When I re-save my image assets, do I lose the pivot points that I placed?

[johnnyivan]

Hi All,

My first post, I'm a newbie!

I re-exported my image assets from Adobe Illustrator, and I seemed to lose the pivot points that I placed/specified on them earlier in my Spriter project? I have to re-do them all now.

Does that seem right?

Thanks
John

[Mike at BrashMonkey]

No, this doesn't seem right at all. Hopefully we can figure out the problem.

If you're simply updating the image files Spriter is using by re-saving them out of illustrator with the exact same name and size. (saving over the original image files) then in spriter only the images should update, and it should have absolutely no effect on the pivot points you set, UNLESS:

1) you're confusing default pivot points, which is set by double-clicking the images in the files palette with setting non-default pivot point positions which only effect the pivot point for the key frame you set it on.

2) you're saving the images as a new size or with different trimming, so the pivot point would appear to be in a different location once the new images replace the old versions in Spriter.

Is one of these the case? If not, can you screen record the process, first showing original images and their pivot points in Spriter, and then showing the re-export of the images and their pivot points being different?

[johnnyivan]

Hi Mike,

Thanks for the help! I suspect that the problem was simply that I deleted the assets from my computer

Unfortunately, Illustrator doesn't seem to re-export assets with the same filenames as previously, so they don't either overwrite—or just take the place of what was previously there.

I suspect Photoshop is the same. I'm really not impressed by the slice/file export in either of those apps.

I'll check into this and report back

John

[Mike at BrashMonkey]

Someone had created a photoshop plugin (

 ) which automatically trims all layers and saves them as images named after the layer name. This would ensure some consistency except there's still the problem that if your edits make the specific image on a layer a slightly different size, then obviously the newly exported update to that image will have a different final pixel dimensions and therefore the pivot point will shift a bit.

"This is why I work in the way I just explained in another thread: The workflow I suggest is to first sketch out a mock up of a screen for your game at the actual target screen resolution. For example, if you're making a retro pixel art game you might set up your mock up screen to a total resolution of 256x240 (NES screen resolution). This will help you figure out the exact size you want the player character, props, and environment tiles etc should be, as well as figuring out where HUD elements should go, how big they should be etc.

Once you're happy with your mock-up, you now know exactly how many pixels across and vertically your character sprite should be etc. IN cases like this, where you're going for retro pixel art style, then it would be counter-productive to work at 2x or 4x, as it's best to just create and work with the low res pixel art from the beginning.

If, however your target screen resolution and style are higher res, and not a pixel art style, then it makes sense to first create your mock-up at actual target size (for example 640x480 or 1920x1080) and then enlarge the mock-up to 200 percent before starting to clean up the art and cutting it up into layer/pieces for body parts etc.

Whenever you need to edit the art, you work at the 2x resolution (200 percent), but once you're ready to export for use in Spriter you can export at 50 percent to bring it back down to the final required resolution.


What I do is keep my working art as separate body part images (already trimmed BUT with at least 10 or so pixels of transparent space all around in case my edits need a bit more room) at 2x or 4x scale... edit those when I need to make a change or clean it up, but then when re-exporting, I export at whatever reduction I need to end up back to the target resolution. For example, if my working art is at 2x (200 percent), then when I re-export after editing, I do so at 50 percent so that it's the proper final size.

[johnnyivan]

Yep, that sounds good, Mike.

I've been leaving plenty of space around each image in the slices in my 'exploded-view' Adobe Illustrator working file of the character.

It makes me wonder how in Photoshop, you can export layers to PNG sprites with space around them. Perhaps that plug-in can do it. I'll check it out, thanks

John