FIle Conversions and Color Loss; possible remedies?, Chara Spritesheets and Chara Battlesheets Options

[Lynx the Destroy...]

I'm trying to use 2003 and I've been working on custom sprite sheets. I've done this before with 2000 and had no problems but now I'm experiencing formatting issues.

2003 says it only accepts PNG and XYZ. I've found XYZ is similar to 256 color. I've converted different sprite sheets to various formats, including PNG, and the maker tells me:
[1] For all formats but PNG or 256 colors, I'm reminded these file types aren't supported
[2] For PNG files I've made myself, "This PNG type is not supported"; it however supports anything I download
[3] It accepts 256 color files.

The issue with file acceptance for 256 colors is the complete loss of color accuracy and depth. I've made reds that swapped and turned blues, half of every sprite becomes partially transparent, outlines merging and entire characters changing to a single conglomerate of indecipherable colors.

Are there any suggested solutions to this sprite sheet dilemma?

[amerk]

The loss of color is probably because you are using MS Paint. You'll need to use another image program, which saves the quality of the colors when converting. Any should work:

Paint.net, GIMP, GraphicsGale, Photoshop, Irfanview...

[shinyjiggly]

Ah, this age old problem. Here's an old post of mine explaining how to convert a PNG:

Well, I usually use the GIMP to change my color depth (it's free!) and it works pretty well as long as you have more than 16 colors total (otherwise it automatically converts into a 16 color instead of a 256 color). But your problem seems to be an amount of colors over 256.
If you can download and use GIMP, you can use a tool called "colorcube analysis" that will tell you how many colors you have in your picture. If it says that you have more than 256, you might want to use "posterize" at the lowest possible setting where everything still looks nice.
Once that's over with, you can convert it to indexed mode. Just remember that unless you want dots all over your picture, don't use the floyd-steinberg method (which is selected by default...) Once that's done, you can save it and use it!

One thing I would add to this is to not use posterize because it turns out that the index option picks out better colors than the posterizer (the posterizer tends to pick colors out a set palette of a chosen scope and the indexer actually goes with the most used colors in the image).

But, most spritesheets will not need to worry about the color limit.

[mavsith]

I'm trying to use 2003 and I've been working on custom sprite sheets. I've done this before with 2000 and had no problems but now I'm experiencing formatting issues.

2003 says it only accepts PNG and XYZ. I've found XYZ is similar to 256 color. I've converted different sprite sheets to various formats, including PNG, and the maker tells me:
[1] For all formats but PNG or 256 colors, I'm reminded these file types aren't supported
[2] For PNG files I've made myself, "This PNG type is not supported"; it however supports anything I download
[3] It accepts 256 color files.

The issue with file acceptance for 256 colors is the complete loss of color accuracy and depth. I've made reds that swapped and turned blues, half of every sprite becomes partially transparent, outlines merging and entire characters changing to a single conglomerate of indecipherable colors.

Are there any suggested solutions to this sprite sheet dilemma?

I think the best way is to use photoshop.

[gadesx]

I use micrografx photomagic, that let you change to any number of colours, choosing the best combination for no lost much
quality

[MissCoriel]

For most sprite work I recommend iDraw3 takes a bit to get working but well worth it.