Broken Palette Links / and another Palette Choice

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dougeff
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Broken Palette Links / and another Palette Choice

Post by dougeff »

I tried several of the links to NES palettes (.pal files) on this board, and they seem to be broken...

Specifically, the links to some of FirebrandX's palettes, and Kizul's 'definitive' palette. (I know that FirebrandX has his own website, but the files there are much different than they were a year ago).

viewtopic.php?f=21&t=13555

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=13252

Wouldn't it make sense to have some of the better palettes stored here? Somewhere.

EDIT: the link on page 3 of the Kizul Palette, where he changed a few things, not the link on page 2 with the original palette. The one that starts...*EDIT: aaaaaaand that's done now. and goes to a .cx Christmas Islands website.
Last edited by dougeff on Tue Feb 21, 2017 3:31 am, edited 1 time in total.
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syboxez
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Re: Broken Palette Links

Post by syboxez »

I largely maintain (with the help of others) an archive of all the NES palettes I can find on the emulation wiki. All past and present FBX palettes are there, along with the Kizul palettes.

http://emulation.gametechwiki.com/index ... e#Download

The Kizul palette on page 3 is included (note the modification date of the file and the post on page 3).
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dougeff
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Re: Broken Palette Links

Post by dougeff »

Thank you for posting that. Very interesting.

I don't know which one I like best (for accuracy), but somehow they all seem a little wrong. Kizul's palette comes pretty close. I think I'm going to have to just make my own. I know, I know, every TV is different. I'm weird like that.
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dougeff
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Re: Broken Palette Links

Post by dougeff »

I've gone and edited the heck out of the Kizul palette, using a very high tech device called 'my eyes'. This looks right to me.
NTSC-DF2.pal
(192 Bytes) Downloaded 427 times
PaletteDF3.png
PaletteDF3.png (51.91 KiB) Viewed 13300 times
Compared to my CRT TV, with the brightness turned to about 35%.
Last edited by dougeff on Tue Feb 21, 2017 8:42 am, edited 1 time in total.
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dougeff
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Re: Broken Palette Links

Post by dougeff »

Notable difference to the Kizul Definitive palette, all the 2x colors have been lightened, especially around 27-28. This is why...
DEJAVU.png
DEJAVU.png (52.87 KiB) Viewed 13327 times
RYGAR.png
(note, I did gamma correct the photo of my TV in both).
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dougeff
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Re: Broken Palette Links

Post by dougeff »

And, 22...well, really all the blues...01/11/21/31 02/12/22/32, have been shifted in hue slightly.
SMB.png
This seems more appropriate to me.
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Firebrandx
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Re: Broken Palette Links / and another Palette Choice

Post by Firebrandx »

Sorry to necro an old thread, but I've been recently made aware of Kizul's claims that anyone who uses pure black for all the black palette entries is in error. I take great offense to that for a very specific reason:

A properly calibrated CRT (or PVM for that matter) will NOT show a difference in ANY of the black palette entries. In order to see any difference, you have to turn the brightness WAY up, washing out the rest of the picture. So I didn't make all the black entries pure black "in error", I made them that way because THAT'S how they appear on a calibrated CRT monitor. There's no getting around that, and if Kizul thinks you need off-blacks for better accuracy, he's sadly mistaken.

Entries like 0D fall well below the expected voltage for pure black, and in fact will glitch out certain models of CRTs as it effectively appears as a blanking period. Nintendo even issued a memo NOT to use this entry as a result. So note the games that use it are primarily unlicensed games (because they didn't get that memo).
Last edited by Firebrandx on Mon Nov 23, 2020 8:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.
tepples
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Re: Broken Palette Links / and another Palette Choice

Post by tepples »

Help text from 240p Test Suite, for comparison (with my emphasis):
The PLUGE (picture line-up generation equipment) pattern is used to adjust the TV's "brightness" or black level.

The inner bars are a signal level slightly lower than standard black, which causes some TVs to distort or even lose sync. The outer bars are the darkest mix of colors the NES can show.

Adjust brightness until the outer bars are clearly visible and inner bars are not.
If you can see the line between $0D and $0F, it's washed out.
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Firebrandx
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Re: Broken Palette Links / and another Palette Choice

Post by Firebrandx »

Yep. I wish I had contact info for this Kizul character so I could school him on how black levels work on CRTs.
lidnariq
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Re: Broken Palette Links / and another Palette Choice

Post by lidnariq »

Different TVs do different things depending on the range of brightnesses on-screen.

Rainwarrior (I think?) mentioned that his TV automatically brightens the whole screen so that the {0 IRE black that is color $3f} becomes brighter if any {-14 IRE color $0D} is on-screen.

Also, personally, I have never seen a CRT TV that emits absolutely zero light when displaying nominal black.
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Firebrandx
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Re: Broken Palette Links / and another Palette Choice

Post by Firebrandx »

lidnariq wrote: Mon Nov 23, 2020 8:11 pm

Also, personally, I have never seen a CRT TV that emits absolutely zero light when displaying nominal black.
That's because they were never designed to emit non-zero light even with no signal. The point being that if you send a black level too low a voltage, some CRTs will lose sync as a result. Nintendo realized this and issued a memo to all licensed companies to stop using 0D as a result.
lidnariq
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Re: Broken Palette Links / and another Palette Choice

Post by lidnariq »

I'm really not clear what point you think you're making?
$0D is bad, because large horizontal runs of it can cause certain TVs to lose sync, but $0D is also blacker than 0IRE and real-world CRT TVs will display this (because the other "blacks" are really "dark grey")

Also there's a number of licensed games that used $0D too.
tepples
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Re: Broken Palette Links / and another Palette Choice

Post by tepples »

The point is that a properly calibrated TV won't show $0D as noticeably darker than $0F, despite that $0D's signal level is lower, because calibration would cause luma signal levels less than the 0 point to be clipped to 0.
lidnariq
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Re: Broken Palette Links / and another Palette Choice

Post by lidnariq »

Except that's not true! No CRT TV I've ever seen displays 0 IRE as Really Black, and so -14 IRE has always been Even Darker ... as long as it doesn't lose sync.
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dougeff
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Re: Broken Palette Links / and another Palette Choice

Post by dougeff »

The screen itself isn't pitch black even when off. My TV has a dark gray color. I think that is what Kizul is seeing.

Though I do own a modern TV that is nearly black when off, it is a flatscreen.
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