I recently came across this program, which I find easy to use. It uses patterns to achieve color effects, and it is very effective. DaDither.
https://www.dadither.com/
https://www.dadither.com/bin/DaDither.64.exe
Select the platform, then the screen type, and once you are happy with the dithering result, use Result > Pic.
Make sure that the image you are going to convert has a 4:3 width and height ratio respectively, and the program takes care of making the correct conversion.
If you want to check if the image will look good in the QL, you can use this tool for the classic 4 and 8 color modes:
https://javguerra.github.io/Sinclair-QL-SCR-viewer
Alternatively, you can always do the job manually with Photoshop or similar:
You are going to need a suitable color palette:
https://github.com/JavGuerra/Sinclair-Q ... c-palettes
And these are the steps to follow:
- Include the color palettes in the appropriate program directory.
- Crop the image to a height and width proportional to 4/3.
- Reduce the image proportionally: 512x384 or 347x260.
- Crop the image to 512x378 or 347x256 as appropriate.
- Reduce the image to its final size: 512x256 or 256x256.
- Use the "Indexed Color..." option to load the desired QL color palette.
- And define the most appropriate screen ("Diffusion" screen at 50% generally).
- Save in RAW format, without header and with interleaved channel order.
- Rename and copy the image to the emulator folder.
- Run the raw2scr_bas program in the emulator.
- Save and display the resulting image in the QL.
This is the small program:
Code: Select all
100 REMark programa de volcado raw
110 REMark Javier Guerra 2004
120 :
130 fic$="ejemplo" : REMark fichero
140 dis$="win1_" : REMark unidad
150 modo=8 : REMark 8 - 4
160 c_fi=5 : REMark canal fichero
170 c_pa=6 : REMark canal pantalla
180 :
190 MODE modo
200 IF modo=8 THEN
210 linea=255 : valor=1.475
220 ELSE
230 linea=511 : valor=.7375
240 END IF
250 OPEN #c_pa,scr_512x256a0x0
260 SCALE #c_pa,255,0,0
270 PAPER #c_pa,7 : CLS #c_pa
280 OPEN_IN #c_fi,dis$&fic$&"_raw"
290 FOR y=255 TO 0 STEP -1
300 FOR x=0 TO linea
310 color=CODE(INKEY$(#c_fi))
320 INK #c_pa,color
330 POINT #c_pa,x*valor,y
340 END FOR x
350 END FOR y
360 CLOSE #c_fi : CLOSE #c_pa
370 :
380 PAUSE
390 REMark SBYTES dis$&fic$&"_scr",131072,32768
400 PRINT #0,"OK"
You can read an article with more details here, but it is in Spanish that you can translate with Google.
https://badaman.badared.com/ql/artiql/qlpal.htm
This method is more complicated, but a lot of fun if the goal is to spend time doing things.
Regards.