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Making Customs Backgrounds (w/ BMP Pasting)

Good whatever time of day you're reading this,

So I've found a neat little method of copy-pasting backgrounds into SMW here:

https://www.smwcentral.net/?p=viewthread&t=82704


However, once I clear BG1 using F7, all of my BG1 graphics screw up. To preface, let's assume I'm on stage 105 in LM, and I perform this step. The hills lose all detail and become blocky. Also, when I do complete the copy-pasting procedure, all of my graphics screw up in the stage and it becomes unplayable.
How can I do this without all of the other graphics screwing up?
Looking for high quality rips from our Grand Dad SiIvaGunner for my hack. Much appreciation to anyone who links me to any (besides Athletic PAL).
It works like this: the hills are actually graphics mapped from the file assigned to BG1, which in this case would be 1B. If you set BG1 to 7F, you'll make the slot skip loading a graphics file for it, so there won't be a file for the hills' Map16 tiles to load graphics from in the level.

If you set BG1 to some other file, for example, ExGFX file 1FF, the hills Map16 will load graphics from that file instead. So if file 1FF contains graphics not related to SMW's hills whatsoever, the hills will look garbled.

I think your issue is the former, where you're setting BG1 to 7F while the hills you have in the level are expecting a graphics file in that slot, more specifically 1B. That'd also explain the game being unplayable I guess. If you want to keep the hills while using other background ExGFX I suggest you to use BG2 and BG3 instead, which are never used by any of SMW's original graphics.
If I understand correctly, if I'm going to be making/inserting custom backgrounds I shouldn't mess with the BG1 slot if I want to preserve the original backgrounds (for future use) and should only use BG 2 & 3 slots.
In that case, how would I make more 8x8 tile space for the backgrounds? Or should I just get rid of the old backgrounds?
Looking for high quality rips from our Grand Dad SiIvaGunner for my hack. Much appreciation to anyone who links me to any (besides Athletic PAL).
Originally posted by Chairman of the Bored
In that case, how would I make more 8x8 tile space for the backgrounds? Or should I just get rid of the old backgrounds?


Use FG1 or FG2. Otherwise, you don't. I'd recommend using BG1 as well though.
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You can also make use of the 8x8 tiles in the BG1 graphics file that aren't used by the vanilla background. For that you could simply copy the GFX file, rename the copy to ExGFXyyy.bin, open it in your editor of choice, replace the unused tiles, insert ExGFX and put its number in BG1.
That relates to another detail that's been bugging me; I've been reading up on ExGFX, and out of all of the walkthroughs none of them stated whether or not I should copy and rename the standard GFX files into the ExGFX folder. So, when working with ExGFX should I copy the standard GFX files into the ExGFX folder and rename them starting with GFX80 up to the highest hex value?
Looking for high quality rips from our Grand Dad SiIvaGunner for my hack. Much appreciation to anyone who links me to any (besides Athletic PAL).
Originally posted by Chairman of the Bored
should I copy the standard GFX files into the ExGFX folder and rename them starting with GFX80 up to the highest hex value?

Files go from 80-FFF.
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None of them mention that because it's not a thing you have to do.
If multiple tutorials don't mention something that's never in any way implied, it's likely not a thing you need to do!
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Originally posted by Chairman of the Bored
should I copy the standard GFX files into the ExGFX folder and rename them starting with GFX80 up to the highest hex value?

We usually copy them because it makes the process faster (especially if you have .bin files associated to your graphics editor program), but for ExGFX you can't rename them to "GFXyyy.bin". Instead, rename to "ExGFXyyy.bin" where yyy is any hex number from 80 to FFF, place them in the ExGraphics folder and press #lm{insexgfx}. Do note that you shouldn't go copying any GFX file you see though. For graphics meant to be used for Layer 1, Layer 2 and Sprites you should use a 4 kB file. For Layer 3 it's 2 kB. For ExAnimations it can be up to 6 kB.
I see! So when working with ExGFX, I only copy what I need, and the files themselves need to be named "ExGFX---.bin".
Back to the backgrounds, what I'd need to do to keep the graphics from corrupting while inserting my own custom background, I need to:

1. Copy the hills GFX file into the ExGFX folder.

2. Rename it to "ExGFX--.bin"

3. Go into Lunar and insert the ExGFX.

4. Follow the process BMP-pasting backgrounds.
Looking for high quality rips from our Grand Dad SiIvaGunner for my hack. Much appreciation to anyone who links me to any (besides Athletic PAL).
I went back and tried it last night. This is what I learned:

-Editing one level's background does not affect other levels. In this case, I've been trying to edit the Bonus Stage background (and hopefully layout), but thought doing so wrecks the graphics for all other stages. I theorize that editing a default background in a stage wouldn't edit the same background in a different stage, assuming they're stored seperately (to which I don't think they are).

-Inserting an ExGFX file of the hill BG is redundant if I'm trying to clear space without removing the FG graphics.

-Bonus stages seems to be impossible to edit graphically, as they reset to the default settings when properly loaded. When loaded from an overworld tile, the stage become broken (i.e. no collision and garbled graphics).

-Despite the Bonus Stage's in-gameplay graphical errors, I got the background in question to load properly in Lunar, so there's that.

Until I learn how to edit the Bonus Stage graphics (if it's possible without learning assembly coding or breaking the game), I'm going to experiment on other stages.
Looking for high quality rips from our Grand Dad SiIvaGunner for my hack. Much appreciation to anyone who links me to any (besides Athletic PAL).
Well, I tried other stages with the background I'm using and broke the stage as a result. I simply removed BG1, BG2, and BG3 on stage 105 and set the background to have no movement (so only a particular section of the background stays visible.
Does it hurt if I use any color from the pallet when pasting my background? I've also been using the color I need for an accurate translation, but perhaps not for practicality
Looking for high quality rips from our Grand Dad SiIvaGunner for my hack. Much appreciation to anyone who links me to any (besides Athletic PAL).