[solved] Organizing the Sprite Sheet

[SG2]

I'm fairly sure this question belongs here and not the sprite forum, I apologize if otherwise.

I searched the web and lurked a few LF2 forums before joining to ask my questions here, because I couldn't find the answers to my specific questions. I'm hardly a n00b at spriting - I've been spriting for about 8 or 9 years, making animations for 3, and programming for about 1 - but I am a n00b as far as learning the Data Changer for LF2. I'm confident I'm smart enough to learn the basics on my own as I go along, as there are numerous tutorials provided out there, but I can't seem to find anything specifically addressing this...I'm either blind, or I just don't know what specifically to search for to find it.

Anyways, to quote my intro post, my specific question:

My main question...how do you go about editing the sprites? Everything I've ever programmed has required me to give each sprite frame its own .png file...so I have no idea how LF2 reads the entire sprite sheet .bmp and knows which frames it's assigning to what. How do I go about making my own sprites into an LF2-compatible sheet? For starters, the size of the sprites I'd be using wouldn't match the LF2 sprites (they'd be smaller; I use JUMP! Ultimate Stars as a base). Then there's the issue of the different animation frames my sheets would have...for example, my JUS sprites don't have a pre-existing 'drink' animation, and the LF2 frames don't have some of the special attack animations my JUS sprites would have. Basically I'm just confused how I make my own sheet as a .bmp file that LF2 can recognize...I haven't found any information to help me understand in Data Changing tutorials, and everything in the sprite section seems to be more tutorials on how to actually create sprites, not how to make the LF2 sheet. I'm not sure if my wording even makes sense...I'm just looking for an explanation of how I can use sprites I already have and create my own LF2 characters from them. Obviously I put all the sprites into one .bmp file, but how? Is there a special organization or step I have to take? There must be, I'm sure, but I don't get it. Like say for example this was the sheet I wanted to use (I only grabbed frames from the sheet that basically match the LF2 animations; I have more animations on my sheet and if I learned how to do this I'd want to use as many as I could):

Image (Click to View)

Obviously I'd have to edit my own new sprites for things like the lifting or frozen/on fire animations, but that's no problem at all. My concern is...how do I organize these sprites so that they're recognized as each frame and not as just one giant .bmp image? Like I said, I've never worked with my entire sheets like this before, I've always had to make my animations by turning each frame into its own document, in GameMaker, Flash, etc...I'm really confused, and any help for this confusing question would be appreciated. I feel so stupid for asking what is probably obvious to everyone else, but I really don't understand.

Again, I apologize as I'm sure this has been asked a million times, and I know how annoying it is for n00bs to come in and ask the same questions over and over...but I did search before resorting to asking about it, and I just can't find the answers I need after looking all afternoon (it's 10:30 PM my timezone right now, I discovered LF2 Data Changer around maybe 4 PM or so today). Any help would be appreciated, and if you can dumb it down for me at all, that'd be nice, too. I still don't know my way around Data Changer all that well, though I've read up on the basics and played with it a bit in accordance with the tutorials. I'm not worried about figuring out how to write the code on my own. I'm just not entirely sure I'm grasping the way the sprite uploading works, and to me, I'd rather that be my first step before I actually get to work on my script modding.

Sorry for being a n00b, guise D:

[Drahcir]

At the top of the .dat file there's a part where all the info about sprites is, clearly readable if you have a data changer. Change that and magical things happen.

[SG2]

Okay, I think that helped me. I used Bandit as a template and added my own sprites in there at the same dimensions, and they are indeed running in the game. I even extended the rows heading from 10 to 12 so I could use my complete walk cycle animation, and though I was expecting some sort of error for that, it worked as well.

Thank you very much!! A mod can close this thread now, I think I've got the hang of it.

[skelguardian]

you can click "solved" at the top right of this page

[SG2]

Oh, okay. Done!! Thank you

[HappyHouR]

Oh, okay. Done!! Thank you

Next time use the button .That what it for.