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Complete content Copyright © 2009,
Steigerwald EDV™ Verlag, all rights reserved.
Steigerwald EDV Verlag, Am Hasenloehle 12, 91481, Federal Republic of
Germany. Dungeons Daring™, Jörðgarð™,
Vintyri™ and Steigerwald EDV™ are
trademarks of Steigerwald EDV Verlag.
Fractal Mapper™ is a trademark of NBOS Software. Dundjinni™ is a trademark of Dundjinni
Enterprises.
The Vintyri
Project is the successor to the Projects
Groups 1370™ and the earlier game design groups who created the Northern Journey™ adventure. which now
is distributed by http://www.candlekeep.com
.
Current:
November 5, 2009
The Vintyri Cartographic Collection
Possible Issues with Fractal Mapper™ 8, Dundjinni
and other programms
1. Important ... Before You Install!
Experience with
E-Mail that we received after the release of Symbol Sets 1 and 2 has made clear
that many users have had unexpected difficulties getting the results that they
want from the Vintyri Cartographic Collection. These problems are due to scaling issues, and
they are easy to resolve. It's clear
that we didn't explain this issue clearly enough in our first two PDF booklets. Users of other software also have posed
several questions.
Dundjinni users above all can anticipate some problems
with speed und usability of the Vintyri symbol sets if they are
installed by default and then used.. One
should consider that Dundjinni originally was developed for the mapping
of dungeons and encounter scenarios. Fractal
Mapper 8 is a bit more flexible, but FM8 users also can get some
unhappy results if they use the wrong scaling.
The problems that the two programs can have are somewhat different, so
let's look at them separately. Users of
other software should go to Section 1.3 below.
Go direct to issues for other programs
1.1 Fractal
Mapper 8 Issues
FM8 can work with any scale that a symbol
designer chooses, because he or she tells FM8 what scale to use with the
symbols in any catalog. The cartographer
doesn't have to worry about the scale, because a responsible symbol designer
already will have taken care of the problem in a small, usually unseen file
called default.xml.
That usually solves
all problems, but there can be some unpleasant surprises. Let's look at some different approaches. The raster symbol catalogs that are delivered
with FM8 are defined at a scale of 1 foot = 50 pixels. That's an excellent scale for dungeon
dressing and the other small items that are included in the FM8 symbol
sets. It would be a very problematical
scale for a symbol for a huge building.
A 120-by-120 foot building at that scale would require about 50 MB for
one, single building symbol.
The structures in
the Vintyri Cartographic Collection originally were intended for
placement on maps of small villages and sections of cities. Building symbols at a scale of 1 foot = 50
pixels would be highly impractical for such maps, in fact, some computers would
run out of available memory in trying to process such maps. However, such high resolution is absolutely
unnecessary for such maps. Therefore,
most of our symbol catalogs are made for a scale of 1 foot = 10 pixels, which
works out excellently in most cases.
Only the catalogs Parts for Structures and External Objects,
which contain relatively small symbols, are at a higher resolution of 1 foot =
40 pixels. These issues usually are of
no concern to you, because they are handled automatically in the background.
However, there are
two cases when this lower resolution might make you unhappy:
·
In maps where you like to zoom in frequently on a
single building. In this case, you may
find that the standard Vintyri FM8 symbols are unsatisfactorily blurry
with heavy pixilation.
·
In scenario maps that close in on two, three or
perhaps four structures. Here too you
may find that the standard Vintyri FM8 symbols are blurry and pixilated.
The Vintyri
Cartographic Collection is available in two versions. When the resolution in the FM8 version
is too low, you always can download the Dundjinni version, where the
same building symbols are available in a resolution of 1 foot = 40 pixels, the Dundjinni
standard. However, do not unzip
the Dundjinni catalogs directly into the FM8 folders on your hard
drive. That will give you all of the
disadvantages of large files when you don't need them.
Instead we suggest
that you open the Windows® Explorer or whatever other file manager you
use and create a new, personal folder in the NBOS folder hierarchy as shown in
the illustration below. On most systems,
you'll find the NBOS folder under C:\Programs, if you did a standard FM8
installation. If you're running a 64-bit
version of Windows 7 or Windows Vista®, the NBOS structure
probably will be under C:\Programs (x86) instead.
After you've
created the folder (Big Symbols in the illustration), open a graphic
viewer and look at the high resolution Dundjinni symbols that you copied
earlier into a temporary folder. Pick
only those high resolution symbols that you need and copy them into the new
folder that you created in the NBOS hierarchy (Big Symbols in the
illustration).
The next time that
you open FM8, the high resolution symbols will be available in the new
entry (Big Symbols in the illustration) that you created for the graphic
symbols menu in the lower, left hand corner of your FM8 screen. (See the illustration to the right below.)
If you use the Dundjinni
versions of Symbol Sets 1 and 2 in FM8, you need to unzip the patch version
of the scaling file default.xml into each folder that contains the high
resolution Dundjinni symbols.
These does not apply to the Fill and Textures set
or the Symbol Sets 3 through 5!
Problems some users
have had with our objects in Dundjinni arise from a combination of
resolution issues and the power of the PC upon which Dundjinni is
running. Remember that Dundjinni
originally was keyed toward making maps of dungeons and encounter scenarios.
Dundjinni uses a single resolution for all objects
(symbols in FM8 parlance). It
measures at 1 foot = 40 pixels. This
default scale works beautifully for the kind of objects that are delivered with
Dundjinni. For the most part
these are dungeon dressing, figures, tokens and other relatively small
objects. Most have a file size of
several hundred kilobytes.
For example, when
you load up the light clay tile wainwright's complex included in Symbol Set 3,
you have a single object with a file size of more than 40 megabytes. Even when running Dundjinni on a
modern PC with a dual core quad processor, 8 GB of memory and the 64-bit
version of Windows 7, such gigantic object files bring Dundjinni to
a near standstill. Some older PCs simply
can't process such huge objects in Dundjinni. They drop out with insufficient memory
warnings.
Thus, before
installing symbol sets of the Vintyri Cartographic Collection, one would
do well to ponder first how one intends to use the objects in the
collection. It was developed above all
to provide a set of objects for mapping small villages and sections of
cities. Building objects remain
relatively small in such maps, making high resolution unnecessary. If this is the main use that you foresee, we
strongly recommend that you install the FM8 versions of the catalogs
instead of the Dundjinni versions.
The scale of the FM8 objects is 1 foot = 10 pixels, except for
the catalogs Structures for Parts and External Objects. These catalogs hold relatively small
objects. They use the Dundjinni
scale of 1 foot = 40 pixels. Installing
the FM8 symbols does have a brief disadvantage, however. These objects will be out of scale at first,
being about 25% of their rightful size in comparison to Dundjinni
objects. The problem is trivial. Using the illustration below as a guideline,
do the following:
1. Pick the object you want from the menu and
stamp it at the desired location.
2. Click the object to mark it.
3. Click the percentage number in the field Size.
4. Set the level to 400%.
That's it. The slow performance and memory gobbling of
the high resolution symbols is a problem of the past.
Installing the FM8
symbols instead of the Dundjinni objects will solve your speed and
memory problems, but it might cause a new problem for you, the same problem FM8
users have at times when they need high resolution symbols. It may be that at times you want to make a
map that is filled mostly by a single building or that depicts an encounter
scenario with anywhere from one to four structures in it.
When the resolution
of the FM8 symbols is too low, you always can download the Dundjinni
version too. However, do not unzip
the Dundjinni catalogs directly into the Dundjinni folders on
your hard drive. That will give you all
of the disadvantages of large files when you don't need them.
Instead we suggest
that you open the Windows® Explorer or whatever other file manager you
use and create a new, personal folder in the Dundjinni folder hierarchy
as shown in the illustration on the following page. On most systems, you'll find the Dundjinni
folder under C:\Programs, if you did a standard installation. If you're running a 64-bit version of Windows
7 or Windows Vista®, the Dundjinni structure will be under
C:\Programs (x86) instead.
After you've
created the folder (Big Symbols in the illustration), open a graphic
viewer and look at the high resolution Dundjinni symbols that you copied
earlier into a temporary folder. Pick
only those high resolution symbols that you need and copy them into the new
folder that you created in the Dundjinni hierarchy (Big Symbols
in the illustration below). The next
time that you open Dundjinni, the high resolution symbols will be
available in the new menu entry that you created.
If you use the FM8
versions of Symbol Sets 1 and 2 in Dundjinni, you need to unzip the patch
version of the scaling file ~properties into each folder that contains
the standard resolution FM8 symbols.
These does not apply to the Fill and Textures set
or the Symbol Sets 3 through 5!
1.3
Issues With Other Software
We also have
received several inquiries from users of such diverse programs as Campaign
Cartographer™ 3, The Gimp, Paint.NET™, Adobe® PhotoShop® and Corel®
PaintshopPro® regarding the use of the Vintyri symbols, objects,
fills and textures.
All of these Vintyri
elements are graphical files in the standard PNG format or in low-compression,
high quality JPG format. In general, to
minimize file sizes, we've used the PNG format for objects with transparency
and JPG for solid objects without transparency.
Because these are
standard file formats, our symbols, objects, fills and textures should work
in principle with any graphical software program that can work with these
formats. However, with any of these
programs there may be resolution issues that you need to resolve.
The Vintyri
Cartographic Collection elements have the following resolutions:
·
FM8 Version, Catalogs External Objects and
Parts for Structures: Scale 1 foot = 40
pixels.
·
FM8 Version, all other catalogs: Scale 1 foot = 10 pixels.
·
Dundjinni Version, all catalogs: Scale 1 foot = 40 pixels.
What you may need
to do to adjust resolutions is dependent upon the software you are using. Campaign Cartographer 3 is a special
case, because it uses multiple resolutions for many of its graphical
objects. Some time ago, Ralf Schemmann
of ProFantasy Ltd. offered instructions on the CC2-L mailing list on how
to use CC3 menu options to convert third party elements for use in CC3.
If you're a CC3
user and you want to make maps with the Vintyri symbols, objects, fills
and textures but you do not know how to make the conversions with CC3,
we suggest that you E-Mail Mr. Schemmann for help at:
2. Installation
If you're using a
program other than FM8 or Dundjinni, we suggest that you unzip
the Vintyri files into a temporary folder and then use the Windows
Explorer or other file manager of your choice to move these files into your
preferred working folder or into a folder that may be required by your
software.
If you're using FM8
and/or Dundjinni you need to decide whether the standard resolution FM8 version or the high resolution Dundjinni version of a particular symbol set best suits
your needs. Regardless of which version your
choose, the ZIP files will create folders named Artisans and Commerce Clay Brown, Artisans and Commerce Clay Light,
Artisans and Commerce Slate, Artisans and Commerce Wood Shingle and External
Objects, as shown in the illustrations on the following page.
·
Fractal Mapper 8: Unpack the ZIP files into the FM8 folder named MapArt (see the illustration below). The main nbos
folder is found under Programs (or Programs x86, if you use 64-bit Windows 7 or Vista). Unzipping into MapArt will create the new folders shown in the left
illustration below. These folders
contain the symbols, and they can be accessed in your symbol menu. The folders also contain the XML file
required for FM8 and the ~properties file necessary for Dundjinni. If you have installed other symbols from the Vintyri Project, you already may have a
folder named Vintyri Collections in
the FM8 directory structure, as seen
in the illustration below. This may lead
to a message box asking whether you want to overwrite the existing
folders. Click Yes .
Doing so will add the new folder and files, but it will not overwrite
existing content.
·
Dundjinni: Dundjinni was installed on your PC under Programs (or Programs x86,
if you use 64-bit Windows 7 or Vista) in the folder hierarchy shown in
the illustration below. Unpack the
ZIP-files that you downloaded into the folder Fantasy. This will create
the new folders as shown in the right illustration below. These folders contain the objects, and they
can be accessed in your menu. These
folders also contain the ~properties
file necessary for Dundjinni and the
XML file required for FM8. This may lead to a message box asking whether
you want to overwrite the existing folders.
Click Yes . Doing so will add the new folder and files,
but it will not overwrite existing content.
Installation folders
for Fractal Mapper 8, left, and Dundjinni, right