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This file is designed to help you get the most out of Paint the Wall. While I have yet to refine it further, you have a number of tools at your disposal.
I'm going to cover the basics first, then move on to the tougher parts of the program.
Display:
Atfirst glance, the numbers may look too confusing and complicated. However, their purpose is to give you control when working with colors that look almost the same.
The first two numbers are numbers that indicate where your cursor is on the screen. 0 means the left on the first digit. 0 on the second digit means top of the screen.
The next two colors may baffle you. Third digit is the color selected by the recent color commands; more on that later. The fourth digit is the color behind the dot. This may be helpful if the color and the background are the same and you want to erase the color, for example.
The two numbers below that are the numbers that tell you how big the picture is. Your cursor can not reach these locations.
Colors:
To change a color, simply press a letter on the keyboard. If the color does not change (the third number), check to see if your CAPS LOCK is on. Turn this off, as you will need the shift key later.
There are a huge number of palettes to choose from. To switch a palette that your letters reach, simply press a number on the number row. This increments your color by 26.
For a faster way to change colors and see what color you really want, press Shift+c. This brings up the rainbow of colors, of which you can type in any number from 0-F (F being 15 in hexidecimal.) and check out the colors in that row. If there's nothing there, press backspace to return to the rainbow. If you choose a color from this palette, you should press a number between 0-F, remembering that the first color is color 0.
Tools:
Many of the simple tools such as LINE, BLOCK, BLOCK FILL, and PAINT are available to you via keyboard shortcuts.
The first main tool you may already know is the dot command. Press Space to draw a single dot of the color. Notice that the fourth number is now the same as the third. This indicates that your color has made it to the screen.
Another tool that you have is the Line command. Press F3 to enter line mode. You'll drop a dot marking where the line will be drawn from, and you may move around a second dot to complete the line command. Once it's set, press Space. The line will be drawn on the screen.
F4 is the block command. It works the same way as the Line command, but draws a box instead of a line. If you press Shift+F4, the box will be filled in on top of it.
Filling in a gap is important. That's why the Paint command is available. However, I must caution you that it will save the picture before filling in the space, as if there are any holes, it will fill the screen.
To use the paint command, press Shift+P. The painting will save, then paint on the screen. Any gaps of color (i.e. the border is not made up of the same color at every point), the paint fill oerflow and erase the whole drawing. If this happens, simply press N to load the original image back.
Here are some advanced tools that I have added to make my life easier! Press F6 to make the color that your cursor is over the color of the cursor. This is in case you didn't remember the color of the dot there or can't convert decimal to hexidecimal easily.
F7 is a color masker. Place it over any of the colors in the painting and press it. The program will search out all of the colors in the painting that are this color and change them to the color of the cursor. This is in case you want to erase all of the colors in a picture.
F5 allows you to resize the image to make it larger or smaller. Start at the upper corner and press F5. The background will turn black. Select the bottom corner of the pic and press Space. If you accidently activated this command, press Escape to cancel the resize.
F8 is designed to flip a picture from left to right. When creating mirror images of a pic, this command is helpful.
Tab is a tool that you may never have to use, but I use it for creating sprites more easily after flipping them. Set the cursor to the color you want to increment and those above it, and type in the number of colors to increment. If you designed a sprite to have another set of colors, this command will shift the colors to that palette.
File Management:
You can press F1 to load an image that you already created. A warning when using this: it will not prompt you to save the old pic first.
As always, what good is a picture you painted if it can't be saved? F2 alone allows you to save a picture as the filename you selected at first.
However, if you want an alternate copy saved elsewhere or as a different file name, press Shift+F2. This brings up a screen that will ask you for the filename that you want to save it to. If it exists, it will prompt you if you want to overwrite it.
Sample walkthrough:
Double click on the Batch file to run the program. From there, it will ask you to type in the extension of the files. If you only want the files in that directory, type in "ONLY ", then the extension. If you want to skip the file search, type in "SKIP ", then the extension.
Now, it will ask you for a file name. Type in "demo" to get a feel for the program.
The program should now be asking you how big you want the picture to be. Type in "50,50" for a 50X50 picture.
Next, the computer will ask you if you want a custom color palette to load. Since there are no color palettes yet, type "n".
Since you typed "n", the painting screen should show up. The numbers are at the bottom of hte screen, and your dot should be at (25,25). The color that you should have selected is blue, and the color behind it is black.
Press Space. The cursor should stop blinking now. The colors are the same, and the cursor is invisible! Don't worry, your computer has not frozen up. Try moving the cursor to the left or right with the arrow keys.
Try all the keys. Line, Block, Block Fill, and even the color palettes! This part is where you get ot have some fun!
End Notes:
If there is anything you still don't understand, Send me a question of what you don't fully know. I'll do my best to answer it.
Have fun painting with the program!
Future improvements:
I must make it able to take "yes" and "no" and ignore case in the first couple of commands.
I should place the 26 colors at the bottom of the screen too.
Contact:
DoomRater