Heightmap conversion

Topic: Heightmap conversion (Read 7702 times) previous topic - next topic

Heightmap conversion

September 14, 2008, 11:11:57 am

Hello,
one of new abilities of Simutrans (12th Sept.) is reading heightmaps in BMP format (precisely the RLE variation). This saves quite some space!

I couldn't find any "normal" image conversion program for Windows that would allow me to specify this as option, so I had to resort to ImageMagick.

Using it requires some knowledge of command line usage, and the way to convert the files is described here.

One warning, Windows already include command called convert, so you're best off copying convert.exe from imagemagick in the same folder and renaming the copy to imconvert.exe or something. Maybe you'll have to set PATH as well...

So! Does anyone else know a gui program that can handle this task? I'm asking since in future people will want to use this and I don't see any easy way.

By the way: turning on filesystem compression in XP is even better

Re: Heightmap conversion

Reply #1 – September 14, 2008, 11:55:09 am

I'm not tested, but what The Gimp?

Re: Heightmap conversion

Reply #2 – September 14, 2008, 04:02:23 pm

Ah, yes, my brain has rotten again

It is possible. Change image mode to grayscale, then save as BMP shows option for RLE compression...

Re: Heightmap conversion

Reply #3 – September 14, 2008, 06:53:05 pm

Paint Shop Pro does it too. Never realized that other programs do not do it well.

Re: Heightmap conversion

Reply #4 – September 14, 2008, 08:00:37 pm

Well, the point is that you have to use exactly one subformat. My experience is that you can't choose this in most programs. When did you last see eg. filter selection for PNG or compression for TIFF? Usually there is just the option for "bmp", "png" + level etc., but nothing beyond that.