A more friendly Str Editor

[Tokei]

Heya,

I've been working on a tool for a few weeks now and I believe it is in a ready enough state to be shown. This software is meant to edit str files, which are mostly used to display skill animations in-game. There may still be bugs left in the tool; reporting them here would be appreciated. You can download the software here:

• https://www.mediafire.com/file/epu1pr9xjdneupi

Generic

• Ctrl-Z/Ctrl-Y to undo and redo an action.
• You can edit most shortcuts via File > Settings > Shortcuts.

Transformations for the preview panel (same shortcuts as Act Editor)

• Translate: Left Mouse Button on the selected frame.
• Rotate: Shift-Left Mouse Button on the selected frame.
• Preview panel move: Right Mouse Button.
• Horizontal/vertical scaling: Ctrl-Shift-Left Mouse Button.
• Uniform scaling: Ctrl-Alt-Left Mouse Button.
• Unbound scaling: Ctrl-Left Mouse Button.

Transformations for the edition panel

• Each layer can have multiple textures. To add a new one, click the texture combo box and select "Add new...". It will bring you to where the file is currently loaded from. While you can browse elsewhere, the textures must be in the same folder as your str file will be in.
• You can edit textures more rapidly with the gear button next to it.
• You can edit some fields by clicking the text before them. If you hold down the Left Mouse Button on this field (P1XY), you will be able to move it freely without moving the entire texture. This is especially handy when dealing with angles as those can give you unwanted results if you are editing them via the preview panel.
  
• The FPS property can be changed and saved. However, the client appears to completely ignore it and runs your animations at 60 FPS regardless.
• Editing an interpolated key frame will automatically create a new key frame on the timeline.

Timeline panel

• A dot represents an existing key frame. An arrow represents an interpolated animation from the left key frame to the right key frame.
  
• You can right-click a key frame to bring up options:
  
• You can also copy the frame and move it elsewhere. The texture indexes are not re-adjusted. It copies the key frame as is.
• You can select multiple key frames by holding down the Left Shift key and holding down the Left Mouse Button.
  
• The traditional windows shortcuts can also be used for selection. These include:
  • Arrow Key: move to the desired next frame.
  • Ctrl-Arrow Key: move to the next key frame block in the wanted direction.
  • Shift-Arrow Key: move to the next key frame for selection.
  • Ctrl-Shift-Arrow Key: move to the next frame block while selecting what's inbetween.
  • Double-Left Mouse Button: selects an entire frame and its interpolated section.
  • Ctrl-A: selects the entire layer.
• You can move a key frame by selecting the key frame, clicking on the dot and then moving the key frame to the desired location.
  
• The operation above can also be done by selecting multiple rows at the same time.
• You can do a quick preview of the animation by moving the timeline selector.
  
• You can move a layer up and down by holding down the Left Mouse Button and moving it where you want it to.
  
• Right-clicking a layer also brings up more options.
  

And I believe that's it! The next "feature" I wanted to implement was editing multiple frames at the same time, but unfortunately this project needs a small break from my end...! Hopefully some of you may have an use for it.

Edit: I am most certainly not an animator and I do not know the real needs of those who will actually use the software. That is why it's being posted as a work in progress rather than a finished tool. If you have requests, feel free to post them below and I'll add as much as I can.

Edited February 2, 2022 by Tokei

[Neo-Mind]

Finally!! This was a well needed addition. Great Job as always @Tokei

[mrfizi]

Wow! Another good tools. Great job @Tokei! Thank you for sharing..

[Froost]

Hallelujah  

[Zell]

I LOVE YOU, PLEASE MARRY ME

[Froost]

Just now, Zell said:

I LOVE YOU, PLEASE MARRY ME

DON'T MARRY HIM! HE CHEATED ME, MARRY ME, I AM FAITHFUL!!

 

[Panic]

It only took me 2 years of complaining to get him to work on it. (^:

[Tokei]

A few things were updated:

• Zoom in and zoom out for the timeline preview panel.
  
• When playing back the animations, the speed will now actually match the FPS.
• Fixed a bug where frames would not show if they didn't explicitly have the interpolated markers.

[JinYuichi]

nice  

[intron]

Thank you for the tool. I'm a programmer that had played with those files before, I discovered they come from the game ez2dj and also are used in djmax , and the RO online documentation helped me to have some fun with it.

There are many features like auto texture increment modes, that RO files don't use, but are available features that I think RO supports by default. The layer #0 , is used when you need a basic untextured color bg, maybe it's always transparent on RO but it may not

There are extra uv parameters linked to the image files.

There is also a bezier function, but the parameters were added in the RO .EZV json-like file and then converted into individual keyframes in the ezv to str conversion. That's why some animations are smooth and seem to be interpolated, but actually are made from a lot of keyframes and no morph/delta-frames, so it would be interesting, but ambitious to make the app work based on ezv/json

I also have a modified version of one of the rhythm games where I can just open it and immediately play an str natively, for testing

Here is my fork of a previous str viewer, with useful info and commits
Info on animation types (I could test the missing types later to incorporate them)

Cheers

Edited February 23, 2022 by intron
mistake

[Royr]

This has been talking years of years, that there's going to be 1 Person who will make a friendly STR Tool similar to the GRF Tool you've made.
Finally it became true "Tokei". Thank you very much for sharing!

 

[ez2ac]

Thank you for making str editor tool.

I wish the .ezv tool function was added.
and I hope ez2on can also apply.

I'm looking forward to a perfect str tool that responds to ez2dj/ez2on.

This is ezv tool of ez2dj.

The test folder contains .ezv together.

ez2visual tool (ez2dj) : When .ezv is opened and saved, .str is generated.
https://www.mediafire.com/file/k79ls3iyndgu19z/

ez2on .str file :
https://www.mediafire.com/file/9nvpqdzifus9zbx/

@intron@Tokei

Edited April 8, 2022 by ez2ac

[intron]

4 hours ago, ez2ac said:

Thank you for making str editor tool.

I wish the .ezv tool function was added.
and I hope ez2on can also apply.

Hi ez2ac, thank you very much for the ez2visual tool. Has that tool ever surface the internet before?
I think you wanted to mention me instead of Royr. And you want a str to ezv converter right? If that's the case I could check how easy it could be to do. I think we may all want to try the ez2visual tool for str editing.

As this is another game's forum I hope this isn't qualified as off-topic. If it is, we can continue talking on a github issue on my repo here , or discord .
But it really isn't off-topic as the ez2visual tool looks like a native tool totally qualified for str editing.
It may be easy to code the str2ezv.

Now for ez2on, as it has new features (like the djmax's vc/vce/vci) , if they went on the djmax route and added per-texture coordinates, probably the only thing useful would be for Tokei to consider integrating those into his project , because if you convert those to the outdated str format, those coordinates would be totally lost, and any new features. But if you don't mind that , that converter would be similar to do.

Edited March 1, 2022 by intron
ez

[intron]

Well I tested the tool and sadly the ez2visual is a 1999 old tool with the big drawback that it can't show the textures or do any opengl rendering on the main window. The preview/play function doesn't work because calls a missing str player called "playstrfull.exe" and "playstr.exe".

Edited March 1, 2022 by intron
added img

[ez2ac]

7 hours ago, intron said:

Well I tested the tool and sadly the ez2visual is a 1999 old tool with the big drawback that it can't show the textures or do any opengl rendering on the main window. The preview/play function doesn't work because calls a missing str player called "playstrfull.exe" and "playstr.exe".

i don't want str2ezv

Because the program is too old.

I think it'd be nice to add new functions to the str editor program.

 

[Tokei]

Heya,

I missed quite a few posts there, sorry. I didn't know this format was used on other platforms. The Ez2Visual tool was quite interesting actually, it almost feels like it could be the original tool for this file format. There are however issues with the conversion between STR and EZV. As @intron pointed out, there is an easing method used on some RO animations and that information is lost in the STR files. It's possible to retrieve it, to a degree, with some magic and guessing.

The layer 0 now makes more sense. RO never uses it, so I simply skipped its visual in my tool instead. Though... what are you supposed to be able to do with the layer 0 exactly? Does it have restrictions? Is it simply another layer? I'm not sure about what its properties are meant to be.

The UV parameters can be shown via File > Settings > Show texture coordinates fields. Though it only shows the first set of UV coordinates. The "uv2=0.0000,0.0000" and "uvs2=1.0000,1.0000" do not appear to be used in RO and I do not know what their purpose is. So I've hidden those fields entirely. The UVs in RO are pretty much always static and never used, so this option is hidden by default.

It appears that the easing method used is r = time ^ (1 + bias / 5).

I do see a field for "bezier=0.0000,0.0000  0.0000,0.0000", but I have not... found where this is used Ez2Visual. Where is this setting at? What does it actually do?

STR files also lose the scale value in the process. I haven't played enough to see what can be done about this one, but that might be possible to retrieve.

The ez2on link was not working for me, so I... have no idea what this tool is.

So all in all, it would be possible to convert STR to EZV and vice versa. I'll have a bit more time to continue this tool in the following days.

[ez2ac]

On 3/2/2022 at 3:03 PM, Tokei said:

Heya,

I missed quite a few posts there, sorry. I didn't know this format was used on other platforms. The Ez2Visual tool was quite interesting actually, it almost feels like it could be the original tool for this file format. There are however issues with the conversion between STR and EZV. As @intron pointed out, there is an easing method used on some RO animations and that information is lost in the STR files. It's possible to retrieve it, to a degree, with some magic and guessing.

The layer 0 now makes more sense. RO never uses it, so I simply skipped its visual in my tool instead. Though... what are you supposed to be able to do with the layer 0 exactly? Does it have restrictions? Is it simply another layer? I'm not sure about what its properties are meant to be.

The UV parameters can be shown via File > Settings > Show texture coordinates fields. Though it only shows the first set of UV coordinates. The "uv2=0.0000,0.0000" and "uvs2=1.0000,1.0000" do not appear to be used in RO and I do not know what their purpose is. So I've hidden those fields entirely. The UVs in RO are pretty much always static and never used, so this option is hidden by default.

It appears that the easing method used is r = time ^ (1 + bias / 5).

I do see a field for "bezier=0.0000,0.0000  0.0000,0.0000", but I have not... found where this is used Ez2Visual. Where is this setting at? What does it actually do?

STR files also lose the scale value in the process. I haven't played enough to see what can be done about this one, but that might be possible to retrieve.

The ez2on link was not working for me, so I... have no idea what this tool is.

So all in all, it would be possible to convert STR to EZV and vice versa. I'll have a bit more time to continue this tool in the following days.

Hello!!
 

I don't want convert STR to EZV

Because the ez2visual program is too old.

 

Since the ez2on .str header part is different, if you change it accordingly, the file will open.
This is the file that changed the header.
https://www.mediafire.com/file/kf8kxqmq5oouta0/
The image size is large, so the image is cut off in the preview.

I hope that the preview resolution control function will be added.
640x480 / 800x600 / 1280x720 / 1920x1080

A zoom bug has been found.
If you increase and decrease the zoom with the mouse wheel, the image position will be out of place.

 

The reason why .str files can be used in different games is because Gravity Company produced them.
Gravity Company belong to AmuseWorld, which produced ez2dj in the past.

Edited April 8, 2022 by ez2ac

[intron]

6 hours ago, Tokei said:

The layer 0 now makes more sense. RO never uses it, so I simply skipped its visual in my tool instead. Though... what are you supposed to be able to do with the layer 0 exactly? Does it have restrictions? Is it simply another layer? I'm not sure about what its properties are meant to be.

It's for coloring the entire str render area with a color, and only color data is aplied, rest discarded. Little purpose for RO since effects should be transparent. If it has no keyframes, it becomes transparent. Example  .

6 hours ago, Tokei said:

The UV parameters can be shown via File > Settings > Show texture coordinates fields. Though it only shows the first set of UV coordinates. The "uv2=0.0000,0.0000" and "uvs2=1.0000,1.0000" do not appear to be used in RO and I do not know what their purpose is. So I've hidden those fields entirely. The UVs in RO are pretty much always static and never used, so this option is hidden by default.

That's for Multitexturemode , in short, it's a thing to make color math with the first and the second(or the rest) of the textures in the layer. The UV2 and UVS2 params are for the second texture. I think it's complicated and unused. It should be useful to link a texture to an alpha map texture, to have gradient transparency. But in the strs I've seen , they just make a copy of the layerand do blendSource1=ZERO blendDest1=SRC_COLOR ; blendSource2=blendDest2=ONE (example ez2dj's "be my baby") . The rest of the games don't deal with that since they can use png files.

6 hours ago, Tokei said:

I do see a field for "bezier=0.0000,0.0000  0.0000,0.0000", but I have not... found where this is used Ez2Visual. Where is this setting at? What does it actually do?

There's not a direct connection between ezv parameters and str parameters. The bezier and "bias" tools would be the most useful things of ez2visual for now. You can make the layer position follow a bezier curve. The problem is that the interface is a bit hard to use sometimes , you have to click the exact vertices and sometimes holding the CTRL key depending on the situation to input a curve. (Sample images attached)

4 hours ago, ez2ac said:

I don't want convert STR to EZV

Because the ez2visual program is too old.

You want a str "version 2" to str "version 1" converter, and viceversa.

 

Edited March 2, 2022 by intron
wrong detail

[ez2ac]

35 minutes ago, intron said:

You want a str "version 2" to str "version 1" converter, and viceversa.

NO.. 

I wish the str editor would add more new functions.

[Tokei]

7 hours ago, ez2ac said:

If you increase and decrease the zoom with the mouse wheel, the image position will be out of place.

It zooms at your cursor position, that is intended.

[ez2ac]

1 hour ago, Tokei said:

It zooms at your cursor position, that is intended.

ah~~ okay

[Froost]

It would be very useful for an option to choose the background to be able to see how it would look ingame, instead of testing every modification, that would make it much easier.

[Nelly Snow]

In editing interface, I think its would be good if it can highlight layer line when it be selected, I'm almost blind when I edit some item with 2x layer lol
there is refer from photoshop and premiere, I also see some video editor use color to highlight, and if we can set the custom layer name (just for easy edit), it would be help to find item.

 

 

if it can be, I want character and background refer, for the size and blend preview, the blend mode is a bit hard to understand and the effect looks different with game and editor preview.

In function , I think the path move is the most need function, for now its really hard to adjust object moving a circle.

 

--

I'm not English base user, if I said something wrong, forgive me plz

Edited March 10, 2022 by Nelly Snow

[Tokei]

Alright, there's been some updates...!

• Texture names will be displayed over the keyframes.
  
• Re-organized the UI to clear up the right-sided panel.
• The Play button has been moved on the menu bar itself, with the Space shortcut.
• Adding a Snap option which is set to 1 pixel by default.
• Added an experiemental feature to retrieve the bias values from str files (does not recognize bezier nor uvbias).
• Can load and save with some EZV files (currently only tested with version 0.94 and 0.95). I haven't seen newer versions (not in RO anyway). It currently saves as version 0.94.
• Added background selection via Edit > Select background.
• (There are some unused buttons added, will clean up later.)
• I do plan on supporting bezier curves, but there aren't for now.

 

[annicellin]

I just want to say thank you for making this tool, I've been a big fan of your works for a while. I'm a sprite artist and I've been dying to find out a way to make special effects, this makes it MUCH easier. I'm downloading it right now as I type this.