Heartache 101 ~Sour into Sweet~

@Kevincalanor: are you still there? I'd have a question to ask you ...

... a little teaser ...

I'm currently working on a tachie-generator (i.e.: a PROGRAM) which is intended to be much easier too use - especially regarding recoloring ...

Have a look at this example:


My program seperated all those layers of Kevincalanor's DarkComet_Model_2.psd and calculated masks for every part that might get some recoloring (skin, eyes, hair, cloth, neck-tie and so on) ...

Then it's only a matter of applying some magick (ImageMagick filters, that is) and recombining that layers.

PS: Take a close look at her eyes ...

Tank you.

Here's a picture of how the generator currently looks:

author=Marrend
Sweeeeeet. What's the slider above "eyes" for? What's that an indication of?

That slider is just used to resized the tachie WYSIWYG style ... left should be as small as iwonttellthenameofthehiddencharacter right should be as tall as fits on screen.

I have a usable-but-not-perfect alpha version ready for those who like to try it out ... alas installing would require to first install python, image magick and several other things.

Installation (under Windows):
1. Install python 2.7 from here (Python 3 might not work see below.)

You should add python to your PATH environment variable (so that it can be stared by typing "python" into any cmd-Window). There's an option to use your freshly installed python for all .py files ... enable it, please.

2. Install Imagemagick as described here.
(If you happen to have an older version of ImageMagick somewhere on your system - you should upgrade it to the latest one!)

Reboot your system after those two steps.

3. You should now be able to install python wand by just running


in a commandline window ("DOS Box")

4. Install wxPython from here
This seems to explicitly require python 2.7 and no newer version ...

5. Now the fun part ...
- Make a fresh directory somewhere on your PC
- Download Kevincalanor's "DarkComet's part pack" into this directory
(You'll need a fresh, unmodified copy!)
- Donload tachirgrn.zip from my locker.
- Extract this into the same, fresh directory where you put DarkComet_Model_2.psd

Now you should be able to start "extract.py" which will probably run for several minutes.

The result should be a subdirectory full with a few hundred .png files extracted from Kevincalanor's parts pack (including at least as many black-and-white mask files).

Finally - fire up tachiegen.py. On the first run it will ask you to define a path for saving and another one for the resulting tachie.

NOTE: the whole stuff sounds worse then it actually is. It's all been done before. And as a result you'll get a nice new Toy tool to play with.

Basic instructions:
- You can use the slider to resize the tachie
- Click on (almost) any part of the current image to be able to recolor her cloths, eyes, hair and skin. Just play around with the different methods. You'll get the point. Promise.
- The color "sticks" ... if you recolor her eyes and change them, the color stays. If you want to revert to the original color: just click again and select "none" as a method.
- Use the stuff to the right of the tachie to select her outfit, pose, hairdo and facial features
- If you have a result you'd like to keep, save it (File menu and save of course)
- Use File/Export to generate a .png that you can use in your profiles or so.
- NOTE: save generates two files. One for the generator and one "recipe" which will list the used parts and recolorings in a human readable form.

EDIT: please do contact me if you run into problems. I'll need the feedback.

EDIT: Minor update: the program now removes somee 46 empty lines above her head. (i.e. a tachie with a ponytail now fills the picture).

EDIT: Using the slider now tells how tall the resulting tachie is and compares her to the build-ins (minus you-know-who)
And recoloring has an option to generate brighter colors (like real white).

This is the content I'm currently working on:

1. Updated version of "WingGirl" (v1.3)
Download: winggirl-1.3.zip
Some minor bugfixes, some improved grammar.
AND a way better science club questline for Sayumi.

2. "WingGirl - Pathways" (v.0.4)
Download: pathways-0.4.zip
REQUIRES WingGirl 1.3 TO PLAY
An rather early version of an extension to WingGirl featuring two new girls.
Currently one path for one of the girls is "all almost playable" and several other paths are ... somehow hinted to.

A few hintsfor those having difficulties to find that one working path:


I tried a few new things in "pathways" ... there are usually more then one route per girl (NYI) and sometimes quite a few different ways to finish each route. An extreme example is the currently finished route: at one point you have to chose the "right" place for a date. There are plenty "right" choices - none of which really a guaranteed success.

Another new feature is that parts of the story are told from a different viewpoint.

Like this STORY which plays from Himekos perspective:

Edit: Dread. Since when can I no longer nest a code-tag in a hidden-tag? Well the STORY snippet is in my locker now ...

@Marrend: you could mark characters "Merika" (ID = 97) and "Shika" (ID = 98) as publish now.

@Marrend: thank you.

I think the problem with my post was that the CODE-section was just a tad bit too large for HIDE to like it.

@Marrend: in my previous post most of the text OUTSIDE of the hide tags got "hidden" and there are only TWO instances of #hide# ... #/hide# in that post. One of which seems to be displayed in the CODE section. But still ... there are three show-buttons.

TL;DR: hide tags are WEIRD.

author=Marrend
They are at that. Delving further into that post...

*Edit: Hide-tag and Code-tag are rather UNFRIENDLY with one another, aren't they? ;)

You could even say they DISLIKE being mixed with each other.

*EDIT: took a look at the HTML code of my nested code/hide/code stuff ... seems like the board code itself is breaking things completely. It's not just a weird style sheet or something.

author=Kevincalanor
Whoa, looks like I got quite a lot of catching-up to do x3

Downloading n' installing the TachieGenerator right now.
Also a question on it, would a already extracted (And much bigger .rar for sure) require less steps into the installation process?
I'm afraid that some people will get drawn away of the program, because of the advanced proprieties and cmd handling.

Please, do tell me about your experiences with this tool and anything you'd like to see me improve with it.

As for the extraction step: I didn't want to touch your .psd file, and I don't have enough space in my locker for a pre-extracted version of it.

If anything else is installed correctly (as in: python and image magicks convert can be started from a dos box by just typing "python" or "convert") running extract.py should be the easiest part.

*EDIT:* I reread your post ... maybe you were talking about bundling python, image magick and wx python with my scripts? Well ... this would be certainly too big for my locker.