avjohns
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The EA Graphics Editor is a general purpose graphics viewer and editor, its intended use is to view and edit Electronic Arts graphic files. It was primarily written for the NBA Live Series, but it will work with a lot of files from EA
http://www.nba-live.com/eagraph/
A common misconception about editing players in NBA Live 2000 is that you must somehow patch or save to the plrdata*.viv files. Starting with NBA Live 99, EA has added some important user enhancements that make player-editing easier than ever. In fact, one of the easiest ways to edit a player is by constructing a non-compressed *.fsh file and placing it in a special directory (art\ingame\players\update\). The game will automatically look in that directory before checking the *.viv files, so patching the plrdata*.viv files is really unnecessary.
Here are the steps for a creating/editing a player. We will use a tattoo on Alan Henderson's right arm as an example.
Open plrdata0.viv in EA Graph and extract 0alhende.fsh naming it face.fsh and decompressing it (EA Graph will automatically ask you if you wish to decompress the file)
Open plrdata1.viv and extract 0alhende.fsh naming it fac1.fsh and decompressing it
Open plrdata2.viv and extract 0alhende.fsh naming it fac2.fsh and decompressing it
Look up the skin color for the player in players.dbf (Henderson is color 3)
Open common.viv
Go to armslegs.fsh and save ARD3 as ardr.bmp or another format that you can edit
Save ARM3 as armr.fsh, changing the label to armr in the SHPI properties dialog
Edit ardr.bmp to add any effects you wish (You may wish to use another program like Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro to do your editing)
Open the modified ardr.bmp in EA Graph
Save it as ardr.fsh, changing the label to ardr
Open amr.fsh and import ardr.fsh into it using the Import Wizard's Import Existing File Option (this will automatically scale ardr to create the modified armr). Alternately you could swap ARDR and ARMR in steps 6-10 if you wanted to edit armr and make ardr automatically. Or you can follow the ARDR step for both of them and edit them both manually.
Now, go to the Import Wizard and select the Create a new SHPI by combining FSH files option
The new FSH file to build is art\ingame\players\update\0alhende.fsh (you may have to create the folder if it doesn't already exist)
Select face.fsh, fac1.fsh, fac2.fsh, ardr.fsh, and armr.fsh as files to add
You're done. Run the game and Al Henderson will have a modified right arm.
You can use the same steps to customize left arms, legs, shoes, jerseys and shorts for a single player. Look at 0refere1.fsh in plrdata0.viv for the right names for all the parts. If you're going to do a jersey you will also have to get the chest skin out of plbuild in common.viv and blend the jersey on top of it or you'll end up with black holes around the neck and armpits.
If you want to edit a face, edit the 16bit fac2.fsh first. Then use the Import Wizard to import fac2.fsh into face.fsh and fac1.fsh to automatically create the lower resolution versions. The best thing to do is extracting all the pieces into one directory, for this example you might make a directory called 0alhende. If you want to make changes, edit the single pieces and use EA Graph's Import Wizard to put them back together again.
Miscellaneous Tips for Creating Players
Name the new *.fsh file the same as it is in the *.viv File (i.e., 0aamckie.fsh).
For an example of how to replace everything for a single player, look at 0refere.fsh from plrdata0.viv. Note how the low-resolution legs are rotated 90 degrees. If you were doing this for a player, the images under the label le?? would be used for skin, not pants. Use the 0refere.fsh as a reference to determine the names and sizes that should be used for replacing any part of a player, including faces. Not all of these pieces have to be present, but each resolution must be provided for the piece(s) you customize.
Customized jerseys must have the chest skin already merged with the jersey or the area around the neck will be black.
All images added to a *.fsh File must have the same size and resolution as the original (as in the reference 0refere.fsh).
You may need to use EA Graph's Palette Workbench to set the appropriate surrounding areas to transparent (Opacity = 0).
You can even replace a player's mouth; just use the names and sizes of the mouth from mout.fsh in art\ingame\misc\common.viv.
Chest skins to go under customized jerseys can be found in plbuild.fsh in art\ingame\misc\common.viv.
Arms, legs, and accessories can be found in armslegs.fsh in art\ingame\misc\common.viv.
If you build individual player *.fsh files (as described above), you will not need to patch the plrdata*.viv files. The Large Textures (plrdata2.viv) only need to be installed to speed up load times if you are using MAXIMUM texture detail (only works with 32MB+ video cards) or HIGH texture detail in One-one-One/Practice/3-Point mode. That'll save you about 150MB hard drive space!
The new Versions 0.7+ run much more stable, use less system resources and add support for even more EA File Types while already supported File Types are supported even better. In addition, you are now able to make changes to the Image right in EAGraph!
Here's a rundown of the exciting new features:
added support for more EA File Types
better support for already supported EA File Types
incorporated many new file formats into the Import Wizard:
bmp, fsh, gif, jpg, pcx, png and tga
The Import file may be of ANY format (8 to 32 bits per pixel) and the Import Wizard now recognizes and allows import to nearly any FSH format (8 to 32 Bits per pixel; a number of palette types).
EAGraph 'registers' these formats so that they are viewable from the file browser ('add file to list') in ImpWiz. This means that you get to preview all files as you browse for them
added support for the TGA file format (read only) so that you can view game shots saved using the F12 key
(the current TGA object only reads non-compressed TGA images, but EA does not use compressed TGA in any of their games)
added read-only support for Adobe TIFF files (non-compressed)
added support for the file formats Windows MetaFile and Windows Extended MetaFile
EAGraph reads and writes WMF/EMF except that writing this format does not yield a true vector graphic but a bitamp in a metafile shell (not recommended though)
fixed bug where opening and then closing a picture child using the 'x' button on the child prevented the picture from being opened again from the Most Recently Used List
fixed Most Recently Used list problem where the list was only accessible when no other files were open
added a SHPI object to reduce memory leaks and program instability for most file types
Import Wizard will now transfer transparency chunk information from PNG files. This means that FSH files can be created with opacity settings from an external editor. Any PNG file that contains a tRNS chunk will work.
fixed a bug that sometimes included a 20 color palette in 24 bit images 'Saved as BMP'. Although EAGraph would successfully read these images other programs could not.
fixed a bug where the Picture Child canvas could not be unlocked and therefore wasted system resources while EAGraph was running
added a number of special effects including a convolve tool, flip horizontal, flip vertical, rotate to any angle, contrast, brightness, and embossing
added a number of Colors features including count colors used, a color replacer, palette save and import functions, color reduction, Grayscale, and negative colorizer
added a number of paint tools including draw, line, circle, rectangle, etc.
added a text tool to add text to images
added a selection tool to select rectangular regions for cut, copy, paste, paste as new, paste as selection, etc.
added a wand tool to select odd shaped graphics components for cut, copy, paste, etc.
added a free select tool to cut, copy, and paste odd shapes
added the ability to resize and resample the current picture child canvas
added 16,24,and 32 bit per pixel options in the 'Save As FSH' function
added a dialog to save the palette in multiple formats in the Palette Workbench
added a number of tips to the main status bar which are visible when the mouse cursor passes over buttons or other objects
added an Option Dialog where several preferences can be set
added support for Triple Play 2000 graphic Files
added a Windows Help File
added a File Associations Dialog to allow various graphic file extensions to be associated with EAGraph
lots of small bug fixes and cosmetic changes
http://www.nba-live.com/tutorials/index.php
http://www.nba-live.com/eagraph/
A common misconception about editing players in NBA Live 2000 is that you must somehow patch or save to the plrdata*.viv files. Starting with NBA Live 99, EA has added some important user enhancements that make player-editing easier than ever. In fact, one of the easiest ways to edit a player is by constructing a non-compressed *.fsh file and placing it in a special directory (art\ingame\players\update\). The game will automatically look in that directory before checking the *.viv files, so patching the plrdata*.viv files is really unnecessary.
Here are the steps for a creating/editing a player. We will use a tattoo on Alan Henderson's right arm as an example.
Open plrdata0.viv in EA Graph and extract 0alhende.fsh naming it face.fsh and decompressing it (EA Graph will automatically ask you if you wish to decompress the file)
Open plrdata1.viv and extract 0alhende.fsh naming it fac1.fsh and decompressing it
Open plrdata2.viv and extract 0alhende.fsh naming it fac2.fsh and decompressing it
Look up the skin color for the player in players.dbf (Henderson is color 3)
Open common.viv
Go to armslegs.fsh and save ARD3 as ardr.bmp or another format that you can edit
Save ARM3 as armr.fsh, changing the label to armr in the SHPI properties dialog
Edit ardr.bmp to add any effects you wish (You may wish to use another program like Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro to do your editing)
Open the modified ardr.bmp in EA Graph
Save it as ardr.fsh, changing the label to ardr
Open amr.fsh and import ardr.fsh into it using the Import Wizard's Import Existing File Option (this will automatically scale ardr to create the modified armr). Alternately you could swap ARDR and ARMR in steps 6-10 if you wanted to edit armr and make ardr automatically. Or you can follow the ARDR step for both of them and edit them both manually.
Now, go to the Import Wizard and select the Create a new SHPI by combining FSH files option
The new FSH file to build is art\ingame\players\update\0alhende.fsh (you may have to create the folder if it doesn't already exist)
Select face.fsh, fac1.fsh, fac2.fsh, ardr.fsh, and armr.fsh as files to add
You're done. Run the game and Al Henderson will have a modified right arm.
You can use the same steps to customize left arms, legs, shoes, jerseys and shorts for a single player. Look at 0refere1.fsh in plrdata0.viv for the right names for all the parts. If you're going to do a jersey you will also have to get the chest skin out of plbuild in common.viv and blend the jersey on top of it or you'll end up with black holes around the neck and armpits.
If you want to edit a face, edit the 16bit fac2.fsh first. Then use the Import Wizard to import fac2.fsh into face.fsh and fac1.fsh to automatically create the lower resolution versions. The best thing to do is extracting all the pieces into one directory, for this example you might make a directory called 0alhende. If you want to make changes, edit the single pieces and use EA Graph's Import Wizard to put them back together again.
Miscellaneous Tips for Creating Players
Name the new *.fsh file the same as it is in the *.viv File (i.e., 0aamckie.fsh).
For an example of how to replace everything for a single player, look at 0refere.fsh from plrdata0.viv. Note how the low-resolution legs are rotated 90 degrees. If you were doing this for a player, the images under the label le?? would be used for skin, not pants. Use the 0refere.fsh as a reference to determine the names and sizes that should be used for replacing any part of a player, including faces. Not all of these pieces have to be present, but each resolution must be provided for the piece(s) you customize.
Customized jerseys must have the chest skin already merged with the jersey or the area around the neck will be black.
All images added to a *.fsh File must have the same size and resolution as the original (as in the reference 0refere.fsh).
You may need to use EA Graph's Palette Workbench to set the appropriate surrounding areas to transparent (Opacity = 0).
You can even replace a player's mouth; just use the names and sizes of the mouth from mout.fsh in art\ingame\misc\common.viv.
Chest skins to go under customized jerseys can be found in plbuild.fsh in art\ingame\misc\common.viv.
Arms, legs, and accessories can be found in armslegs.fsh in art\ingame\misc\common.viv.
If you build individual player *.fsh files (as described above), you will not need to patch the plrdata*.viv files. The Large Textures (plrdata2.viv) only need to be installed to speed up load times if you are using MAXIMUM texture detail (only works with 32MB+ video cards) or HIGH texture detail in One-one-One/Practice/3-Point mode. That'll save you about 150MB hard drive space!
The new Versions 0.7+ run much more stable, use less system resources and add support for even more EA File Types while already supported File Types are supported even better. In addition, you are now able to make changes to the Image right in EAGraph!
Here's a rundown of the exciting new features:
added support for more EA File Types
better support for already supported EA File Types
incorporated many new file formats into the Import Wizard:
bmp, fsh, gif, jpg, pcx, png and tga
The Import file may be of ANY format (8 to 32 bits per pixel) and the Import Wizard now recognizes and allows import to nearly any FSH format (8 to 32 Bits per pixel; a number of palette types).
EAGraph 'registers' these formats so that they are viewable from the file browser ('add file to list') in ImpWiz. This means that you get to preview all files as you browse for them
added support for the TGA file format (read only) so that you can view game shots saved using the F12 key
(the current TGA object only reads non-compressed TGA images, but EA does not use compressed TGA in any of their games)
added read-only support for Adobe TIFF files (non-compressed)
added support for the file formats Windows MetaFile and Windows Extended MetaFile
EAGraph reads and writes WMF/EMF except that writing this format does not yield a true vector graphic but a bitamp in a metafile shell (not recommended though)
fixed bug where opening and then closing a picture child using the 'x' button on the child prevented the picture from being opened again from the Most Recently Used List
fixed Most Recently Used list problem where the list was only accessible when no other files were open
added a SHPI object to reduce memory leaks and program instability for most file types
Import Wizard will now transfer transparency chunk information from PNG files. This means that FSH files can be created with opacity settings from an external editor. Any PNG file that contains a tRNS chunk will work.
fixed a bug that sometimes included a 20 color palette in 24 bit images 'Saved as BMP'. Although EAGraph would successfully read these images other programs could not.
fixed a bug where the Picture Child canvas could not be unlocked and therefore wasted system resources while EAGraph was running
added a number of special effects including a convolve tool, flip horizontal, flip vertical, rotate to any angle, contrast, brightness, and embossing
added a number of Colors features including count colors used, a color replacer, palette save and import functions, color reduction, Grayscale, and negative colorizer
added a number of paint tools including draw, line, circle, rectangle, etc.
added a text tool to add text to images
added a selection tool to select rectangular regions for cut, copy, paste, paste as new, paste as selection, etc.
added a wand tool to select odd shaped graphics components for cut, copy, paste, etc.
added a free select tool to cut, copy, and paste odd shapes
added the ability to resize and resample the current picture child canvas
added 16,24,and 32 bit per pixel options in the 'Save As FSH' function
added a dialog to save the palette in multiple formats in the Palette Workbench
added a number of tips to the main status bar which are visible when the mouse cursor passes over buttons or other objects
added an Option Dialog where several preferences can be set
added support for Triple Play 2000 graphic Files
added a Windows Help File
added a File Associations Dialog to allow various graphic file extensions to be associated with EAGraph
lots of small bug fixes and cosmetic changes
http://www.nba-live.com/tutorials/index.php
