WoW Petopia Community

GormanGhaste wrote:Speaking of the green raptor skin, the raptors that use it don't have feathers. Do they use a slightly different model, or are the feathers on that skin just completely transparent?

Good question! It's the same model. However all the raptor skins have an alpha channel. This serves as a mask to make parts of the image transparent if you don't want them shown. For example this is used around the teeth so that they don't have to go into minute detail on the model itself. In the case of the feathers, most raptor skins have a feather-shaped gap in the alpha mask around where the feathers are depicted in the skin file. The green raptor skin has no feathers, and its alpha mask is completely filled in at that point. So the feathers that are on the actual model are rendered invisible. The Devilsaur skins actually have the feather-shaped gap in the alpha mask, despite them having no feathers on the actual skin! This shows they were copied from the raptor skin originally. The mask was never altered, as the model itself has no feathers so there's nothing to worry about. If you copy one over to the raptor model, however, you can see the problem.

I made versions of the devilsaur skin files with a modified mask so that the feather region is invisible, and they now work on the raptor model without any weirdness. For example:


This was fun! I finally learned how to edit individual colour channels in the image files, and even mix and match channels between skins. Doing so gives you all manner of weird and wonderful colour combos, such as:

I really love the moonlight silver in the last one. Note that this is all a matter of random mixing and matching. No artistic talent is involved. If you want to see real artistic talent applied to these skins, well... I'm hoping a certain someone will have something close to finished soon and he'll show you what real artistry is

And a few more novel combos, this time using proper raptor skins rather than the devilsaur ones. I'll avoid doing any more of these as they're not real skins in the database and it's getting a bit off-topic. I'd probably post anything else like this in the fan art forum.

Those raptor skins look so amazing. :O How much effort would it be for Blizzard to implement skins like that if they're just alterations of the color files?

TygerDarkstorm wrote:Those raptor skins look so amazing. :O How much effort would it be for Blizzard to implement skins like that if they're just alterations of the color files?

Well for every interesting combo that looked like it might work in the game, there might have been 5-10 that I rejected. That was using purely random mixes of colour channels from different skins. But it takes just a matter of minutes. That's all!

I would honestly love a larger selection of both raptors and devils. The Devilraptors look insanely stunning. While the devils don't look too bad with raptor skins, I still think there was a little more tlc in their original skins. [Red Devil with black stripes. plz. That's what Dred should have been! Ahahaha!]

Raptor skin waaaaaannnnnttttt.
/drools

Wain wrote:

TygerDarkstorm wrote:Those raptor skins look so amazing. :O How much effort would it be for Blizzard to implement skins like that if they're just alterations of the color files?

Well for every interesting combo that looked like it might work in the game, there might have been 5-10 that I rejected. That was using purely random mixes of colour channels from different skins. But it takes just a matter of minutes. That's all!

Can they even use something that has been 'made' by a fan? I mean they are from their files, but isn't there something that prevents them from using fan submitted work or such? *shrug*

Spiritbinder wrote:

Wain wrote:The necklace is really exaggerated on the devilsaur, though. I expect it to be carrying a handbag and wearing an old fashioned lady's hat.

Wish... GRANTED!

Okay, am I the only one who just had a Harry Potter flashback and thought of Snape in the clothes of Neville's grandmother all of the sudden?!

No Shade, Kalli already mentioned it a few posts up.

Shade wrote:

Wain wrote:

TygerDarkstorm wrote:Those raptor skins look so amazing. :O How much effort would it be for Blizzard to implement skins like that if they're just alterations of the color files?

Well for every interesting combo that looked like it might work in the game, there might have been 5-10 that I rejected. That was using purely random mixes of colour channels from different skins. But it takes just a matter of minutes. That's all!

Can they even use something that has been 'made' by a fan? I mean they are from their files, but isn't there something that prevents them from using fan submitted work or such? *shrug*

I presumed the question was how easy would it be for them to generate new skins by the same method.

Wain wrote:

Love this mottled one!

The Devilraptors look amazing! THey seem slimmer and more wild than the classic raptors. Love it! Those should be implemented some day... Especially the green and brown ones!
The raptor skinned devilsuars.. Not so much.

Wain wrote: I presumed the question was how easy would it be for them to generate new skins by the same method.

That is what I meant, yes. Since you said this is just basic playing around with all of the color files, as opposed to something like SB's worgen horse, I should think it would be something Blizzard could create to make some new skins.

I would love love love the black and red owl and the black eagle...they are beautiful!!!!

LupisDarkmoon wrote:The Devilraptors look amazing! THey seem slimmer and more wild than the classic raptors. Love it! Those should be implemented some day... Especially the green and brown ones!
The raptor skinned devilsuars.. Not so much.

To be fair, I suspect it's because even though they share the same skins, the devilsaur ones are 512x512 and the raptor ones are only 256x256. So the devilsaur ones have 4 times as many pixels. I'm not sure why that is. Since devilsaur skins were derived from raptor ones, I presume the latter do exist at higher resolutions in the art team's database. Hopefully then they could probably be upgraded.

To avoid getting too far off-topic I'll post any other new skin mash-ups I make over here: http://forums.wow-petopia.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=13887

BUMP!

Hey Wain/Noah,

Any chance of getting some of these, particularly the ones below, into 4.3?...

You know Wain != Noah, right? I'd imagine that Wain would add ALL of these skins in on his own if he could!

Kalliope wrote:You know Wain != Noah, right? I'd imagine that Wain would add ALL of these skins in on his own if he could!

The database would be so full of new skins they couldn't be used up in 5 expansions

Seriously though, even if I were Noah I probably couldn't just do that. I imagine the art team would be zealously guarding the database like a big angry Cerberus

Wain wrote:I imagine the art team would be zealously guarding the database like a big angry Cerberus

*brings out standing mirror*
*gives big angry Cerberus pretty new skin*

Wain wrote:

...I NEED THIS.