free xboard/winboard pixmaps

[Eric De Mund]

Hello,

I'm making several sets of chess pixmaps available for free to the chess community. Currently, they're for use in the Jin chess client and with Winboard/Xboard. I'm a computer graphics and image processing software engineer and for quite some time have been vexed by low resolution chess piece images as well as hard to use color schemes, so I took matters into my own hands.

These pieces are antialiased, they have reasonably attractive color schemes, and, in my opinion, are superior in clarity to the pieces used in Chessbase products.

The three font families I used are Alpha, Merida, and USCF, and in each font family there are two types of piece sets, one with Black pieces having white interior markings, and another with Black pieces having transparent interior regions. I've generated pixmaps of sizes 20x20 through 48x48, 52x52, 56x56, 60x60, 64x64, 72x72, 80x80, 88x88, 96x96, 112x112, 128x128, 144x144, and 300x300 pixels. Note that at 300x300 pixels per piece, one can generate high-quality printed output even at 600 DPI. (At 600 DPI, the board would be 2400x2400 pixels in size, or 4 inches by 4 inches on the printed page.)

The results may be seen at:

chess: other
http://ixian.com/chess/#other

Regards, and good chess to all,
Eric De Mund
http://ixian.com/chess/

"uscfb" 40x40 sample, "miami" color scheme

FEN: [6rk/2p2Qb1/pn3B1p/4p3/2n1P3/2P4P/5PP1/6K1 w - - 0 37]
Zhu-Stefanova, North Urals Cup 2007
White to move and mate in 2

"meridab" 32x32 sample, "cote d'azur" color scheme

Compare the clarity here to that of Chessbase 32x32 bitmaps;
now, these are not perfectly clear chess pieces, to be sure, they're
still a bit fuzzier than I like, but this is where several months of toiling
on this project has gotten me so far.

[Ron Murawski]

Nice piece sets, nice colors, and lots of choices!

The wheatfield colors in particular works well with my desktop color scheme (a modified maple theme).

My eyes thank you!

Ron

[James Redford]

Hello,

I'm making several sets of chess pixmaps available for free to the chess community. Currently, they're for use in the Jin chess client and with Winboard/Xboard. I'm a computer graphics and image processing software engineer and for quite some time have been vexed by low resolution chess piece images as well as hard to use color schemes, so I took matters into my own hands.

These pieces are antialiased, they have reasonably attractive color schemes, and, in my opinion, are superior in clarity to the pieces used in Chessbase products.

The three font families I used are Alpha, Merida, and USCF, and in each font family there are two types of piece sets, one with Black pieces having white interior markings, and another with Black pieces having transparent interior regions. I've generated pixmaps of sizes 20x20 through 48x48, 52x52, 56x56, 60x60, 64x64, 72x72, 80x80, 88x88, 96x96, 112x112, 128x128, 144x144, and 300x300 pixels. Note that at 300x300 pixels per piece, one can generate high-quality printed output even at 600 DPI. (At 600 DPI, the board would be 2400x2400 pixels in size, or 4 inches by 4 inches on the printed page.)

The results may be seen at:

chess: other
http://ixian.com/chess/#other

Regards, and good chess to all,
Eric De Mund
http://ixian.com/chess/

"uscfb" 40x40 sample, "miami" color scheme

FEN: [6rk/2p2Qb1/pn3B1p/4p3/2n1P3/2P4P/5PP1/6K1 w - - 0 37]
Zhu-Stefanova, North Urals Cup 2007
White to move and mate in 2

"meridab" 32x32 sample, "cote d'azur" color scheme

Compare the clarity here to that of Chessbase 32x32 bitmaps;
now, these are not perfectly clear chess pieces, to be sure, they're
still a bit fuzzier than I like, but this is where several months of toiling
on this project has gotten me so far.

I looked at the pictures at http://ixian.com/chess/xboard-winboard-pixmaps/ and those are very nice-looking, Mr. Eric De Mund. You did a very professional-looking job.

Let me ask you, or anyone here who knows, how do I use these images within WinBoard, specifically Alessandro Scotti's WinBoard X (for reference: http://www.ascotti.org/programming/chess/winboard_x.htm )? The commands you gave to invoke them don't seem like Windows commands. I recall a discussion by Mr. H. G. Muller, perhaps on another forum, wherein he mentioned that the way XBoard renders the pieces and the squares is different than that of WinBoard.

Previously I've looked through the source code of xboard-4.2.7.tar.gz and I noticed the bitmaps therein, but I also noticed that the binary distribution of WinBoard 4.2.7 doesn't link to any external images (i.e., the piece-images that winboard.exe uses are compiled into the binary).

Am I missing something here? Sorry for my lack of knowledge on this matter, but I can't recall any guides or directions telling people how they can use pixmaps in WinBoard.

On a related topic, I'll raise this matter as perhaps something you may be interested in doing, as you seem like the perfect man for the job.

It would be nice if someone were to convert the Metafont fselch (Feenschach) font--of which is where the standard XBoard/WinBoard pixmaps are taken from--into antialiased images. I, and probably most XBoard/WinBoard users, have never actually seen the XBoard/WinBoard pieces in their original, non-pixelated form.

Although, if my imperfect understanding of how XBoard/WinBoard works is correct, such antialiased images would apply to XBoard. But if this fselch Metafont can be converted to TrueType fonts then they can be enjoyed by Windows users, too (e.g., in WinBoard X, H. G. Muller's version of WinBoard, Arena, as well as for chess publishing on Windows systems).

Given the historical significance of these piece images within the computer chess community, I think it would be great to have these images more widely available in their high-quality format.

Apparently there are some utilities which can make such a conversion possible via a round-about way. For example, converting Metafont to PostScript via mf2ps, and then, e.g., converting PostScript to TrueType via FontForge.

When I was looking into what would be required to achieve this, it appeared that one basically needs a Unix system (such as Linux) and that attempting to do it on Windows would be far more difficult, due to the packages required. As well, from what I've read on it, experience with such graphics processes would make the work much easier.

At any rate, I throw that out there as something you may be interested in doing, given that you obviously had an enthusiasm for creating the fine pixmaps which you've presented to us here. If so, below is where the elch.tar.gz Matafont package may be found, of which the XBoard/WinBoard bitmap pieces (bitmaps.fselch.tar.gz) are derived from:

http://cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewvc/xboard/fselch/

Even if you don't want to bother with TrueType, antialiased pixmaps would be great for XBoard users.

SVG versions of the fselch font would also be wonderful.

[Eric De Mund]

Nice piece sets, nice colors, and lots of choices!

The wheatfield colors in particular works well with my desktop color scheme (a modified maple theme).

My eyes thank you!

Ron

Ron,

Excellent. I'm glad that one of the color schemes works out for you. I developed these color schemes on my main monitor, which is an older (year 2000) Envision CRT. It's a bit dim in its "natural state" now, and so I've got the Gamma correction boosted to 1.6 in my Xfce window manager. The upshot then is that I can't be sure exactly how dark or light these pixmaps will look on another CRT, let alone on another LCD display.

On my roommate's ViewSonic LCD, for example, some of the pixmaps look lighter, some look darker, and they all look a little bit yellower than on my CRT. I don't like it that the LCD renders quite a few of the color schemes that I've become very fond of on my CRT unpalatable. However, I figure that most folks should be able to find one or two of the color schemes in the bunch acceptable if not downright attractive.

Regards,
Eric
--
ead-chess@ixian.com
http://ixian.com/chess/

[Alex Guerrero]

Great job Eric !
Xboard needs it.
I did some pieces in past for xboard and it takes time.

Thanks !

[H.G.Muller]

I looked at the pictures at http://ixian.com/chess/xboard-winboard-pixmaps/ and those are very nice-looking, Mr. Eric De Mund. You did a very professional-looking job.

Let me ask you, or anyone here who knows, how do I use these images within WinBoard, specifically Alessandro Scotti's WinBoard X (for reference: http://www.ascotti.org/programming/chess/winboard_x.htm )? The commands you gave to invoke them don't seem like Windows commands. I recall a discussion by Mr. H. G. Muller, perhaps on another forum, wherein he mentioned that the way XBoard renders the pieces and the squares is different than that of WinBoard.

Previously I've looked through the source code of xboard-4.2.7.tar.gz and I noticed the bitmaps therein, but I also noticed that the binary distribution of WinBoard 4.2.7 doesn't link to any external images (i.e., the piece-images that winboard.exe uses are compiled into the binary).

Am I missing something here? Sorry for my lack of knowledge on this matter, but I can't recall any guides or directions telling people how they can use pixmaps in WinBoard.

On a related topic, I'll raise this matter as perhaps something you may be interested in doing, as you seem like the perfect man for the job.

It would be nice if someone were to convert the Metafont fselch (Feenschach) font--of which is where the standard XBoard/WinBoard pixmaps are taken from--into antialiased images. I, and probably most XBoard/WinBoard users, have never actually seen the XBoard/WinBoard pieces in their original, non-pixelated form.

Although, if my imperfect understanding of how XBoard/WinBoard works is correct, such antialiased images would apply to XBoard. But if this fselch Metafont can be converted to TrueType fonts then they can be enjoyed by Windows users, too (e.g., in WinBoard X, H. G. Muller's version of WinBoard, Arena, as well as for chess publishing on Windows systems).

Given the historical significance of these piece images within the computer chess community, I think it would be great to have these images more widely available in their high-quality format.

Apparently there are some utilities which can make such a conversion possible via a round-about way. For example, converting Metafont to PostScript via mf2ps, and then, e.g., converting PostScript to TrueType via FontForge.

When I was looking into what would be required to achieve this, it appeared that one basically needs a Unix system (such as Linux) and that attempting to do it on Windows would be far more difficult, due to the packages required. As well, from what I've read on it, experience with such graphics processes would make the work much easier.

At any rate, I throw that out there as something you may be interested in doing, given that you obviously had an enthusiasm for creating the fine pixmaps which you've presented to us here. If so, below is where the elch.tar.gz Matafont package may be found, of which the XBoard/WinBoard bitmap pieces (bitmaps.fselch.tar.gz) are derived from:

http://cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewvc/xboard/fselch/

Even if you don't want to bother with TrueType, antialiased pixmaps would be great for XBoard users.

SVG versions of the fselch font would also be wonderful.

If I understood correctly what Eric did, it is exactly the opposite of what you suggest: he started with a font, and converted it to bitmaps. If it was a true-type font, he would not have had to do anything at all, it would work immediately in WinBoard.

So indeed, it is not possible to use those pixmaps in WinBoard, but you could achieve the same effect by directly using the fonts they were derived from, through the -renderPiecesWithFont option. You can adjust the colors anyway you want in WinBoard as well, or use textured boards.

[James Redford]

I looked at the pictures at http://ixian.com/chess/xboard-winboard-pixmaps/ and those are very nice-looking, Mr. Eric De Mund. You did a very professional-looking job.

Let me ask you, or anyone here who knows, how do I use these images within WinBoard, specifically Alessandro Scotti's WinBoard X (for reference: http://www.ascotti.org/programming/chess/winboard_x.htm )? The commands you gave to invoke them don't seem like Windows commands. I recall a discussion by Mr. H. G. Muller, perhaps on another forum, wherein he mentioned that the way XBoard renders the pieces and the squares is different than that of WinBoard.

Previously I've looked through the source code of xboard-4.2.7.tar.gz and I noticed the bitmaps therein, but I also noticed that the binary distribution of WinBoard 4.2.7 doesn't link to any external images (i.e., the piece-images that winboard.exe uses are compiled into the binary).

Am I missing something here? Sorry for my lack of knowledge on this matter, but I can't recall any guides or directions telling people how they can use pixmaps in WinBoard.

On a related topic, I'll raise this matter as perhaps something you may be interested in doing, as you seem like the perfect man for the job.

It would be nice if someone were to convert the Metafont fselch (Feenschach) font--of which is where the standard XBoard/WinBoard pixmaps are taken from--into antialiased images. I, and probably most XBoard/WinBoard users, have never actually seen the XBoard/WinBoard pieces in their original, non-pixelated form.

Although, if my imperfect understanding of how XBoard/WinBoard works is correct, such antialiased images would apply to XBoard. But if this fselch Metafont can be converted to TrueType fonts then they can be enjoyed by Windows users, too (e.g., in WinBoard X, H. G. Muller's version of WinBoard, Arena, as well as for chess publishing on Windows systems).

Given the historical significance of these piece images within the computer chess community, I think it would be great to have these images more widely available in their high-quality format.

Apparently there are some utilities which can make such a conversion possible via a round-about way. For example, converting Metafont to PostScript via mf2ps, and then, e.g., converting PostScript to TrueType via FontForge.

When I was looking into what would be required to achieve this, it appeared that one basically needs a Unix system (such as Linux) and that attempting to do it on Windows would be far more difficult, due to the packages required. As well, from what I've read on it, experience with such graphics processes would make the work much easier.

At any rate, I throw that out there as something you may be interested in doing, given that you obviously had an enthusiasm for creating the fine pixmaps which you've presented to us here. If so, below is where the elch.tar.gz Matafont package may be found, of which the XBoard/WinBoard bitmap pieces (bitmaps.fselch.tar.gz) are derived from:

http://cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewvc/xboard/fselch/

Even if you don't want to bother with TrueType, antialiased pixmaps would be great for XBoard users.

SVG versions of the fselch font would also be wonderful.

If I understood correctly what Eric did, it is exactly the opposite of what you suggest: he started with a font, and converted it to bitmaps. If it was a true-type font, he would not have had to do anything at all, it would work immediately in WinBoard.

So indeed, it is not possible to use those pixmaps in WinBoard, but you could achieve the same effect by directly using the fonts they were derived from, through the -renderPiecesWithFont option. You can adjust the colors anyway you want in WinBoard as well, or use textured boards.

Actually, Mr. Muller, I was clear in my own mind on the point you raise in your first paragraph. If that did not come through in the first part of my above post, then it's because I didn't even attempt to address that issue, since it wasn't a concern of mine.

Nor did I even "suggest" (contrary to what you wrote in your first paragraph) that that is what Mr. De Mund did. Had I even bothered to spend any mental energy on the matter, then it would be quite apparent to me that he went from a vector image to a raster image. But in fact that thought never crossed my mind, as it was already so obvious as to be immediately grasped subconsciously, hence not requiring any conscious effort on my part. Add to that the fact that this wasn't a concern of mine in the first place, and hence there was no reason for me to expend any mental effort on the subject.

Perhaps where your misunderstanding derives from is the fact that Mr. De Mund uses images derived from fonts which are already available on Windows, hence one may (naively) conclude, doing away with any point to using his images in the first place on such a system. Thus, apparently you pegged me as someone attempting to reach a destination when they're already there. But in the screenshots of my system which I've already shown you, I don't use the antialiased fonts setting on my Windows XP system. Perchance, donning a philosophical stance, you may posit that one who likes hinted fonts in written text ought to accept them in all matters, but then that takes us far afield from there being no point in wanting to use such imagery on said system, since then we come into the domain of personal tastes and whose tastes are allegedly the most rational.

Further, given the second part of my above post, it ought to be clear that I quite understand the difference between raster and vector images. There certainly was no misunderstanding in my mind on that matter.

But, Mr. Muller, I here thank you very much for answering my question regarding whether or not these pixmap images can be used in WinBoard. It is as how I thought. Mr. De Mund would do well to modify his statements regarding these images, since in fact they cannot be used in WinBoard.

[H.G.Muller]

I guess the misunderstanding is that what I meant by "what you suggest" was "what you suggest to do", while you took it to mean: "what you suggest Eric did"... So your rant only hits thin air.

[James Redford]

I guess the misunderstanding is that what I meant by "what you suggest" was "what you suggest to do", while you took it to mean: "what you suggest Eric did"... So your rant only hits thin air.

I was of quite calm and cold mind in my immediate post above. It is a wonderment wherefrom you derive any hint of a rant in my previous post.

Moreover, your previous post's statement is quite clear:

""
If I understood correctly what Eric did, it is exactly the opposite of what you suggest: he started with a font, and converted it to bitmaps. If it was a true-type font, he would not have had to do anything at all, it would work immediately in WinBoard.
""

Of course, as I explained in my previous post, I suggested no such thing, which you here admit. I never suggested that he started with bitmaps (actually, pixmaps would be the word to use here) and then converted them to a font. Again, as you say: "opposite of what you suggest: he started with a font, and converted it to bitmaps." What would be the opposite case? As a computer-programmer, you ought to be able to parse this own statement by you with no ambiguity.

Your present elaboration wouldn't even be grammatical were it to be inserted into your above-quoted paragraph.

And I don't see how such a heated word as "rant" came into this discussion. I've been quite cool and polite in all of my posts on this forum. Indeed, it would be silly for it to be otherwise, as nothing about any topic I've discussed here gets me piqued.

[Olivier Deville]

Hi all

I am pretty sure everybody here is cool and polite.

There are other places where flame wars are very welcome

Olivier

[H.G.Muller]

Moreover, your previous post's statement is quite clear:

""
If I understood correctly what Eric did, it is exactly the opposite of what you suggest: he started with a font, and converted it to bitmaps. If it was a true-type font, he would not have had to do anything at all, it would work immediately in WinBoard.
""

Well, what can I say. If you feel more qualified to judge what I meant then I, and want to go off at some imagined insult, by all means do. But don't expect any future reaction from me...

[James Redford]

Moreover, your previous post's statement is quite clear:

""
If I understood correctly what Eric did, it is exactly the opposite of what you suggest: he started with a font, and converted it to bitmaps. If it was a true-type font, he would not have had to do anything at all, it would work immediately in WinBoard.
""

Well, what can I say. If you feel more qualified to judge what I meant then I, and want to go off at some imagined insult, by all means do. But don't expect any future reaction from me...

Your own words on this matter are publicly available. They are quite clear and unambiguous. If you had in mind some other meaning, then it's no error on my part that I took your meaning to be what you clearly said.

As far as imagined insults, I did not imagine that you used the word "rant." Nor did I describe it as an insult. Rather, I said that "I don't see how such a heated word as 'rant' came into this discussion." You're here using a worse description for your own verbiage than what I ever said of it.

At any rate, Mr. Muller, as I said before, I thank you very much for answering the question I posed in my original post in this thread, as you confirmed what I had thought.

[Charles Browne]

If pixmaps do not work in Winboard would it best, to avoid confusion, to change the title of the thread which is presently

free xboard/winboard pixmaps


Being a Winboard X user when I saw "winboard" in the title my thought was well "lets see what this is about".

But maybe I am missing understanding something and the title is fine as it is

... to modify his statements regarding these images, since in fact they cannot be used in WinBoard.

Change in title/statement already previously suggested

[Eric De Mund]

If pixmaps do not work in Winboard would it best, to avoid confusion, to change the title of the thread which is presently

free xboard/winboard pixmaps

Being a Winboard X user when I saw "winboard" in the title my thought was well "lets see what this is about".

But maybe I am missing understanding something and the title is fine as it is :?:

I owe everyone an apology. I assumed that these pixmaps would work just the same in Winboard as they do in Xboard. I don't spend much time on my Windows XP Pro SP3 system much any more, and I did not test these pixmaps under Winboard. Unfortunately, I'm seeing now that there's just no way for Winboard to be told to use pixmaps.

(Rhetorical question) How can this be? (Several hours later....) Ok, I now see item 69d in the file <xboard-4.2.7/ToDo> from the xboard 4.2.7 source code:

69. xboard has some features not in WinBoard. Among others:
69c. Font size selection by pattern fill-in. (leave out)
69d. Alternate bitmaps specified at runtime. (good to add, often requested)
69e. Flashing.

I did not know that Xboard and Winboard had such major differences. Therefore, I'm sorry to report that if and until Winboard supports alternate bitmaps, these pixmaps of mine are only good for Xboard. (Well, I've adapted them for use in Jin, and they'll shortly be adapted for use in the Chessbase HTML Viewer, but you know what I mean re "only good for Xboard".)

Again, apologies to all.

Regards,
Eric
--
Eric De Mund
ead-chess@ixian.com

[H.G.Muller]

Thanks to the work of Allessandro Scotti, WinBoard now has a superior mechanism for importing user-defined graphics, which is the font-based rendering. In contrast to te pixmaps, font-based rendering does not require you to provide a separate set of pixmaps for every board size. It in fact does automatically the equivalent of what Eric had to do here by hand: scaling the symbols to the required board size, and converting them to bitmaps.

So equiping WinBoard with the ability to read pixmaps is not on my to-do list.

On the contrary: it is my intention to throw out the pixmaps of xboard as well, in favor of a font-based option. The pixmaps are troublesome, as they describe squares and pieces as one entity. This interferes with the introduction of board textures (as in WinBoard_x), or diversifying square colors. (E.g. for the crazyhouse holdings, or for a pictorial representation of the promotion popup.)

So if it is upto me, the pixmaps will be stripped from xboard completely.

[xinix]

In the XiniX interface, I only use 128 by 128 bitmaps, and scale them dynamicly. With all enhancements set (scaling=trilinear.. etc) it still looks good at 10 by 10.

That is however with a transparent color set, I'm not sure if it works with masks, old winboard used to use.

Tony

Technical detail: I actually always scale, because the 128 piece bitmaps are copied to a board jpg, wich is 110 by 110 per square, to "blend the pieces in" so I can use black and white bitmaps, and the greyscales are calculated. This is to make the pieces less "sharp".
If I had put the greyscales in the bitmap, then the scaling to small size would have made them fuzzy.

[Eric De Mund]

In the XiniX interface, I only use 128 by 128 bitmaps, and scale them dynamicly. With all enhancements set (scaling=trilinear.. etc) it still looks good at 10 by 10.

That is however with a transparent color set, I'm not sure if it works with masks, old winboard used to use.

Tony

Technical detail: I actually always scale, because the 128 piece bitmaps are copied to a board jpg, wich is 110 by 110 per square, to "blend the pieces in" so I can use black and white bitmaps, and the greyscales are calculated. This is to make the pieces less "sharp".
If I had put the greyscales in the bitmap, then the scaling to small size would have made them fuzzy.

Tony,

Can you shoot me a copy of one of your 128x128 pixel bitmaps, and its corresponding 10x10 pixel little brother?

And yes, the scaling such as you describe is the way to go, if one can go that way. All my pixmaps are scaled down from 600x600 pixel parents. If xboard were able to scale pixmaps dynamically, I would have happily fed it one 600x600 pixel parent per piece.

I was inspired by ChessX's absolutely gorgeous rendering of chess pieces, which dynamically scales pieces just as you describe. It uses the Qt toolkit, which, under the hood, performs a simple bilinear interpolation.

These pieces are all a precursor to a project I have on deck which is yet another chess diagram generator. However, mine will feature pieces as gorgeous and professional looking as I can make them, and will be cross-platform: X Window System, Mac OS X, and Windows. Presently, I'm leaning towards using the Qt toolkit to do this, just as ChessX uses.

Of course, between you, me, and the fence post, bitmaps and pixmaps are very old school. If I can do it, I will have my diagram generator use SVG files internally for the pieces. I view SVG as superior to fonts, for programming purposes, as they support the notion of interior and exterior.

Cheers,
Eric De Mund
ead-chess@ixian.com
http://ixian.com/chess/

[rulet]

How to install those pixmaps described in first post to use them on xboard?

[H.G.Muller]

Put them in a directory somewhere onyour system, and then specify that directory as "Diretory with pixmap pieces" in the View -> Board menu dialog.

[rulet]

Yea, I tried to do so, but when specify a directory with images and then click "ok", xboard just closes. Maybe I have to change some permissions?

r@ngf:~$ xboard

Loading XPMs...
1 Error -1 loading XPM file "/home/r/xboard/merida/sandbar/pll87.xpm"
r@ngf:~$