

The more features that get added, the more bloated the program becomes, and the less charm it holds.

The different brush types, along with the opacity options in V1.05 are more then enough for me, and I'd be happy if this part of Colors never got added to again.

I would much prefer Jesse spends his time working on the exciting sounding WiFi side of things, helping to cement an already skilled and friendly community!

I won't help in any way saying that but I'm happy there is no "undo" function in Colors. It reminds me my girlfriend when I asked her to teach me how to draw "Don't use something to erase what you did, just draw again and correct it by drawing".
You can say that even if there is an eraser tool in Colors, I could just forget it and don't use it but... I'm sure I'd use it.

About features, I'd like to zoom more sometimes. I read before that another zoom (x2 maybe) would be added ^^.

I'm also agree with a lot of people "more save slots" ^^. Even though, for now, I just go to DSOrganize and rename files.

Viva Colors ^^.
_________________
めくらの国では片目は王様

You are right, we don't need the stamp tool or undo because art is art and every mistake you make in the drawing is also part of it and will help you improve next time... :)

I really would like the defined pressure other than 100% opacity, though. It is easy to maintain an opacity level in paper, but flaws on the DS screen make it difficult.

I also look forward to the wifi feature to easily upload, view and playback paintings from the Colors! database. Even though I don't think the RAM will be enough :P

Playback controls are indispensable.

MORE SAVE SLOTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Joaqo

Joaqo wrote:

MORE SAVE SLOTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

...more like:

MORE SAVE SLOTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
_________________
DS Firmware 1, Datel Games n' Music card / Chism's FW hacked GBA MP v2 CF

There's no place like 127.0.0.1.

Nice work! The pressure sensitivity is surprisingly good, especially using a finger (although it's a bit harder to slide along the screen). I like how it's nice and simple, and sort of has its own 'feel' due to the blending style used. I'm a terrible abuser of undo though, so it's a bit tough to put a lot of effort into something without it. But then as some have said, real artists don't need undo :p
_________________
___________
The best optimization is to do nothing at all.
Therefore a fully optimized program doesn't exist.
-Deku

Pleeeeeassee let us use the microphone to blow the paint ( area touched by the stylus )
pleeeaasee =p

select could turn the mic on and off

and use the d-pad for direcion!
_________________
http://flickr.com/photos/stuffbox

Last edited by Dudu.exe on Mon Aug 06, 2007 5:30 pm; edited 1 time in total

Could you please stop shouting and demanding?
Thank you.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

I've gotta agree with the "less extraneous features" mindset. I'm a heavy photoshop user, primarily for digital painting and texture painting. I do make good use of layers, but for something like Colors!, I'd much rather the focus be on speed and accessibility. Layers would tax the already-limited available RAM, and for a sketchpad, do you really want to be futzing around with lots of layers?

I've also really enjoyed the lack of an undo, especially since I haven't run into the "line across the screen" issue in the most recent versions.

The only thing I could really ask for would be an opacity slider. That's all. :)

ps. Blowing paint or ink could be interesting, but to get anything even remotely convincing, wouldn't that require a fair bit of horsepower? And a lot of dev time, too.

v1.05 is great! im finally able to save!

anyways yes shouting is kinda rude...maybe you should just say it...im sure jesse reads all new posts, plus its already been suggested...next time try to be more polite

Just had to stop in and say 'thanks' for Colors. I'm carrying my DS with me everywhere once again!

It's such a pleasurable and intuitive experience painting in Colors compared to something like Phideas.

I'm definitely more of the opinion that Colors should stay a simple digital sketch book and doesn't need novelties like blowing paint around. It just needs to stay fast and smooth.

As far as features, the only thing I think it -needs- is an opacity control slider.

Things that would be nice:
Higher resolution support (maybe take advantage of the extra ram available on some carts?).
Network mode. Network mode in OpenCanvas is a lot of fun. We used to play around in this a lot at one of the studios I used to work at.
_________________
sinistergfx.com
robotdawn.com

Any know why my DS would erratically draw straight lines when im drawing? this happens with Colors v1.04 & 1.05. havnt tried other versions.

My roommate doesnt have the same problem. The only differenct between our DS configuration is that mine has a HORI screen protector.

-Jesse:
Post something so we can know you're alive.

Joaqo

PS: Sure, why not...
MORE SAVE SLOTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Also:
Will there be a fully compatible Colors! playback player(PC version)?

Joaqo

krooked wrote:

Any know why my DS would erratically draw straight lines when im drawing? this happens with Colors v1.04 & 1.05. havnt tried other versions.

My roommate doesnt have the same problem. The only differenct between our DS configuration is that mine has a HORI screen protector.

Quote:

Q: Why did Colors! just draw a big line all over my painting?
A: Stylus jumping (where the DS reports an incorrect stylus touch) in
Colors! can cause long lines to be drawn over your painting. This normally
only appears about once every 5 minutes, but can differ from DS to DS. Also,
having pressure on different parts of plastics close to screen (resting your
hand for example) can make this more common. Stylus jumping is also present
in official titles, which indicate it is not a completely solvable problem
and the current state of libnds seems to work as well as Nintendo's official
libraries. As for Colors!, it is possible that this will be slightly better
in future versions since it may be possible to make some special predictions
of what should be allowed. This could reduce this problem, but it will
probably never completely go away.

This does not depend on HORI foil. This is more like per unit difference.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

Hello all. I've just gone through the last pages of posts since the release of v1.05 and I'm really happy that it seems to be working so well for everyone. Still, I understand those who said that this was best left for the card-manufacturers to fix the broken DLDI code, and by bypassing the problems in Colors! I've not helped the state of DS homebrew, but that's a cross I have to bear.

I've read the discussions here with great interest. It?s great to see that the feature-set of Colors! has reached a point where a most suggestions for improvements have more than one side (except for the ?more save-slots? suggestion :). Regarding the layers discussion I believe many of you already know where my preferences are. It would probably be possible to find a good way to integrate a second layer into Colors!, but it would still make the program more complex. Also as mentioned, there are technical considerations as well. So for now, I won?t spend time trying to find a way to implement multiple layers but it could be something I will come back to in the future.

Regarding the opacity control, I thought I would get away without having one, but it seems like there are very many of you asking for it so I?m starting to sway on that one. No promises though.

Quote:

Could we possibly get a way to skip the replay of a drawing once we start it.

Yes. I hope to get that in when I implement the playback controls.

Quote:

- custom brush (create our own brush)

Sorry, I have no plans of implementing custom brushes at this point.

Quote:

I'd like to zoom more sometimes. I read before that another zoom (x2 maybe) would be added ^^.

Correct. That is the plan.

Quote:

Pleeeeeassee let us use the microphone to blow the paint ( area touched by the stylus )

As I mentioned earlier, I love this idea, but it?s pretty low on my priority list at this point.

Quote:

Higher resolution support (maybe take advantage of the extra ram available on some carts?).

That?s an interesting idea. I need to research that a bit.

Quote:

Network mode. Network mode in OpenCanvas is a lot of fun. We used to play around in this a lot at one of the studios I used to work at.

This is definitely something I want to do, but as far as I know this isn?t possible using the homebrew SDKs yet.

Quote:

Will there be a fully compatible Colors! playback player(PC version)?

Probably not, but the plan is to be able to download a video of your painting from the online gallery.

So, that?s it for the some comments. I?m currently working away on a couple of different things, where one of them is improving precision of the brushes (especially with the small brushes) which seems to go pretty good. Also, I?ve started the initial work on the wifi support. Next version will probably not be out until the end of august, but it?ll be worth the wait!

Thanks for all the complements and feedback!

It's awesome that you're taking a lot of people's ideas into consideration.

I don't think I'd ask for much more than you're already planning. It's kinda like the MSPaint drawings in a way, it's more interesting seeing what can be done with limited toolsets (for the record, Colors beats the hell outta Paint).

Thanks again for the awesome app. I'll be eagerly awaiting the end of August and try to refrain from changing my sig line to: More save slots!!1!
_________________
DSL Onyx w/ R4 & 1GB Kingston SD. FlashMe'd v.7

Hello,
your homebrew is really a good one, all my graphist friends tried it and approved it (and bought a NDS to have it :) )
However if I can make a suggestion, the tool we all miss is the eyedropper.

Thanks again for developping this homebrew .

...Colors has an eyedropper, haven't you looked at the Start menu, it shows all the controls, eyedropper/color picker is one of them, I think it's hold Y to use it.
_________________
DS Firmware 1, Datel Games n' Music card / Chism's FW hacked GBA MP v2 CF

There's no place like 127.0.0.1.

krooked wrote:

Any know why my DS would erratically draw straight lines when im drawing? this happens with Colors v1.04 & 1.05. havnt tried other versions.

My roommate doesnt have the same problem. The only differenct between our DS configuration is that mine has a HORI screen protector.

Same for me ^^; I thought I played too much to Ouendan and that made my screen bad but it seems it's a problem with all DS.

Na?l wrote:

Hello,
your homebrew is really a good one, all my graphist friends tried it and approved it (and bought a NDS to have it :) )
However if I can make a suggestion, the tool we all miss is the eyedropper.

Thanks again for developping this homebrew .

calcprogrammer1 wrote:

...Colors has an eyedropper, haven't you looked at the Start menu, it shows all the controls, eyedropper/color picker is one of them, I think it's hold Y to use it.

And me, I need one more eye. Yesterday, I was drawing and tried to find the color I used before, without succeed. I even didn't notice there was an eyedropper ^^;

Thanks calcprogrammer1 ^^.
_________________
めくらの国では片目は王様

I got my DS release week 2004, so it's VERY scratched up from a lot of use, but Colors rarely has stylus jumping problems on it, though DS WiFiVoiceChat Client ALWAYS has that problem.
_________________
DS Firmware 1, Datel Games n' Music card / Chism's FW hacked GBA MP v2 CF

There's no place like 127.0.0.1.

I just want to say I've been using this app since 1.0 and its probably the coolest thing out for the DS. Keep up the good work :)

sorry if this has already been covered but i'm a complete noob to the whole DS & homebrew thingy

I want colors badly (mostly cos I can't afford a cintiq) so I need one of those homebrew cards and I don't want one that it won't work on, is there a compatibility list or can someone suggest a card/SD card combo I can get in the UK that definitely works on a very recent DS lite?

I did read the thread but there's only a couple of mentions of cards that work - ideally I want one of the small cards rather than the big cart things

ta very much

edit:
actually, while I'm here. what file formats are supported for output? I couldn't see that written down anywhere either

poopipe wrote:

can someone suggest a card/SD card combo I can get in the UK that definitely works on a very recent DS lite?

edit:
actually, while I'm here. what file formats are supported for output? I couldn't see that written down anywhere either

1. Get R4 - Colors! was always working ok on R4.
2. It saves PNG, plus DRW (Colors own format to store strokes so you can see how the image was painted).

I would like to warn you that Colors! is not replacement for Centiq, and if you expect that, you will be disapointed. Colors is excelent application, its fun to play with, and you can create real masterpieces with it, but its not heavy duty everyday application. I bet you know that already, but i just wanted to be sure.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

thanks very much for that :)

I know it's not a cintiq replacement but I see this as a really good way to get quick sketches down while I'm out and about (or more accurately sitting on the toilet)

anyway - I'll stop clogging up the thread now.

poopipe wrote:

clogging up the thread now.

But we just love doing that :)
Don't have to read carefully to see us all ask the same stuff over and over again :/
Maybe a forum on jetboy's page would give us more room for chit-chat?

Anyway..
"Get R4 - Colors! was always working ok on R4. "
Same as the 'M3DS Simply' , works perfect! and is pretty cheap.
Those two are the same products, just different name.
I accually ordered a R4 card but instead got a M3DS Simply..

If you live in the UK, you can probably get a Games n' Music in local stores (they have them here in the US, and Datel, manufacturers for the GnM, are headquartered in the UK), it's $30 to $35 and comes with 128MB microSD (plenty enough for 9 pictures >.< need more save slots) and USB microSD reader/writer.
_________________
DS Firmware 1, Datel Games n' Music card / Chism's FW hacked GBA MP v2 CF

There's no place like 127.0.0.1.

It would be nice to have a FTP-upload feature, so that I can save my paintings on a FTP server. With that feature we would have more save-"slots" and it would be easier to load them on the computer.

....

Draw pic in Colors!, turn off DS, turn on DS, boot DSFTP.

Open ftp://192.168.1.6 (or whatever your DS is) on your computer. Drag Colors folder to local folder or Desktop. Upload.

Though, looking back on that method, it takes a reboot and you have to copy it from the computer.

It would be a nice thing to have, but definitely not a top priority, but have it where you can select an FTP and upload, it'd be nice.
_________________
DS Firmware 1, Datel Games n' Music card / Chism's FW hacked GBA MP v2 CF

There's no place like 127.0.0.1.

There really are some amazing drawings being posted to the Colors! gallery lately. How satisfying it must be to have made a program that gives so much back Jesse. Anyway some of you guys should really think about buying a fullsize tablet I think (and that isn't meant as a slight against Colors!).

calcprogrammer1 wrote:

It would be a nice thing to have, but definitely not a top priority, but have it where you can select an FTP and upload, it'd be nice.

Maybe a HTTP-POST upload would be easier to implement. So you can upload a php file somewhere and upload it to that destination. You could even make something like a online gallery.

znat wrote:

Maybe a HTTP-POST upload would be easier to implement. So you can upload a php file somewhere and upload it to that destination. You could even make something like a online gallery.

There is online gallery already. And direct upload was ment striaght from the beggining. Current system is just to get going before direct upload gets ready, and will be used for people who do not have wifi connection.

Q: What do you mean by Wifi-support?
A: The first step for Wifi support is to integrate it into the online gallery and be able to upload and download painting directly to your DS. Also, I would really like to allow for multiple people to paint on a painting as once using through connecting between DS-to-DS directly, but that is not possible using homebrew SDK yet.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

Jetboy,

I like the inclusion of random pictures on the front page of the gallery and feel it should remain even when the rating system is implemented. Without it pictures can get lost in the mists of time (there were some 21 pages of pictures last time I looked) and never get on the front page again (people are unlikely to go back through older pictures and rate them).

I was thinking about the possibility of the pressure being able to control brush size as well. Perhaps, with options such as, normal, opacity, and size, so which ever you choose (maybe possible to choose more than one at the same time), you get the effect with the brush. For example, say if you choose opacity and size, the brush's pressure would decide the thickness of the line and the darkness.

masscat wrote:

Jetboy,

I like the inclusion of random pictures on the front page of the gallery and feel it should remain even when the rating system is implemented. Without it pictures can get lost in the mists of time (there were some 21 pages of pictures last time I looked) and never get on the front page again (people are unlikely to go back through older pictures and rate them).

The problem with those random pitures is that they are taken only form te prechoosen list. I made this because quality of newest pictures vary. It may be that there are many great pictures, but it may be that there are only weaker works. But we want to be sure that some good works will be shown when somebody visits for the first time, so he can get interested.

I think that totaly random pictures shown too, would be good idea, for the reasons you gave. But the page will need major redesign when rating system gets implemented and running, so i will include that idea somehow.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

speaking of the website.

how about having accounts so that users can manage their pictures as well as being able to search by user. of course anonymous upload should still be enabled.

I think it'd be nice to include a sharpen filter. There's a lot of blurry pictures in the gallery. The gallery looks great, btw. That dragon picture is amazing!

I know there's no more space in the color and size choosing menu, but this could be possibly squeezed in :D

-There should be two sliders available, size and opacity.
When the standard pressure-controls-opacity option is selected, only the size slider is shown, when you select the constant-pressure option, two more options appear: slider-controls-size (both sliders are shown) or pressure-controls size (only the opacity slider is shown).

-There MUST be a more precise way to callibrate the screen... I really need one...

-SELECT could be quick-save

Joaqo

Some moron keeps posting naked photo of lucy liu... pathetic...
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

Lucy Liu? Yuck! He should at least post someone attractive.

Jetboy, I love the new layout of the gallery. Feels more like an art gallery now.

And Jesse, thanks for putting in so much effort. I can save without gettting corrupt pngs on my N-Card now.

Did anyone ever play that online game where you enter a chat room and one person is given a word? You have to draw a picture of the word and everyone else has to guess. Like online Pictionary. I wish we could do that on DS. Of course DS would need a keyboard...... actually it would be amazing if it had voice recognition. Can you imagine how fun it would be to be drawing and yelling at your DS, playing online with other people? Maybe on DS 2?.....

zombielove wrote:

Did anyone ever play that online game where you enter a chat room and one person is given a word? You have to draw a picture of the word and everyone else has to guess. Like online Pictionary. I wish we could do that on DS. Of course DS would need a keyboard...... actually it would be amazing if it had voice recognition. Can you imagine how fun it would be to be drawing and yelling at your DS, playing online with other people? Maybe on DS 2?.....

I would love that.
If you are drawing then you dont need keyboard, and you could paint on the touchscreen, when you are guessing, you dont need painting, so youcould have virtual keyboard on the touchscreen.

However i think that it would be beter made into different homebre than incorporated in colors. Btw. voice recognition would be too difficult, especialy when shouting is involwed.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

You guys are talking about iSketch.net. I love this game and a DS version would rock!

http://blog.dev-scene.com/0xtob/

Pictoblog support would be great :)
_________________
MrShlee.com
Projects
Dev-Scene
MyTechpedia

I just thought it could be fun to throw a theme for a week:
then every one could draw a pic and share it on Jetboy site, kind of little competition.

And something useless but that would add some nice touch to Colors, is sounds.
a sharp noise of pencil when using sharp brush.
and a soft brush sound using smooth brush...

anyway I think this program is really nice :)

Mrshlee wrote:

http://blog.dev-scene.com/0xtob/

Pictoblog support would be great :)

What do you mean by pictoblog support?
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

So I had an idea for the Colors Gallery site. Currently the vertical layout doesn't seem to utilize the entire site. I was wondering if it would be possible to make it into a horizontal layout with voting options bellow.

The Voting can be constrained to one per IP address and it could be calculated mathematically. 1 unit per star. So the images with the most stars voted appear in the top images section.

Or completely eliminate the voting and display top 5 random images.

Though I would love to see smaller preview thumbnails and a horizontal view of the images, just to utilize the wasted space. Here is a quick 2min mock up I did during work. Any thoughts? I could spend some time and actually make it pretty.

http://kprojekt.net/wp-content/gallery/ds/colors.jpg

jetboy wrote:

Mrshlee wrote:

http://blog.dev-scene.com/0xtob/

Pictoblog support would be great :)

What do you mean by pictoblog support?

I assume he giving it a similar function to pictoblog.
I read that the source was released.

Personally, rather than adding it to colors i'd love an intermediate app which is basically pictoblog but can upload images from your cart (ie drawn by colors)

The thing with pictoblog is that the drawings are very limited.

er, also this short topic is related
http://forum.gbadev.org/viewtopic.php?t=13011

Quote:

Pictoblg goes Open Source!
April 17th, 2007 by 0xtob

As promised, I’m releasing the source code of Pictoblog. I hope someone will pick it up and develop it further. It should also be pretty easy to use my MetaWeblog API class in other projects.

I would really like to see more blog-enabled homebrew, because I think blogging and the DS go together very well. With the DS you can blog in unusual places (as long as they have WLAN) and in unusual ways (by drawing, recording voice messages etc.)

Get the it here.

If you have any questions concerning the source, don’t hesitate to post in the Pictoblog thread on the GBADev forums!

Have Fun!
Tob

I'm almost certain the answer is somewhere on these forums, but I simply can't find it.

When I load Colours! I get an error message saying something about the FAT file not being loaded and I can't save files. The program recommends a site to visit, but I have no idea what to do there. If it helps, I'm using an R4DS.

You need to DLDI patch it for your specific cart.

there should be a few patching guides around here.

Za Warudo wrote:

I'm almost certain the answer is somewhere on these forums, but I simply can't find it.

When I load Colours! I get an error message saying something about the FAT file not being loaded and I can't save files. The program recommends a site to visit, but I have no idea what to do there. If it helps, I'm using an R4DS.

Strange. R4DS should be able to auto patch it.

Do you have latest firmware for R4? If no then go to http://www.r4ds.com/download-en.htm and download v11 kernel, then install it on your card.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

jetboy wrote:

Za Warudo wrote:

I'm almost certain the answer is somewhere on these forums, but I simply can't find it.

When I load Colours! I get an error message saying something about the FAT file not being loaded and I can't save files. The program recommends a site to visit, but I have no idea what to do there. If it helps, I'm using an R4DS.

Strange. R4DS should be able to auto patch it.

Do you have latest firmware for R4? If no then go to http://www.r4ds.com/download-en.htm and download v11 kernel, then install it on your card.

This solved my probelm completely.

Serves me right for not being tech savy.

Thanks again.

Hello all,

I've been working away on the promised precision updates and it seems I've finally nailed a great balance between precision and speed (but it took much more work (and math) than I anticipated). This also means that the "pressure controls brushsize" will be in the next version. Yay!

Other than that I've been working all over the place and there will definitly be some cool things in v1.06.

Quote:

-SELECT could be quick-save

I rather not. Saving often takes 20+ seconds anyway, so a couple of more seconds to navigate the UI doesn?t seem tedious. The downside of this request would be that you could accidentally press the button as well making the user having to learn one more thing.

Quote:

-There MUST be a more precise way to callibrate the screen... I really need one...

Working on it. :)

Quote:

Did anyone ever play that online game where you enter a chat room and one person is given a word? You have to draw a picture of the word and everyone else has to guess. Like online Pictionary

It would be very cool, perhaps that could be made as a spin-off of Colors! somehow. :)

Quote:

Pictoblog support would be great :)

This as well would feel like bloating? but? I myself would really much like a feature like that so perhaps I could sneak in there somehow. Thanks for the idea!

Quote:

And something useless but that would add some nice touch to Colors, is sounds.

Yes, I?ve actually been planning to do some simple sound stuff. Not sure if you could have the pencil sounds as you suggested without going mad, but I will definitely try it.

Quote:

There really are some amazing drawings being posted to the Colors! gallery lately. How satisfying it must be to have made a program that gives so much back Jesse.

You are so right. The gallery gives me all the energy and motivation I need to spend time working on Colors!. It?s wonderful to know that I?ve been a part of creating artwork like that.

Thanks again for all the feedback and support!

Jesse wrote:

Joaqo wrote:

While pressing a button (maybe the pan button), when you touch the touchscreen, the circle (the one that shows the size and place where the stroke will appear) is shown (this circle can also be seen with the smallest brush if you look at the screen at an angle). This way you can know where the stroke will appear and see if the size is correct for what you need.

That's a great idea. Gold star for you. :)
I'll have to put it on a wierd button namely the zoom buttons, but I'll try to fix that for the next version. Thanks!

Heay Jesse, this feature you've done nicely in the new version! A bit hidden though.. You could put it under 'select', that way it's easy to name it in the instructions-screen and more important it's easier to use..?

madwurmz.com wrote:

Heay Jesse, this feature you've done nicely in the new version! A bit hidden though.. You could put it under 'select', that way it's easy to name it in the instructions-screen and more important it's easier to use..?

Hmm. I'm not sure I think it's such an important feature to warrant an own button. Or am I wrong here? Also, having it on select would only work for left-handed people, I think.

wow nice features coming, Jesse I'm so impressed by the way you drive this project. thanks a lot.
A kind of pictoblog function would be great with free WIFI almost everywhere in perfect places to draw (trains stations, Fastfoods&Coffes).

Quote:

having it on select would only work for left-handed people

we deserve it ;)

I would really like to see an undo button. I need it. :)
_________________
--DS lite -- M3 Simply -- 2GB Lexar --

http://www.quinndamerell.com/

i would be very grateful if you would make or add a Colors! where the files get saved in the /data/colors/ map instead of in the /colors/ map.
So maybe a seperate version which does this, or edit a few lines in the code so that it will check if there is /data/colors/ map before it saves things to the default /colors/ map.

quinbd wrote:

I would really like to see an undo button. I need it. :)

I know. A lot of people are asking for it. :)

Here is what the FAQ says.

Q: Will undo be implemented?
A: At the moment no Undo feature is planned. However there is a plan to extend the playback functionality so you can stop the playback and continue painting from there. The reason why there will be no traditional undo is that it would eat up too much memory.

laurens wrote:

i would be very grateful if you would make or add a Colors! where the files get saved in the /data/colors/ map instead of in the /colors/ map.
So maybe a seperate version which does this, or edit a few lines in the code so that it will check if there is /data/colors/ map before it saves things to the default /colors/ map.

From next version on, I will be using efslib for internal file-access to reduce the memory consumtion. This solves the problem of not knowing here the Colors.nds is, which allows me to have the config-file next to it instead of in a hardcoded directory (/colors/). By that I can also allow the user specify where the save-folder should be. Hopefully I can get that into the next version.

Jesse wrote:

Here is what the FAQ says.

Q: Will undo be implemented?
A: At the moment no Undo feature is planned. However there is a plan to extend the playback functionality so you can stop the playback and continue painting from there. The reason why there will be no traditional undo is that it would eat up too much memory.

But couldn't you just use reverse-playback?
_________________
If I use a term wrong or something then feel free to correct, I?m not much of a programmer.

Original DS Phat obtained on day of release + flashme v7
Supercard: miniSD, Kingston 1GB, Kingston 2GB
Ralink chipset PCI NIC

Dood77 wrote:

But couldn't you just use reverse-playback?

Reverse-playback is something that can't be done with the way the Colors! works. The information that is stored for playback is basically just how the stylus has touched the screen. Therefore the information about what was underneath a stroke isn't there and I can only play it in one direction.

Did you guys know that there are 442 paintings posted on the gallery right now? That was something I could never have imaged two months ago. Thanks all!!!

Jesse wrote:

Dood77 wrote:

But couldn't you just use reverse-playback?

Reverse-playback is something that can't be done with the way the Colors! works. The information that is stored for playback is basically just how the stylus has touched the screen. Therefore the information about what was underneath a stroke isn't there and I can only play it in one direction.

Ah, I suspected something like this.
_________________
If I use a term wrong or something then feel free to correct, I?m not much of a programmer.

Original DS Phat obtained on day of release + flashme v7
Supercard: miniSD, Kingston 1GB, Kingston 2GB
Ralink chipset PCI NIC

excellent, excellent app. probably the most elegant UI of any homebrew ds app i've seen yet. i'm amazed at how well the pressure sensitivity works with the stroke opacity, can't wait for the brush size to be controlled via pressure as well!

the gallery images really look like they were done in a sophisticated desktop applicaction. who would think that a device marketed as a children's toy could produce such quality output?

colors alone makes a ds and homebrew card worth buying. i love having a little digital sketchbook i can put in my pocket.

great job, i'm very excited to see where this goes. even if dev. stopped it's already a killer app.

i agree, though, that some sort of networking or online collaboration feature would be great. maybe that's for a separate app., when homebrew developing toward online gaming is easier. from the first day i got my ds i thought that an isketch/pictionary-like game would be splendid.

i think sounds should be a very low priority. i'd just turn them off, or turn off the volume. interesting, sure, but just a novelty that would wear out quickly.

muchachotron wrote:

i agree, though, that some sort of networking or online collaboration feature would be great. maybe that's for a separate app., when homebrew developing toward online gaming is easier. from the first day i got my ds i thought that an isketch/pictionary-like game would be splendid.

PictoChat?
_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.

tepples wrote:

muchachotron wrote:

i agree, though, that some sort of networking or online collaboration feature would be great. maybe that's for a separate app., when homebrew developing toward online gaming is easier. from the first day i got my ds i thought that an isketch/pictionary-like game would be splendid.

PictoChat?

Pictochat is just sending pictures back and forth. Collaboration on a single picture is much more fun, and I think would work well in Colors. Since you'd probably either be near a computer or near the other person, I don't think a chat window or anything would be necessary, just a connection screen on the start button menu. It'd be really cool to grab a couple friends and draw some pictures at a cafe or something.
_________________
___________
The best optimization is to do nothing at all.
Therefore a fully optimized program doesn't exist.
-Deku

I just want to chime in and say how much I've been wishing a program like this would show up for the DS. It's really wonderful, and the interface is so well designed!

Two things I'd like to mention:

I'm having problems with pressure sensitivity on my NDS Lite, it seems to only be reacting on the edges of the screen. Is this common? If so - I would really like an opacity slider! 25-50-75-100% increments would be enough for me.

With the fear of bloating the program, I would like a two extra types of brushes: A grainy pencil, and even watercolor. That would really make it feel like a real sketchbook :)

Also, you should add some PayPal-contribute button on your site. You should get something back for making an excellent little program such as this.

Rune
_________________
www.superrune.com

DekuTree64 wrote:

Pictochat is just sending pictures back and forth. Collaboration on a single picture is much more fun, and I think would work well in Colors. Since you'd probably either be near a computer or near the other person, I don't think a chat window or anything would be necessary, just a connection screen on the start button menu. It'd be really cool to grab a couple friends and draw some pictures at a cafe or something.

Drawball DS!!

Quote:

excellent, excellent app. probably the most elegant UI of any homebrew ds app i've seen yet.

Ernst did an excellent job with the UI. Many thanks for that.

Quote:

I agree, though, that some sort of networking or online collaboration feature would be great

That is one of my personal most wanted features. The problem is that no one to my knowledge has managed to do any sort of DS-to-DS communication with the homebrew, so I'm pretty reluctant to dig into it before that.

Quote:

I'm having problems with pressure sensitivity on my NDS Lite, it seems to only be reacting on the edges of the screen. Is this common?

Yes, it is common but differ between DS'es. The v1.05 workaround is that you can pan the image so that you don't have to use those areas but I'm working on a smarter calibrating system.

Quote:

A grainy pencil, and even watercolor

For now, I think I've reached the feature set I want for the painting engine and will spend time working on things like wifi features instead. It could change when I'm "finished" with that though. An idea I've been having is to break up the painting into different modes, depending on what you want to do into for example a sketch mode, a watercolor mode etc. With separate palette/brush screens and stuff for each mode, I could still keep the UI simple (perhaps even simpler) and intuative for each mode. Probably a stupid idea, but it would be far off anyway.

Crass wrote:

Drawball DS!!

Hey, I didn't know what Drawball was, but that is soo cool. :)
I wonder how hard it would be to do...

DekuTree64 wrote:

tepples wrote:

muchachotron wrote:

i agree, though, that some sort of networking or online collaboration feature would be great

PictoChat?

Pictochat is just sending pictures back and forth. Collaboration on a single picture is much more fun

In PictoChat, you can collaborate on a single picture by scrolling it to the bottom of the top screen and pressing Select to copy it down to the touch screen.
_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.

I just had to say, awesome app. It's retail worthy in every way and it just keeps getting better.

Is there any chance of implementing HSV sliders, maybe a button to toggle them in or something?

Picking up the exact color you want is kinda hard because of the size and being able to fine tune with an HSV slider would be perfect.

Thanks again for the great app.

idream wrote:

Picking up the exact color you want is kinda hard because of the size and being able to fine tune with an HSV slider would be perfect.

What do you mean with "because of the size"? Do you mean that the triangle is too small to get the exactly right color? I know some people prefer sliders instead of the circle/triangle style color-picker and I've been wondering if I should include an option to switch between them.

Thanks for the compliments!

Just wanted to say thanks for this wonderful homebrew! I've now used fairly enough to say that "colors" justifies by itself the acquisition of a DS card.

Thanks again!

Please try not to clog Colors with too many features. Keep the spirit of it: simplicity

the only drawbacks I see to Colors are:
- stylet "jumping" across the screen (3 times in 3 hours)
- lack of precision for tiny brushes

except from that everything rocks.

What I would kife to see added:
- possibility to select color through HSV or RGB sliders to be able to select a specific color with a better precision
_________________
- Ben
http://lostpapers.free.fr

Well, with the pretty small screen size and the fat point of the stylus, the triangle is as perfectly sized as its going to get. Making it any bigger or being able to zoom in on it would probably clutter things up if that's what you were moving toward when you asked if "the triangle is too small."

Thats why like you said, being able to switch in the sliders would be perfect because then you could just use the triangle most of the time, and when you can't get the exact color you want, just switch in the sliders and fine tune the general color you chose on the triangle. But yea, you're right. Some people just use them for everything.

idream wrote:

Well, with the pretty small screen size and the fat point of the stylus, the triangle is as perfectly sized as its going to get. Making it any bigger or being able to zoom in on it would probably clutter things up if that's what you were moving toward when you asked if "the triangle is too small."

Nah. I just wanted to be sure of what you ment. But you are right, with the low resolution and so, it's not possible to get full precision from the color-picker.

I'll note down the slider thing as "a good thing to have". Enough people have been asking for it. Thanks for the feedback.

lostpapers wrote:

stylet "jumping" across the screen (3 times in 3 hours)

Yes, that's a hazzle. I haven't been looking at that issue for a long time, but it's up there on my list. There's some extra info on the issue in the FAQ, if you haven't seen already.

lostpapers wrote:

lack of precision for tiny brushes

This is something that will be much better in v1.06

Thanks for the complements and the feedback!

Awesome app !

Definitely the most interesting thing available on the ds... official games included !
I mostly use it while commuting in subways and tramways. I hope I will improve my drawing skills.
Some people posted some amazing paintings on the gallery. I would never have thought so much could be done with so few tools.

I have to admit, this is definitely one of the most used apps on my DS.
You, sir, are an amazing app writer.
few quick questions though--
1: Is the pressure-sensitive-brush-size brush still in the works? And will that be the only thing the pressure controls on this brush, or will it control the size and opacity simultaneously?
2: Is an 'undo' function completely out of the question? It seems like with the .drw thing, an one-step 'undo' would be possible, without going into the full fledged .drw viewer...or am I completely wrong?
3. Will there be a feature for viewing a different image on the top screen while drawing on the bottom? It would be great to be able to display a reference photo while drawing...
4. A higher zoom function. Please. That would be great.

However, your application is truly amazing. It actually doesn't 'need' anything else, and the fact that you continue to improve it is truly respectable. Thank you.

From Jesse's FAQ:

Q: Will undo be implemented?
A: At the moment no Undo feature is planned. However there is a plan to extend the playback functionality so you can stop the playback and continue painting from there. The reason why there will be no traditional undo is that it would eat up too much memory.

regarding the replay function, it would be nice to be be able to stop it without switching the console off.
So far it's the only improvement I would like to see.
True an undo would be great but the replay as indicated in the faq would be enough...

... except that for a consequent painting, using this kind of function could be quite long. Maybe a one-step undo as indicated above could be thought over ?
Well, even though, I love Colors !!!!

I would much rather have the calibration and basic levels implemented than to see an Undo. Without an undo you become more careful with your brush strokes. Make them count!

You can paint interesting things not only with colors:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDZs__m5iAI

This is somewhat off topic, but i think interesting for the people writting here, so I hope nobody minds.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

Hiya, just stopping by to say that Colors! is awesome. I tried it out on the bus on the way to uni, and it really seems nice.

However, there was one idea I came up with which I think would really help some people with accuracy issues.

The idea? Giving a handedness compensation/pixel offset. All this would do is when you're drawing, if you set the pixel offset two to the right, then when you hit pixel 100,100, it'll draw at 102,100.

It might sound a bit useless at first, but I've always had a problem with accuracy using the touch screen. I'll let this picture explain exactly what my problem is. I'm not entirely sure what the cause of the problem is. I've experienced it in a number of games, and I always figured it was one of the following:

- I'm left handed, and Nintendo's internal touch screen stuff has a very slight bias to the left, so that a right handed person would find it feels much more natural (very unlikely).

- The default stylus that comes with the DS is shit. The rounded tip, as opposed to one with a pointed tip, would result in part of the rounded edge touching the screen, not the actual tip.

- The distance between the actual LCD screen doing the drawing and the touch screen causes it. In that while I press on the screen at a certain point, the touch screen registers that exact point, but doesn't know what angle my stylus is on. So, while I'm expecting to hit the pixel that continues along the same angle as my stylus, because of the thick touch screen, it appears to be slight off target.

That's all just speculation though. There would be some problems with it in that the angle of your stylus might not always be the same, but it should be easy as pie to program, and could help any others that have the same problem as me.

Keep up the good work.

Edit: if my problem still isn't clear, I'll try and take a digicam photo. There's some clear compensation for right handed people at the moment (holding the stylus straight up and hitting a point, it'll be fairly far off to the left), and it'd be really awesome if there was a handedness option. As is I need to hold my DS on a ridiculous angle for fine details to see exactly where I'm drawing. I've destroyed this poor face's eyeball about ten times.

Iean wrote:

1: Is the pressure-sensitive-brush-size brush still in the works? And will that be the only thing the pressure controls on this brush, or will it control the size and opacity simultaneously?

Yes. It'll be in v1.06. Right now it only paints with full opacity, but I'm planning to rework the brush-selection based on recommendations from this forum.

Iean wrote:

3. Will there be a feature for viewing a different image on the top screen while drawing on the bottom? It would be great to be able to display a reference photo while drawing...

I'm not sure yet if I will go in that direction.

Iean wrote:

4. A higher zoom function. Please. That would be great.

Yes. That's on the list.

Thanks for the feedback and the compliments!

herkan wrote:

regarding the replay function, it would be nice to be be able to stop it without switching the console off.

Yes, that's on the list.

Thanks!

Kiz wrote:

The idea? Giving a handedness compensation/pixel offset. All this would do is when you're drawing, if you set the pixel offset two to the right, then when you hit pixel 100,100, it'll draw at 102,100.

That is a good idea and your design is clever. I'll put it on my list.

Thanks!

Kiz wrote:

- I'm left handed, and Nintendo's internal touch screen stuff has a very slight bias to the left, so that a right handed person would find it feels much more natural (very unlikely).

By the way. Colors! use the calibration info from the DS menus, so you could also calibrate that to your liking.

Jesse wrote:

That is a good idea and your design is clever. I'll put it on my list.

Thanks!

Glad I could be of help. I've had a DS for ages, but only first ventured into homebrew apps and games last night, and I was amazed at how professional Colors! both looks and feels. Kudos to you for putting in the effort.

Edit: Cheers for the tip about the DS' calibration. Until about ten minutes ago I didn't even know it existed (was toying with some settings just before you posted it).

Is there anything that can be done about a corrupted image? I was working on something the other night and it just doesn't load anymore. The thumbnail looks fine, but there's an error when loading it up. When I view the .png on my pc, the bottom ~20% of the picture is all garbled 'n' stuff.

Kiz wrote:

Is there anything that can be done about a corrupted image? I was working on something the other night and it just doesn't load anymore. The thumbnail looks fine, but there's an error when loading it up. When I view the .png on my pc, the bottom ~20% of the picture is all garbled 'n' stuff.

Hmm. I thought all those problems were solved in v1.05. What flashcard are you using? This is probably due to faulty DLDI drivers so make sure you are using the latest update for your flashcard. To save your image you can try loading the image and after it has failed you hit playback.

I'm using an M3 Lite (with a 1GB Kingston MicroSD card). To patch the .nds I used the "M3 Adapter (SD Card)" found here. To patch it I used DLDI Patcher v0.32 (the GUI one for Windows).

As far as I'm aware that's the most up to date DLDI driver for the M3 Lite.

Thanks for the tip on saving my image, I'll try it later on.

Heay Jesse, Why didn't you submit 'Colors!' to the Neoflash coding contest?
It would have won lots of credits for sure!
Anyway, don't hesitate to contact me if you need extra attention to the UI for the new version..

Meanwhile.. I've uploaded all my DS images to deviantart.com
Hopefully will tricker new artists to use Colors! :)

http://madwurmz.deviantart.com

I'm finding that the bottom half, near the middle, of my DS has no pressure sensitivity. I can draw, but it usually just ends up somewhere between hard and soft, depending on calibration. Is it just me? Is there something wrong with my DS?

KayDat wrote:

I'm finding that the bottom half, near the middle, of my DS has no pressure sensitivity. I can draw, but it usually just ends up somewhere between hard and soft, depending on calibration. Is it just me? Is there something wrong with my DS?

Presure sensivity is something that is not part of DS specification.
It is exploiting of unsupported features, and it works differently on diferent machines. In other words, its normal.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

deleting my post here: I've discovered something stupid I did...
Cheers

So what new functions will be in the next release?

Another suggestion I thought I'd offer up:

An option to only allow the brush to draw within the bounds of the bottom screen. Handy so that you could draw straight lines by just lining the part you want up with the edge of the screen. It's a bit limited, just because panning bounds are limited, but it'd be an easy way to allow perfect straight lines.

It took me ages to get a halfway straight horizon in my last drawing, I need new hands.

Kiz wrote:

It took me ages to get a halfway straight horizon in my last drawing, I need new hands.

Fun trick:
1) Touch somewhere on the touch screen.
2) While still holding the first point, touch somewhere else.
3) Release the first point.

Voila, straight line :)
_________________
___________
The best optimization is to do nothing at all.
Therefore a fully optimized program doesn't exist.
-Deku

Quote:

Fun trick:
1) Touch somewhere on the touch screen.
2) While still holding the first point, touch somewhere else.
3) Release the first point.

Voila, straight line :)

This technique works for me except when trying to do diagonal lines between bottom left and upper right parts of the screen which results in a V shape... rather interesting...

Kiz: for horizontal and vertical lines you can press some part of your hand against one of the edges of the DS and try to hold the stylus at a fixed distance from that and then just slide your hand along the edge.

And a more general tip for drawing straight lines is to originate the movement of what you're drawing with further up the arm - you can get much better results easier if you use your shoulder instead of elbow or wrist.

DekuTree64 wrote:

Kiz wrote:

It took me ages to get a halfway straight horizon in my last drawing, I need new hands.

Fun trick:
1) Touch somewhere on the touch screen.
2) While still holding the first point, touch somewhere else.
3) Release the first point.

Voila, straight line :)

Cheers, hadn't thought of that, I'll give it a whirl next time I fire it up.

bear wrote:

Kiz: for horizontal and vertical lines you can press some part of your hand against one of the edges of the DS and try to hold the stylus at a fixed distance from that and then just slide your hand along the edge.

Yeah that's what I've been trying to do so far. I'm not a remotely artistic person, and before this I hadn't drawn anything in a few years, so my hand is just really unsteady, even doing that.

nice tips guys. will use them. thx.

Any ETA on the next Colors Release, or Colors Gallery Update?

I was wondering if it would be possible to make the Gallery into an RSS feed.

Needs line and shape tools, not to mention an UNDO button. As of right now its pretty awesome though, first DS APP i've seen that uses pressure sensitivity.

kprojekt wrote:

Any ETA on the next Colors Release, or Colors Gallery Update?

I was wondering if it would be possible to make the Gallery into an RSS feed.

As for gallery, i planned to release new update at the end of the month, but due to some IRL circumstances that cant be done on time. (I need to stay for a while at my parents house where there is no internet connection).

For this update i planned to add user support, logging, simple maitaining submissions, user pages with all pictures of the same artist grouped together, and posibility to leave user comments to pictures.

I will look into RSS thing when i'm done with that.

battleroyalex wrote:

Needs line and shape tools

For gods sake no! That would ruin all the feeling of Colors!
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

yes, i'm salivating in anticipation for the 1.06 colors release. bring on the dynamic brush size! jesse, still looking at end of august?

don't want to rush the progress, just wondering.

muchachotron wrote:

jesse, still looking at end of august?

I don't think I will make it for August. I've been rewriting some core things and there is still too much left to do to get a stable release.

Feature-wise, not much has change since my last update. THe dynamic-brush size will definitly be in there as well as the precision improvements. I also hope to get some basic online features in there (no multiplayer though). I'll see what more I can scrape together... :)

battleroyalex wrote:

Needs line and shape tools

As Jetboy says, that would not work with Colors! design thoughs, sorry.

madwurmz.com wrote:

Heay Jesse, Why didn't you submit 'Colors!' to the Neoflash coding contest?

Well... Not sure, actually. The thought never crossed my mind, I guess. :)

And I'll definitly take you up on your offer to do interface work on Colors!. But you already know that. :)

Kiz wrote:

I'm using an M3 Lite (with a 1GB Kingston MicroSD card).

That is strange. That flashcard has been working well for others. If you like, you could send email me the files that causes a corruped save, and I'll see if there is something special with them.

Has there been any talk about an undo feature? This would make a great addition to the program. If playback is possible I think undoing a stroke should be easy.

Thanks!

Adam

Would it also be possible to have the "COLORS" directory that stores the saved files be created wherever the colors.nds file is located instead of the root directory of the card?

Kiz wrote:

I'm using an M3 Lite (with a 1GB Kingston MicroSD card).

The question is: Do you use latest firmware for your card? If no, try upgrading.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

adamrgolf wrote:

Has there been any talk about an undo feature?

yes, but like 10 000 times only.

Quote:

If playback is possible I think undoing a stroke should be easy.

But it's not.
I think i could explain, but i won't.

edit: sorry for being a retard
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

Jesse wrote:

quinbd wrote:

I would really like to see an undo button. I need it. :)

I know. A lot of people are asking for it. :)

Here is what the FAQ says.

Q: Will undo be implemented?
A: At the moment no Undo feature is planned. However there is a plan to extend the playback functionality so you can stop the playback and continue painting from there. The reason why there will be no traditional undo is that it would eat up too much memory.

should be on top of every pages in this thread ;)

jetboy wrote:

Kiz wrote:

I'm using an M3 Lite (with a 1GB Kingston MicroSD card).

The question is: Do you use latest firmware for your card? If no, try upgrading.

Yeah everything's up to date.

Jesse wrote:

Kiz wrote:

I'm using an M3 Lite (with a 1GB Kingston MicroSD card).

That is strange. That flashcard has been working well for others. If you like, you could send email me the files that causes a corruped save, and I'll see if there is something special with them.

If I come across the problem again, I'll send it to you. I've saved that drawing and done more on it, so it's probably not much use for debugging now. Appreciate the support, and keep up the good work.

I was wondering if anyone knows of a program that can convert or open .drw files? I would like to make .gifs of the drawings being made. I'm not sure if this is even the right forum for this, sorry. Colors! is amazing though, I really enjoy it.

I made a Java application to open .drw files but it does not correctly render .drw files from newer versions of Colors (or older version either).
Jens, the creator of Colors, sent me some info to update it but I have not had time to do it yet.

You can find the app in its current state here.

masscat wrote:

Jens, the creator of Colors, sent me some info to update it but I have not had time to do it yet.

It would be cool if we could integrate it with gallery.
That wayor the other, i'm looking forward for new version of your software.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

hi,

Colors ! is really a fantastic tool, i went into making my ds homebrew enabled just for this software, just love it :3.

Keep up the fantastic work Jesse !

Recently i wanted to make a gallery of the painting, i've done in colors completly in flash, so i've took the oportunity to port Masscat java .drw player in actionscript 3 since the code was posted, i hope you don't disagree Masscat, you can take a look here .

http://railkill.free.fr/colors/

I'm currently working on a better way to render the painting and other functionnality.

I was wondering if it would be possible to have some more information on the .drw file ^^.

Railk wrote:

http://railkill.free.fr/colors/

.

Superb. Flash meets Colors.

jetboy wrote:

masscat wrote:

Jens, the creator of Colors, sent me some info to update it but I have not had time to do it yet.

It would be cool if we could integrate it with gallery.
That wayor the other, i'm looking forward for new version of your software.

It is designed so that it can be. If you have a look at the html source of the test page you will see that the location of the .drw file is passed into the Java applet using the drwfile parameter (path relative to the location of the HTML page containing the applet tag):

Code:

So it should be fairly easy to generate a similar applet tag on, say, the picture details page.
Unfortunately I am a bit busy at the moment so I do not know when I will be updating the code.

Railk wrote:

i hope you don't disagree Masscat

Feel free to use the code, I am glad it was useful.

Railk wrote:

I was wondering if it would be possible to have some more information on the .drw file ^^.

Jens requested that I keep the code he gave private so I am not at liberty to pass it on. Message Jens (Jesse on these forums) and he may help.

I wonder when '06 will come out...

Joaqo

masscat wrote:

I made a Java application to open .drw files but it does not correctly render .drw files from newer versions of Colors (or older version either).
Jens, the creator of Colors, sent me some info to update it but I have not had time to do it yet.

You can find the app in its current state here.

thanks a ton! i just started messin around with colors! and already love it. i dont know the first thing about coding or any of that, so this is a big help. i'll keep an eye out to see if the java app ever gets updated. thanks again!

Joaqo wrote:

I wonder when '06 will come out...

I'm sorry for the delay, but it looks like it will be some time yet, at the earliest next week.

Railk wrote:

I was wondering if it would be possible to have some more information on the .drw file ^^.

Your flash thing looks really cool! I've sent you a mail regarding the info you requested.

mawpaw wrote:

I was wondering if anyone knows of a program that can convert or open .drw files? I would like to make .gifs of the drawings being made. I'm not sure if this is even the right forum for this, sorry. Colors! is amazing though, I really enjoy it.

Converting a painting into a video somehow is pretty up on my list. The big plan is to do it through the online system, but perhaps I can do some temporary feature for the next version that can export an uncompressed avi directly to the flashcard.

masscat>> thx yes your code was really usefull ^^, especialy the bytearray part for parsing .drw file.

Jesse>> thx ^^, and i just received your mail, i send you a reply now.

Jesse wrote:

mawpaw wrote:

I was wondering if anyone knows of a program that can convert or open .drw files? I would like to make .gifs of the drawings being made. I'm not sure if this is even the right forum for this, sorry. Colors! is amazing though, I really enjoy it.

Converting a painting into a video somehow is pretty up on my list. The big plan is to do it through the online system, but perhaps I can do some temporary feature for the next version that can export an uncompressed avi directly to the flashcard.

The Java AVI exporter for FlickBook builds uncompressed AVIs so I could put the facility into the Java Colors .drw application.

The biggest problem with doing the export on hardware is that the uncompressed AVI files get big very quickly. A 512x384 24bit AVI requires 589824 bytes per frame, so running at a cinematic 24 frames per second that means 13.5MiBs per second. Those file sizes are fine on your average desktop but can quickly fill up a smaller memory card.

Might it be possible to reverse-engineer the lossless delta encoding format that the GPL'd CamStudio Codec produces, which is optimized for images with very little motion, and have the DS output that format?
_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.

Jesse wrote:

mawpaw wrote:

I was wondering if anyone knows of a program that can convert or open .drw files? I would like to make .gifs of the drawings being made. I'm not sure if this is even the right forum for this, sorry. Colors! is amazing though, I really enjoy it.

Converting a painting into a video somehow is pretty up on my list. The big plan is to do it through the online system, but perhaps I can do some temporary feature for the next version that can export an uncompressed avi directly to the flashcard.

Doing that online would be perfect! (I just found a giant hair in my ice cream(not mine)) If the time is there, some sort of test app would be awesome, just to see it. thanks again!

p.s.
I'm pretty new to all of this and was wondering if I could get pointed in the general direction of some reading for coding and development? Thanks.

I have added an AVI exporter to the Java Colors .drw application.
ColorsDraw_avi_out2.jar

Run as:

Code:

java -jar ColorsDraw_avi_out2.jar

Or maybe double/right click the .jar file.

Note that the rest of the Java app is the same as before, i.e. no support for recent Colors features, incorrect stroke render.

EDIT: There is a limit on the size of film the exporter can generate. This is about 3500 frames. At 24 frames per second this means the film cannot be longer than 2 minutes 25 seconds long.

EDIT: Updated the java app. Changed the image read/write method speeding up export. Set the minimum commands per frame to avoid trying to create an AVI that will be too big.

Last edited by masscat on Wed Sep 05, 2007 1:42 pm; edited 2 times in total

Joaqo wrote:

I wonder when '06 will come out...Joaqo

Still people are posting better images in the gallery every day, acting like it's not needed to wait :)
I mean http://colors.brombra.net/details.php?i=652 Awesome like Hell Yeah!!

masscat wrote:

I have added an AVI exporter to the Java Colors .drw application.
ColorsDraw_avi_out.jar

Run as:

Code:

java -jar ColorsDraw_avi_out.jar

Or maybe double/right click the .jar file.

Note that the rest of the Java app is the same as before, i.e. no support for recent Colors features, incorrect stroke render.

The export is slow as the reading/writing of the images currently uses a very slow method.

awesome masscat. thanks for that

madwurmz.com wrote:

Joaqo wrote:

I wonder when '06 will come out...Joaqo

Still people are posting better images in the gallery every day, acting like it's not needed to wait :)
I mean http://colors.brombra.net/details.php?i=652 Awesome like Hell Yeah!!

Yay thank you very much! I will try to post more girls for my fantasy school(fantasy school is not the title i am still thinking about the title).

I'm working on 2 girls right now and i am hoping that i could finish it today or on Saturday. I will post the playback too.

Colors is so close to open canvas my favorite drawing software so i find colors pretty easy to use and it became my most valuable DS application.

If Jesse could add a temporary Lock to the save files so no one would accidentally save over their work that would be really fantastic.

Thank you for making Colors it gave my DS another use other than Playing games.

Jetboy thank you for the gallery also i am looking forward to your goals.
_________________
Wii will Win

hi jetboy, any idea when the gallery updates will come into effect? the updates you listed to be in the new gallery sound great.

Hi, Jetboy. Can you take off some of the Henti on the colors gallery site. I have my kid brother using colors and submitting pictures and I really don't want him to be seeing and reading suggestive stuff http://colors.brombra.net/details.php?i=656

Just my take on it.

kprojekt wrote:

Hi, Jetboy. Can you take off some of the Henti on the colors gallery site. I have my kid brother using colors and submitting pictures and I really don't want him to be seeing and reading suggestive stuff http://colors.brombra.net/details.php?i=656

Just my take on it.

That only proves that perversion is just in ones mind. One see bukake there, other see a girl that eat ice cream on a stick, but was a bit clumsy. On the other hand comment is quite suggestive, and i had to bend my mind to see it as a girl eating ice cream.

Personally i would rather lean toward adding disclaimer when you enter colors gallery for the first time saying that you have to be over 18 to watch it. As this is one of the pictures i like best.

But as I do it for Jesse, it is he who should decide how similar cases should be handled in the future. For the time being i will make this picture not showing in the listing (you will still be able to follow above link).
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

Sato: Thanks for uploading censored version. I just love that picture.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

golden

sorry for being a prude :P

comment in gallery wrote:

Angel Wing

The playback stopped somewhere in the middle and i do not know why. Same school with the first girl i uploaded(girl in the comfort room).

Probably drw is too long.
Jesse - you should probably implement some kind of warning when artist gets close to the drw buffer limit.
btw. How big is it? Can it get any bigger?
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

Last edited by jetboy on Mon Sep 10, 2007 6:32 am; edited 1 time in total

comment in gallery wrote:

Angel Wing

Same school with the first girl i uploaded(girl in the comfort room).

Looking sharp! Please do mention your name!

:)

jetboy wrote:

Jesse - you should probably implement some kind of warning when artist gets close to the drw buffer limit.
btw. How big is it? Can it get any bigger?

I know. It's a hack. :)

I think the size in v1.05 is 1MB before it clamps, I think. It's changed a couple of times depending on how much memory was available for each version. I could do this better throgh some simple streaming to the flash-card, which would also remove the memory requirement, so I guess that is the plan. :)

EDIT: Yes, I saw the picture mentioned has a .drw with a size of exactly 1MB (That's a _lot_ of strokes). I've also been working on reducing the file-format further.

Jesse wrote:

jetboy wrote:

Jesse - you should probably implement some kind of warning when artist gets close to the drw buffer limit.
btw. How big is it? Can it get any bigger?

I know. It's a hack. :)

I think the size in v1.05 is 1MB before it clamps, I think. It's changed a couple of times depending on how much memory was available for each version. I could do this better throgh some simple streaming to the flash-card, which would also remove the memory requirement, so I guess that is the plan. :)

EDIT: Yes, I saw the picture mentioned has a .drw with a size of exactly 1MB (That's a _lot_ of strokes). I've also been working on reducing the file-format further.

Oh now i know why.

I got used to drawing really messy at the start so that is why i erase a lot and redo so many things.
_________________
Wii will Win

Jesse wrote:

I could do this better throgh some simple streaming to the flash-card, which would also remove the memory requirement, so I guess that is the plan. :)

That would be excelent, however straming data to the flash card can be pretty devastating to the flash, unless you do some buffering and write in larger chunks. If you would stream it stroke by stroke, you would kill the flash memory pretty quickly.
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

LiteDS wrote:

Oh now i know why.

Excelent pictures! RESPECT!
_________________
Colors! gallery -> http://colors.collectingsmiles.com
Any questions? Try http://colors.collectingsmiles.com/faq.php first, or official forums http://forum.brombra.net

Jesse wrote:

I know. It's a hack. :)

A better way for the future could be paging the document to disk. You need some abstraction in there to do this in a simple manner, but it should be quite doable. Slow, but at least robust :)

The latest issue of http://www.imaginefx.com/ has mention of Colors along with the Cat image by Mattias Snygg.

If anyone is interested pick up a copy at your local magazine store.

Congrats Jens

kprojekt wrote:

The latest issue of http://www.imaginefx.com/ has mention of Colors along with the Cat image by Mattias Snygg.

Yay! I didn't know anything about that. That's pretty cool! :)
Thanks for the info!

I've been pretty quiet for a while so I owe you guys an update.

v1.06 is coming along slowly, but if we are lucky it will be released late this week. As I mentioned earlier, improvements to the precision is one of the big things and I think I'm happy with the result I have now. Pressure Controls Size is also in there and seems to work nicely. I'm currently working closely with Ernst to update the UI for the new features, which also includes an even sharper look. Another big feature I've come a long way on is the Send To Email functionality. By using this you can send your drawing directly to an e-mail address, which is a simple way to extract your paintings from Colors! or to send birthday cards to your friends. I'm not completely sure yet, but I think that will make into v1.06 as the first step of the online functionality. One of the neat things about that is that it is based on the .drw format, so it's repainted on the server in higher resolution before it's sent (1024x768). I still haven't fixed the MORE SAVE SLOTS!!! request, but I probably couldn't get away with releasing another version without doing something about it so I plan to have that fixed as well. :)

Thanks for all the feedback, support and paintings that makes this project so much fun!

gbadev.org forum archive

DS homebrew announcements > Colors! v1.05

#136623 - Jesse - Fri Aug 03, 2007 11:45 am

#136626 - Jesse - Fri Aug 03, 2007 11:57 am

#136628 - Jesse - Fri Aug 03, 2007 12:01 pm

#136629 - Jesse - Fri Aug 03, 2007 12:03 pm

#136631 - laurens - Fri Aug 03, 2007 12:25 pm

#136632 - stu - Fri Aug 03, 2007 12:32 pm

#136633 - Jesse - Fri Aug 03, 2007 12:44 pm

#136634 - dy - Fri Aug 03, 2007 1:25 pm

#136635 - madwurmz.com - Fri Aug 03, 2007 1:28 pm

#136638 - jetboy - Fri Aug 03, 2007 1:46 pm

#136639 - dy - Fri Aug 03, 2007 1:51 pm

#136641 - chrisis - Fri Aug 03, 2007 2:19 pm

#136642 - leonardozimbres - Fri Aug 03, 2007 2:30 pm

#136643 - moket - Fri Aug 03, 2007 2:37 pm

#136644 - Jesse - Fri Aug 03, 2007 3:04 pm

#136650 - crulee - Fri Aug 03, 2007 3:31 pm

#136651 - madwurmz.com - Fri Aug 03, 2007 3:43 pm

#136652 - chrisis - Fri Aug 03, 2007 4:20 pm

#136655 - gas.mim - Fri Aug 03, 2007 4:29 pm

#136656 - TheYak - Fri Aug 03, 2007 4:32 pm

#136657 - gas.mim - Fri Aug 03, 2007 4:38 pm

#136658 - Jesse - Fri Aug 03, 2007 4:53 pm

#136675 - errabes - Fri Aug 03, 2007 7:26 pm

#136688 - Joaqo - Fri Aug 03, 2007 9:28 pm

#136690 - Joaqo - Fri Aug 03, 2007 9:35 pm

#136692 - calcprogrammer1 - Fri Aug 03, 2007 10:01 pm

#136694 - Jesse - Fri Aug 03, 2007 10:07 pm

#136695 - stonelove2 - Fri Aug 03, 2007 10:17 pm

#136701 - masscat - Fri Aug 03, 2007 11:05 pm

#136705 - Jesse - Fri Aug 03, 2007 11:40 pm

#136707 - calcprogrammer1 - Fri Aug 03, 2007 11:53 pm

#136753 - TheYak - Sat Aug 04, 2007 5:01 pm

#136757 - madwurmz.com - Sat Aug 04, 2007 5:52 pm

#136780 - Joaqo - Sun Aug 05, 2007 1:21 am

#136781 - manbitesdog - Sun Aug 05, 2007 1:26 am

#136792 - Cancerboy - Sun Aug 05, 2007 9:35 am

#136794 - jetboy - Sun Aug 05, 2007 10:58 am

#136814 - frosted - Sun Aug 05, 2007 4:53 pm

#136816 - lmn4096 - Sun Aug 05, 2007 5:21 pm

#136824 - jetboy - Sun Aug 05, 2007 6:10 pm

#136827 - x999x - Sun Aug 05, 2007 6:29 pm

#136833 - LoTekK - Sun Aug 05, 2007 7:04 pm

#136849 - Mimi is06 - Sun Aug 05, 2007 10:39 pm

#136865 - calcprogrammer1 - Mon Aug 06, 2007 12:48 am

#136866 - madwurmz.com - Mon Aug 06, 2007 1:40 am

#136871 - Joaqo - Mon Aug 06, 2007 1:56 am

#136873 - calcprogrammer1 - Mon Aug 06, 2007 1:56 am

#136874 - manbitesdog - Mon Aug 06, 2007 1:58 am

#136881 - Joaqo - Mon Aug 06, 2007 2:42 am

#136882 - x999x - Mon Aug 06, 2007 2:43 am

#136884 - stu - Mon Aug 06, 2007 2:59 am

#136885 - nekouma - Mon Aug 06, 2007 3:12 am

#136889 - Joaqo - Mon Aug 06, 2007 4:12 am

#136892 - calcprogrammer1 - Mon Aug 06, 2007 4:49 am

#136895 - DekuTree64 - Mon Aug 06, 2007 7:11 am

#136898 - Dudu.exe - Mon Aug 06, 2007 8:03 am

#136901 - jetboy - Mon Aug 06, 2007 8:59 am

#136915 - LoTekK - Mon Aug 06, 2007 12:38 pm

#136916 - dy - Mon Aug 06, 2007 12:40 pm

#136918 - sinistergfx - Mon Aug 06, 2007 1:35 pm

#136955 - krooked - Mon Aug 06, 2007 9:05 pm

#136958 - Joaqo - Mon Aug 06, 2007 10:13 pm

#136960 - Joaqo - Mon Aug 06, 2007 10:21 pm

#136965 - jetboy - Mon Aug 06, 2007 10:35 pm

#136975 - Jesse - Mon Aug 06, 2007 11:58 pm

#136980 - TheYak - Tue Aug 07, 2007 1:20 am

#136981 - Na - Tue Aug 07, 2007 1:33 am

#136982 - calcprogrammer1 - Tue Aug 07, 2007 1:54 am

#136991 - nekouma - Tue Aug 07, 2007 2:51 am

#136993 - calcprogrammer1 - Tue Aug 07, 2007 3:02 am

#136998 - psymastr - Tue Aug 07, 2007 6:48 am

#137020 - poopipe - Tue Aug 07, 2007 1:24 pm

#137027 - jetboy - Tue Aug 07, 2007 2:32 pm

#137042 - poopipe - Tue Aug 07, 2007 4:32 pm

#137097 - madwurmz.com - Tue Aug 07, 2007 10:41 pm

#137102 - calcprogrammer1 - Tue Aug 07, 2007 11:23 pm

#137116 - znat - Wed Aug 08, 2007 1:17 am

#137121 - calcprogrammer1 - Wed Aug 08, 2007 2:26 am