Nerd With An Afro
Smash Journeyman
Somewhat moderate guide to making THPs
With this being my first guide, I’m not going to (try and) fill you up with useless details, instead, im going to jump right to the point. Our goal here is to make a .thp file, which is the movie file type in Brawl and a few other games. This guide is for developing a standard 29.97 FPS THP, you can make THP’s up to 60FPS I believe, but I’m keeping it simple. There’s not too much complexity behind them like move sets and animating, and there’s not going to be much use for them until the file patch code supports them. Right now, it’s USB/backup only (don’t discuss here). For this, you are going to need a few things.
Common Sense and the ability to read.
THPconv.exe and DSPtool.DLL (in the SDK, no discussion on obtaining it here)
Movie wanting to convert
2 programs: 1 that can remove the audio from the video and 1 that can make Serial JPG’s (first paragraph)
Command Prompt
Step 1: making your movie convertible
In order for THPconv to convert you movie into a THP, you will need to make into Serial JPG’s. It is basically, a whole bunch of JPG files with one representing a frame and labeled accordingly. Here is an example.
Wombo Combo001(.jpg)
Wombo Combo002
Wombo Combo003
Wombo Combo…
Wombo Combo146
Note: you’ll notice that the first one is 001, and the zeros are there because the amount of frames (or jpg’s in this case) is less than 1000. If it had 1000 or more, it would be Wombo Combo0001. That s important because if the frames are mislabeled, the program will not convert.
You will need a program to do this for you though, and the only one I know is Adobe after Effects. If anyone could tell me a freeware that does this, please tell me, because I know for a fact that people will “obtain” after effects like they did with Photoshop during the CSP/+1 ages. Lets avoid that
.Now that your program is ready to export several thousand JPG’s from your movie, you should set the destination somewhere close to the root of your harddisk. This will make it easier in the future so lets go create a folder named THP at the root or your harddisk and Save the JPG’s there.
Step 2: Music (optional)
The audio is an optional part of this, but heck, what’s a video without audio? A video. All you have to do here is get a program like audacity, goldwave (betting there are better ones) or a video editor and export JUST THE AUDIO as a .wav. that’s all for the music
Step 3: setting up command prompt
Make sure that all the files required for making the THP are in the THP folder we created earlier. That would be the Serial JPG’s, THPconv, and if your using audio, DSPTool.dll and the .wav. here is the trick part, soget ready. Open up command prompt (or use the Run function and type in CMD) and youll notice it automatically sets its self to C:\Users\Name. We don’t want it like that, and we can’t just point to the THPconv because that won’t work. What you will need to do is type in CD \ and you will notice it takes you to the root of the harddisk. Next you will type CD (insert folder name) and it will make the computer think that the folder is the root (not really, but it wont work unless you do this. If you have a folder within a folder (or didn’t make it on the root….) then you will have to type CD (insert next folder here) until you reach the folder containing THPconv and the Serial JPG’s
Step 4: Making The THP
This is where variables apply from person to person. But im going to attempt to keep it as basic as possible. (unrequired) To begin, if you type in THPconv in the CMD, a whole options list will pop up in the CMD. Most of those are irrelevant and you shouldn’t focus on them until you understand what your doing.(\unrequired)
Your going to start by typing in THPconv –j (JPG serial Name****)
Heres an example. THPconv –j WomboCombo****.jpg
Like I said before, the amount of Stars are dependent on how many frames you have. Just look at the first frame of the Serial JPG and count all the numbers in it. Don’t forget to add .jp to the end and Don’t press enter yet
From there, press space and add –d (file name)
This is what the output THP files will be. In the case of wombo combo, it would be WomboCombo.thp but it can be whatever you want. Just don’t forget the .thp at the end. If your adding music, Don’t press enter just yet, but if your video is going to be boring, then press enter.
Music Time! Press space again and type -S (.wav filename(s))
An example for you. –s Combo.wav
You MUST have DSPtool.DLL for the wav to convert, if not, it will give you an error.
My final script looks like this
C:\THP>THPconv –j WomboCombo****.jpg –d TestingAgain.thp –s Combo.wav
Press enter and it should create a .thp files. If it doesn’t, you may have done something wrong, and if your completely unsure, just post in this topic.
Step 5: Useful things I found with Google AFTER learning how to make THP’s
When I had goggled about THP files, I ran into a few things that would’ve been useful for testing. 1 is the the melee hacking thread. They already knew how to create thp’s, but not with the same type of music. Second, and more importantly, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRxXSCHig7s this is a video on how to play THP files on your PC… and I went through emulation when this was possible…. Something that I did notice is that it doesn’t like some THP’s. it liked Wombo combo, but some videos from brawl and TvC had slight complications, but they still work in game.
Please post if you had any complications at all because i want to make this guide able to be used by anyone.
Videos (of videos?)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJwHHDi-L0Y
Other info
THPconv does not accept frames larger than 672. therefore, make THP's at 640x480 or whatever variation of that you could think of that follows that, along with the X16 rules.
