The SP-Studio moved to a new server and that’s why there were no updates for some weeks… and some errors. But now everything should work fine again! Of course the monthly contests continue, the new one is about the continent of AFRICA. Submit your picture until October 15th. Read more about the rules here.
CONGRATULATIONS TO THE WINNERS OF THE LAST CONTEST!
The pictures show The Godfather, Scarface, Blues Brothers, Psycho and Jaws.
I had some busy weeks and will be on vacation soon, but I will be back with new updates as soon as possible. Until then you can show your SP-Studio skills in the new contest. This time the topic is “Classic Movies” and you can submit your picture in the Community until September 15th. They movie you choose must be at least 25 years old! Read all details about the rules in the Forum.
CONGRATULATIONS TO THE WINNERS OF THE LAST CONTESTS!
Fot this update I included nine new shapes of eyebrows in multiple colors. They will improve the facial expressions of your characters. And if you enjoy building celebrities, friends or family members they can help to create a better likeness. Most of those eyebrows were inspired by requests from the Wish Voting Gallery. Join the SP-Studio community if you want to suggest your own ideas fur upcoming updates!
Seven fashionable new hats are waiting for you! Bowler, tophead, shower / surgeon cap, New Era cap, women’s hat from the 20s, black hat with a veil and golden hair decorations. And I forgot to mention a small update from earlier this month: Three “freestyle collection” shirts.
Time for some gaming related SP-Studio artwork! Join the new contest until July 15th by submitting a picture about a modern videogame (released in the year 2000 or later). Register a nickname in the Community if you haven’t done that already. Read all details about the rules in the Forum.
The last contest (FEMALE MUSICIANS) was won by Jabels. Congratulations! The Top5:
Noodle (Gorillaz), Beth Ditto (Gossip), Brünhilde, Donita Sparks, Nicki Minaj
sp-studio.de Update time!
I added five new items to the
“stuff” category today:
A new contest has started and I hope many will submit their SP-Studio pictures.
This month the topic is “female musicians”. Choose a female singer, drummer, DJ, guitar player or whoever comes to your mind. It must be an existing person or a famous fictional character, no made up ones. So please do not forget to mention the name in the title or description of your upload. You can join the contest by registering a nickname in the Community. Have fun! I am sure everybody knows some female musicians he wants to build with the SP-Studio. Read all details about the rules in the Forum.
The last contest (10 YEARS SP-STUDIO) was won by Caribou. Congratulations! The Top5:
New items for every category! To celebrate the 10th anniversary of this website I prepared an extra huge SP-Studio update. 22 new clothes, hair-styles, fashion accessories and body parts are waiting for you. And because it is the release date of Diablo 3 today some objects are inspired by the Lord of Terror himself. I hope you enjoy the update! 🙂
And please remember: If you want to support the SP-Studio and help it stay alive for another decade every little donation is welcome. Thanks a lot to everybody who already helped me to keep this project going!
In a month like this it’s the perfect time for a look behind the scenes. And that’s what this text is about – I hope some of you find it interesting and the others are not too bored because of it ;). I will answer question about how the SP-Studio is made. But let’s first have a look at what this website looked like 10 years ago. Do you remember this? It was before the age of YouTube, Facebook and World of Warcraft… a really long time ago. Click on the image on the right to play with the first SP-Studio:
When I started to work on it I was still at school and had no experience with coding. I used Macromedia Flash to draw small animations for my South Park fanpage, but creating an interactive tool was something new for me. So I did it as simple as possible. I created a layer for every category (like in Photoshop or Gimp). When you click on a button the item was loaded into this layer. So it was not complicated in the beginning, I just had to learn a few things about Actionscript (that’s how you code in Flash). Here is a screenshot of what working on the SP-Studio looked like back then. You can see the timeline on top of the actual working area. This timeline contains the layers and every layer contains frames. When you jump from one category to anther a different frame shows up. I still use the same software, Flash. But the SP-Studio has become WAY more complex over the years.
The most important things about a character creator like the SP-Studio is the fact, that the items have to appear in the right order. In the SP-Studio every category of items has its own level (levels work like layers). The number of the level tells Flash if it is shown on top or under another item. Items within the same level replace each other. That is why it is more work to include objects for the “stuff” category – usually every “stuff” item needs its own level, because you should be able to include more than one of them. To keep track of which numbers I have already used and which item appears in front of the others I use a very long list ;).
Another important thing is that you take care of the position of the items. If a hat is only 1 pixel aside from where it should be it might not fit some of the hair-styles. A question I read a lot is: Do you draw everything yourself? Yes, I draw everything in Flash, using only my mouse. I added a picture I created some time ago about how I draw a hair-style. Nothing special, but you can see my favorites drawing tools. It is basicaly the same like drawing in Paint or Photoshop, but Flash is a software for vector graphics. Vector Graphics look cleaner than pixel graphics and by using them I can keep the loading time short for my visitors. It is a comfortable way to work because I can do everything with this single software: I draw, create buttons, code and publish in Flash. Some of my visitors asked me to do a HTML5 version of the SP-Studio, but even if I knew how to do this it would be way too much work. Right now I have no plans to give up on Flash.
This was my little insight look. See you in a couple of days with the big anniversary update!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY!
Thanks to all my visitors who have supported this project over the last 10 years!
Wow… when I first got the idea for this website in the year 2001 I did not expect it to become so famous and a big part of my life for so long. The first version was released in May 2002 on my South Park fanpage planearium.de. Unfortunately I do not remember the exact date. So let’s celebrate the whole month! I plan to release some special updates.
First: A CONTEST!
Submit a SP-Studio picture for the birthday contest until May 15th. The topic is very free, anything SP-Studio related counts. As always the winner gets a free wish for an item. Good luck!
