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CharPad 2.8 User Manual - Subchrist Software, 2021.

Importing Data From Files.

CharPad can import data in a variety of ways...

Binary files...

These should be plain (raw) binary files with no specific file-formatting and should only contain the data that needs to be imported.

nb. Binary files that contain character set data may optionally begin with a two-byte PRG header (ie. a 16-bit load address), as the data for a character image is always 8 bytes, a file size divisible by 8 with a 2 byte remainder is easily detected.

Character Sets : 8 bytes per character image (byte 0 = top pixel row of image 0 etc) for however many character images.

Character Set Attributes : 1 byte per image (upper nybble = Material, lower nybble = Colour).

Tile Sets : TileWidth x TileHeight bytes per tile (byte 0 = top/left corner of tile 0 etc) for however many tiles.

Tile Set Attributes : 1 byte per tile (upper nybble = unused (0), lower nybble = Colour).

Map : MapWidth x MapHeight bytes (byte 0 = top/left corner).

nb. Binary files containing tile or map data do not include dimensional information and so the data will just be applied to a project's existing tiles/map using the existing tile/map dimensions.

ie. You will need to know and set the dimensions for a project's tiles/map before importing the binary data.

Image files...

These should be in either Microsoft Windows Bitmap (BMP) or Portable Network Graphics (PNG) format.

CharPad will run a colour processing algorithm to decide on a suitable colour scheme and will convert each 8x8 pixel region of the image into a Commodore 64 compatible character image.

The resulting character set will automatically have any duplicate images removed and a map will be created.

Emulator snapshot files...

This feature currently supports snapshot files (images) made using the VICE (x64) emulator (VSF files).

A snapshot file (aka snapshot image) contains, amongst other things, a binary dump of the entire 64KB RAM at the precise moment that the snapshot was taken.

nb. Despite the name, a snapshot image is not a visible/viewable picture, it is a binary file of a very particular format.

CharPad features a "Snapshot Ripper" tool that allows you to manually search for graphics data in a snapshot file.

Shoot 'em Up Construction Kit (background) files...

Commonly referred to as SEUCK, the Shoot 'em Up Construction Kit was (and remains) a popular tool for making games on the Commodore 64.

When the kit saves data to files, one of them will contain the character set, the tile set and the map, it is known as the background file and it's file name will be terminated with '.B'

If you can find it, CharPad can load it.