![]() I thought now would be the time to reintroduce color cycling, using open web technologies like the HTML5 Canvas element. However, 2D pixel graphics of old are making a comeback in recent years, with mobile devices and web games. Unfortunately the art of color cycling died out in the late 90s, giving way to newer technologies like 3D rendering and full 32-bit “true color” games. And all these effects are achieved without any layers or alpha channels – just one single flat image with one 256 color palette. These include rain, snow, ocean waves, moving fog, clouds, smoke, waterfalls, streams, lakes, and more. Ferrari, who also illustrated all the original backgrounds for LucasArts Loom, and some for The Secret of Monkey Island, invented his own unique ways of using color cycling for envrironmental effects that you really have to see to believe. However, there was one graphic artist who took the technique to a whole new level, and produced absolutely breathtaking color cycling scenes. For an example, just look at the water in this game. While this technically qualified as “color cycling”, it looked more like a bad acid trip. Unfortunately, more often than not this looked terrible, because the artist simply drew the scene once, picked some colors to be animated and set them to cycle. Most games used the technique to animate water, fire or other environmental effects. It was fast, and took virtually no memory. But the programmer could change this palette at will, and all the onscreen colors would instantly change to match. ![]() Back then video cards could only render 256 colors at a time, so a palette of selected colors was used. Anyone remember Color cycling from the 90s? This was a technology often used in 8-bit video games of the era, to achieve interesting visual effects by cycling (shifting) the color palette.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |