Orpheus?

I've made the screens a little lighter.

I seem to recall that that was due to an excessive amount of dedicated personal time from certain Snarkpit members

Yeah, all of this is very much up in the air right now. I'm just trying to get the texture scheme and new areas banged out, then I'll focus on the more subtle elements of the map.

Underdog, I reduced all of the screenshots to 50/60k'is just for you (and other 56k'ers) I do want to make these things as accessible as possible, and have no problem accommodating people on 56k... I just forgot to check file sizes on those pics when I first uploaded them. I think it's a valid request for people to be efficient with their screenies.

The 'orpheus' statement was more literal than you may have taken it. I have honestly wondered in the past whether you are actually Orpheus reborn. It wouldn't surprise me if the ole chap decided to participate in a somewhat covert way. I mean...where he hell did he dissapear to anyway? I don't mean that as an insult - it's just surreal how both of you share strikingly similar mannerisms, pet-peaves, and viewpoints. Also, your comment about 'people contributing to broken palace'.... orpheus offered alot great input on that map, so I would understand him wanting to be recognized as a participant in it's growth. I don't even know why you would care, though, since you had no part in that.

Anyway... no harm or discrimination intended. Back to the real purpose here, making a good map. I'm working on that rock tutorial this afternoon, and will try to get some solid work done on the map also.

if you can recall, as you say, that an excessive amount of some peoples personal time went into giving finger feedback on a map that was in the making more than two years ago, then i'm sure you'd also recall that even though Orph posted lots of pics, he would also have been more than willing to supply smaller versions of them without hesitation.

I didn't mean to start a s**t-storm here. I know how these threads can spin out of control and I don't want that to happen. Soo.. lets just steer this back to the topic.

One of the major things I'm doing with this map, is creating custom textures that fit the theme. I figured it might be nice to show you guys a few of them. Of course, I've made them small....so if anyone wants a high-res version, contact me and I would be glad to share. When I'm finished, I will put them all up for download.

Here's a trim texture I"m working on. It looks ok ingame, but I'm not happy with the snakeish pattern. I sort of just did it quickly as a test, and plan to go back, reworking it and creating a more interesting dragonish pattern.

This is a sort of deteriorated patterned wall texture. I've made a few variations of this one, as you will see further down. The cool thing about these textures (which you can't see here) is the way I'm using specularity. The greenish faded house pattern has a specularity map applied to it, giving it reflective qualities. This creates the illusion of the nice shiny, reflective bits that you see on alot of asian fabrics and patterns.

Same pattern, without the reflective qualities on the 'print' section. I've also made the pattern darker and more obvious.

This one works well, becuase I've applied specularity to only the flower pattern at the bottom of the texture. You would have to see it ingame to really appreciate it... makes it feel like fancy wallpaper.

Here's that specularity map I was talking about.

Here's another texture with a subtle shiny surface to it. It sort of gives the effect of a dull metal surface, or somewhat glossy material.

Now here's the wood trim texture that I use everywhere. It may look somewhat boring in this screenshot, but it works well ingame. This also has a slight specularity to it, which gives it that nice dark polished wood feeling that I could never get in Broken Palace 1.

Another fancy patterned wall, with subtle specularity on the gold leaves of the pattern.

Here's what I currently have for the lamp texture. This one is definately going to get refined a bit, but it has a lightmap channel which makes part of the texture illuminated. Works well as a lightsource, when you throw in some textured lighting and a nice sprite.

Lastly, this is my paperwall texure that you will see all througout the map. I grunged it up a little where the wood meets the paper, and it looks a little more antique and intersting.

All of these textures were created in photoshop. I've got a few gigs worth of reference pictures that I use for such occasions. What I generally do, is slice up photos and combine lots of different elements from different pics to acheive the look I want. I guess I should maybe do a quick tutorial on creating textures, as it's much easier than people might think. There are a few great photoshop tricks that I use which carry me very far in the process.