Mii Editor Blog

In the last post, I mentioned a potential issue which could threaten the practicality of the new, soon-to-be-unleashed feature. I think I've narrowed down the cause and will be able to work around the issue. Actually, it appears only to happen during development and wouldn't be an issue during playback on the web. However, I have still implemented a solution which should prevent the error (an issue with the Flash Player) from becoming an problem - at least in regards to this newest feature. If it happens anywhere else, that could be a different problem.

I have no idea when the new feature will be released, but it's nearing completion so you might not have to wait too long...

Labels: beta, error, fix, upcoming

This is the current error that is blocking my latest and greatest next feature (yet to be disclosed IF it ever sees the light of day). Turns out, someone told me that this error occured for them with the current (or an older) release of the Mii Editor as well. The sad part is, I don't think it's my fault. Instead I think this is an error on the part of the Flash Player.


This message is supposed to come up as a result of a timeout that lets the user escape from a possible infinite loop encountered in the programming of the currently playing Flash movie/application. The default timeout for this is 15 seconds, meaning it would take 15 seconds of an unresponsive Flash movie (caught in an infinite loop) before this message would be seen. Clicking yes would force the looping script to stop while now would let you continue the loop hoping that it will eventually stop looping on its own. In my current, local build, when testing my new feature, this error pops up without any loop and with the Flash Player completely responsive up until the very moment the dialog appears. Hmm, that's not supposed to happen.

I would like to think this error does not happen for the current build of the Mii Editor. However, if it has (or does) for you, I would like to know. Just fill out a bug report or post a comment below with as much information you can about what you were doing, how long you were doing it and what happened when you dismissed the dialog (if anything). Hopefully I can figure out what causes this and workaround it so this dialog won't accidentally appear when it shouldn't.

Labels: beta, delay, error, gui, upcoming

This latest update focuses some on character rendering. There are also some enhancements to the downloadable version including drag-drop support and file association of .mii files with the editor so opening a .mii file will open the editor showing that character.

Additionally, and this was something that was lost since very, very early versions of the editor, Mii Editor will now remember your last Mii and reload it when you go back to the editor later.

Probably one of the more noticable visual improvements is pants color. Admittedly, I mistakenly made the mingle option show a favorite pants color (red) when mingle does not affect the pants color at all (I was just excited just to have pants ;). New pants colors are based off of David Hawley's Mii pants observations. To be honest, I am not entirely sure how accurate these are (I tried to get gold pants on the Wii from this but could not) so it may take some tweeking to nail down... and who knows, maybe the Mii Editor isn't interpretting the Mii id's correctly on its end.

Also special thanks to miicharacters.com (and as always miiplaza.net) for providing me with some mii files with screenshots to do some comparisons with.

Labels: air, beta, desktop, fix, pants, update

The new Mii Editor is now live. If you have used the Mii Editor before you may need to clear your cache as older assets will prevent the editor from working correctly, though I hopefully have resolved that issue in this update (?). Other updates include:

• Lip colors (finally!)
• Updated an eye icon
• Lowered freckles
• Character is now in full view on the first "General information" tab
• Versioning is available on the main File screen
  
• Updated the Image Export
• You can now export as PNG(!)
  
• Background color can now be set and can be transparent for a PNG export
  
• The Mii can be zoomed in the view using the Zoom slider
  
• The Mii can be moved in the view by clicking and dragging in the view
• The downloadable AIR version of the Mii Editor has been updated to this version
• It now supports drag and drop for Mii binary and XML files
• File uploads for XML should now work for the AIR version as well

The drag and drop feature I implemented litterally this morning, so it may not be 100% - and to be honest, I didn't really test this build much at all so there could be potential issues. Anything found I will try to update as quickly as possible, just let me know.

Labels: air, beta, binary, color, desktop, export, fix, gui, lips, update, xml

The Mii Editor has been updated. You may need to clear your browser's cache to see the new features (the editor may also break if you don't in the case that some but not all of the dependant files used by the editor are reloaded causing a conflict within internal definitions). Updates include:

• Inclusion of Mii Body
• Image export size and background are retained when returning to the File screen
  
• Update of Export Preview when a new Mii is loaded
• Fixed error causing screen (tab) to change in the editor when a new Mii is loaded
• Added a simple scrollbar to the XML text output
• Most buttons now have visual feedback for when they are pressed (darken)
• Some hairstyles have been adjusted to be cleaner
• Some colors have been adjusted (i.e. the white favorite color is now less white)

I think now I need to add some more image export options to facilitate the body. I will work on that next.

Labels: beta, body, color, export, fix, gui, hair, update, xml

Progress is being made for the Mii Body. Scaling and proportioning for the body itself seems on target. Next it needs to be correctly proportioned with the head and some additional adjustments needs to be made to be able to scale the body and head back as the Mii height and weight are changed.

The shirt color will also change with the Miis favorite color and the pants will change red if the Mii mingles. When complete, these changes will be made live on MiiEditor.com along with some minor hair fixes.

Labels: beta, body, gui, hair, upcoming

You have to wonder why we called it "AIR." It's hard to say or put into context. Either way, the AIR version of the Mii Editor is now available for installation. Try it out and lets hope it works.

http://www.miieditor.com/download.html

Labels: air, beta, desktop, update

I've recently been looking to bring the Mii Editor to the desktop as a standalone application. Coincidentally someone recently contacted me about doing that with another tool, but my attention has so far been focused on AIR. Despite still being in beta, AIR seems promising and I've already compiled the Mii Editor into a AIR-based standalone application. All I really need to do is port the load, save, and export options over to AIR and it will essentially be complete. When I get that working, I'll release a version for download. Chances are, however, that AIR will still be in beta then, so it will be a beta app (Mii Editor) on a beta platform (AIR) which could get a little sticky. But from what I can tell, there should be little to no problems with it.

Labels: air, beta, desktop, export, gui, upcoming

The export screen should now be fixed (you may need to refresh/clear your cache before seeing the effects). Also with this update is the new (but only barely) JPEG exporter. Linux folks will have to get back to me on whether or not it works.

Labels: beta, export, fix, update

I've identified an issue with the file/export screen which may sometimes cause the buttons to be unresponsive and the image preview to be blank. After some digging around, I've identified this as a Flash Player issue and will need to take some steps to get around it.

This issue, however, should really affect all screens (all Mii feature screens included), but so far I have only seen it for the export screen. It's intermittent, though, so it's rare that you'll experience it. And if you do, just exit the screen and go back to it and you should be fine. You have been warned.


When I get around to fixing that I will also include an updated JPEG export script. There are a couple of minor changes that may or may not help the Linux users out there. We'll see...

Labels: beta, error, export

Posted an update to the Mii Editor. Changes include:

• Default Mii character now default boy (will try to provide a link loading default girl as well)
  
• Extra value for Wii ID
• Adjustable Image export size and background color (max of 999 px square)
  
• Some fixes to character rendering and Mii file format reading primarily with the nose (I think - may still need tweaking)
• Color and feature items are now highlighted for those currently selected for the Mii
• When navigating to a tab, the current feature page is where the currently selected feature exists (instead of defaulting to page 1)
  
• Fixed an issue where a random character could result in a facial feature value which was out of range; visually this has no effect but sometimes it messed up the facial features selection page

There might still be some issues with the nose; it may not be positioned correctly or values may not carry over correctly from the Wii still. I could use some help on identifying those issues, so if anyone notices anything, let me know and I will try to fix it ASAP. It's possible my Mii data for the default boy and girl are corrupt, however. I'll try to look into that later, but if anyone else can provide additional information, that could be helpful.

I also haven't looked into the image output issue for Linux. I'll see what I can do about that (and providing a Mii body) next.

Labels: beta, export, facialfeatures, fix, gui, nose, update

I've heard some reports that the JPEG export from the Mii Editor does not make JPEGs compatible with Linux. Since I don't have a linux box of my own, I am not able to test this, but I will try to look into the export script and see if I can't figure out what is going wrong.

Labels: beta, error, export

I have found some time to work on the Mii Editor this weekend. So far it seems as though it's compiling OK for now (Yippie!) even though its still pretty messy in there. But new features will include being able to select an output size and background color for images being exported, hopefully a fix for the noses (I am not sure if it's right now or not; some of you guys out there might need to help debug that further once an update goes live), and the inclusion of the 4th byte for the Wii ID field - originally I assumed that bit would not change but it appears newer Wii models (firmware?) has a different value for it. Now the Mii Editor will let you change it :)

I will hopefully be able to include selection highlights for feature buttons too, but I am not sure how to work that in just yet. Also, including a body is on the table, but it will take a while to get the scaling (tall/short, thin/fat) worked out right for that.

I'll be sure to post when this new version is live.

Labels: beta, fix, id, nose, upcoming, update, wii

It's the start of May and not much as changed since mid March. I have been checking more mail, however, and even replying to some of you writing bug reports or contacting me directly (yippie!). There have been a few good suggestions, many of which I have planned but just haven't had time to implement. However, I hope to get some work done soon. When that happens, I'll be sure to post about it here. So stay tuned!

Labels: beta, delay, upcoming, update

As some of you know, I work for Adobe. Furthermore, some of you know that Adobe Creative Suite 3 will be announced on March 27 meaning it will be released sometime shortly after that. What does this mean? This means I will have my hands full for the next couple of months with Adobe and probably won't have time to work on the Mii Editor much (as I haven't been for the past couple of weeks).

No fear, the project is not dead. Though there are a lot of bugs to still work out, they'll just have to wait. Keep sending me bug reports and URLs/Files that can help me make the Mii Editor solid.

Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Labels: beta, delay, upcoming, update

I pushed the recent updates for the hair. They're not complete but should be better than before. Also included is frame coloring for glasses that are not shaded. I think some of this is still off so I will have to go back and try to make that a little more accurate.

Some other minor backend adjustments have been made as well, but nothing that should make any difference to the end user.

Labels: beta, glasses, hair, update

I'm almost done with the initial frontal hair designs. After that the rear hair designs will need to be made (long hair, curls and other things seen behind the head). Once these are done, I'll need to go through and massage them to make sure each work with the individual head sizes. This may cause some hair to have a greater variation from the original Mii hair style, but it is necessary for best compatibility without months of extra work on my part.

Labels: beta, hair, upcoming

I forgot to re-compile the View Mii Flash SWF for the latest batch of updates so it was looking all crazy. That should be fixed now.

Labels: beta, fix, update, website

General updates for the face. Eyes and eyebrows should be mostly on the mark for position, size and rotation. I'm assuming all variations are equally separated (if one eye position is 5 lengths away from the one before it, then the next one should be 5 lengths after the current). If that is not the case, it could mean more adjustments.

Additionally I updated the mustaches which should now be sized and positioned more accurately. Some additional hair has been updated as well, but that's taking longer than I expected. I'll be working on that for the next couple of days.

If you've used the Mii Editor before, you may need to refresh/clear your cache before seeing the updates.

Labels: beta, eyebrows, eyes, hair, mustache, update

I'm pushing the new version of the Mii Editor with the updated eye graphics and the new XML format implemented. Its not well tested and the eyes have not been correctly positioned or sized, so they're bound to be off still, but I wanted something new out there for all the kids to play with. Hopefully I didn't break it ;)

If you've used the Mii Editor before, you may need to refresh/clear your cache before seeing the updates.

Labels: beta, eyes, update, xml