A hearty thank-you goes to Hammerknight for putting together the female version of his head-on flying pose in HeroMachine 3. Thanks big guy!

A hearty thank-you goes to Hammerknight for putting together the female version of his head-on flying pose in HeroMachine 3. Thanks big guy!

Posted in HeroMachine 3, Recipes, Tips & Tricks
Everyone was impressed with Me, Myself, and I’s fantastic volcano in the last character contest, and you can see why:

Now for the first time anywhere, he reveals just how he did it! I like these “how to” kinds of guides because even if you don’t want to make your own volcano without the prospect of baking soda blowing up in a high school science fair, the techniques used are applicable to all kinds of things you might want to try.
Many thanks to MMI for putting this together.
Posted in HeroMachine 3, Recipes, Tips & Tricks
Thanks to your feedback, I’ve added six items from the HM2.5 Expansion set to the HM3 Tops-Female-Bustiers set:

These are available now; if you don’t see them, clear your browser’s cache.
Posted in HeroMachine 3, News & Updates, Previews
I’ve completed and uploaded the conversion of the HM 2.5 “Bustiers” set for HeroMachine 3, and it is now live for your use. Here is a preview of a couple of screens worth of entries:

I tried to be careful about bringing over all the items, including things like the star-spangled and striped sets, and to further break them down into the complete item down to the waist; cut off at the navel; and just the bra.
Furthermore there are a number of standalone options for mixing and matching your own creations. For instance, item number nine (first page, first column, last row) is designed to fit over the default shoulder straps so instead of a top portion with pointy ends, you can make them rounded instead. There are also a number of zippers set to different lengths which can be sized, rotated, and moved to serve any number of functions.
Hope you like them! Note that armor stuff will be covered in the conversion of Tops-FantasyArmor from males to females, so don’t be surprised that there’s little enough of that here.
If there’s anything in particular you’d like to see, or problems you’ve noted, with the set then please let me know in comments.
Posted in HeroMachine 3, News & Updates, Previews
(If you’ve ever wondered if you can use HeroMachine to create an animation, you can! Thanks to frequent commenter Nite Rider and an assist from a movie making program, that is. Take it away, Nite Rider!)
With HeroMachine 3, you can create animations of your favorite heroes and villains and post them on sites such as YouTube. But, I must caution you not to violate any copyrights in the process.
You will need programs like Windows Movie Maker and Sound Recorder, a little patience, and a huge imagination.
First, create and copy multiple images of your character in each position of your animation sequence from HM3 to your pic file. Note the sample pics below:
Posted in HeroMachine 3, Recipes, Tips & Tricks
So with the benefit now of however long it’s been, and at the prompting of some of the comments in the last thread, I opened up the “FootRightStandard” set this morning just for a quick look-see. And I realized it’s a bit of a mess.
Back in the day when I was first putting these sets together, I had a pretty hard-core attitude about it. I felt like I was going to just present pieces that you the user would then assemble into whatever item you wanted. So rather than having ten boots with the same foot part and just different designs along the top (Superman’s boot top versus Batman’s versus Captain America’s floppy top, etc.), I thought I would just provide the foot part (which stayed the same) and then separate tops, so you could make your own.
But as time has gone on and we’ve gotten more sets and more feedback, I’m rethinking that position.
It seems to me now that the best way to do these sets is the way I did the most recent Legwear release, where you’ve got the complete item, then a breakdown into pieces of that item in whatever configuration. That way the people who want one click items can have it, while the more advanced users who want the pieces to mix and match can do that, too.
Given that, I wanted to solicit your feedback on whether I ought to redo the FootRight sets, or at least do a couple of sub-sets (like BootTops and Foot or something), with a more orderly breakdown of items.
Posted in HeroMachine 3
If you don’t see it, clear your browser’s cache, but I’ve just updated the Headgear-Fantasy set with the following ten items from the suggestions you made after the last update:

With this release we’re at a turning point in the HeroMachine 3 development process — I have the sense that we’re pretty much done with adding new items, with the exception of female bustiers. Barring any huge item set that I’ve overlooked, and which I count on you to remind me of in the comments, I think the next steps are as follows:
The key takeaway is that this will be the end of “new” item releases for quite a while as I concentrate on converting over the stuff that already exists. I know that’s not super exciting for you (or for me, frankly), but it clearly needs doing.
So, let me know what you think of this proposed plan!
Posted in HeroMachine 3, News & Updates, Previews
I am super pumped to announce the release of the “Headgear-Fantasy” set of items for the HeroMachine 3 Alpha. I’ve included most of your suggestions over the past few months for various other things (full suits of armor when I was working on chest pieces, etc.), and also gone frame by frame to import (and update, for the most part) the items from the same set in HeroMachine 2.
Here’s a quick sample showing some of the all-new items, and then at the end a couple of conversions:

Hope you like them! I’ve got room for a few more at the end, although at 78 items it’s getting close to the ceiling. But let me know if there’s some key bit missing you were really hoping for and I’ll see what I can do.
Posted in HeroMachine 3, News & Updates, Previews
I’ve just added the “Tops-Male-FantasyCommon” set to the HeroMachine 3 Alpha. This set includes 70+ items, some ported over from existing set and many new ones as well. Each entry where appropriate is broken down into the complete item, just the middle portion, just the chest portion, and just the sleeve. To get the sleeve on the left side, make sure you’ve got Multiples selected, add a second sleeve, and use the “Flip” button. Then drag it over to the right.
As usual, if you don’t see it on the list, clear your browser’s cache and it ought to appear — it’s definitely on the server.
Here’s a sample of some of the items. Note that I tried to include some loose sleeves that you can match up with the wide variety of vests to make customized tunics.

Hope you like them! I’ve got room for maybe one or two more items with their breakdowns, or up to eight individual items, if there’s something missing you’ve just got to have.
Posted in HeroMachine 3, News & Updates, Previews
Hammerknight has put together a nice set of recipe cards showing the settings you need to scale your HeroMachine 3 illustrations for various purposes. Thanks again, HK!

Click on an image to see it at a larger, more legible size.
Posted in HeroMachine 3, Recipes, Tips & Tricks