Removing or reworking Grids on maps

[Raised]

The problem I've been running into recently is the preexisting grids that are already overlaid on most dungeon maps that you find in Modules etc. If I try to use Fantasy Grounds' 'Add Grid' option, the immediate few rows of squares will line up properly, but try as I might, I can't get the ones farther away from the origin because my FG-Added Grid isn't pixel-perfect sized to the grid that's drawn on the map, and this slight discrepancy is magnified out so that the later squares become a mish-mash of crossing grid-lines.

I've messed around in Paint.NET, but haven't been able to find a way to remove the grids off the map image without making the map itself look like a copy-paste-edited piece of garbage, losing all the unique textures etc in the process.

On the flip-side, if I just size the tokens to the pre-drawn grids, the distance indicator on the movement arrows and other drawing items wont be accurate.

How do other people work through this issue?

[Sorontar]

Personally if there is a grid I will always try and add the grid from the centre of the map so unless the map is huge the minor pixel discrepancy doesn't have a massive impact.

On bigger maps I've just gone the PAINT route, deleting whole rooms and filling them. Granted this is a full re-work but works okay.

Other than that I re-create rooms using CC3/DD3 when I have the need.

[Griogre]

There are two issues with getting grids to line up. 1) FG grids are integer values. Many maps after resizing or originally do not have a grid that is a whole number. Thus the grids will never line up. 2) Many maps after be scanned, resized or derezzed have "pixel drift" as a result. This means the grid on the map is no longer truly square. The FG grid is truly square.

You can fix the first issue by resizing the map to put the grid on integer values the math is straight forward - though you may introduce the second problem doing this.

Personally, I try pretty hard to avoid using maps with a grid already on them. When I do have to use one because it would take a ton of time to make an alternative instead of revealing it I will just mask the map and lay down an FG grid on it and trace the dungeon using the FG pen tool. Even though the grids won't match up a little slop is OK and this method is *much* more forgiving of mistakes than unmasking (and you can make changes to the map as you draw).

Screen of me doing using the "trace map technique" in a game: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7126

Sorontar advice is also good – just paint out the lines in the rooms by deleting the floor and filling. This also has the benefits of removing DM keys and it is a lot faster than redoing a map from scratch.

[trevorgall]

HI. I struggled with this over the years. but just made a good solution i think.
Set pull up map in FG.
Set a grid as close as you can.
See if the grid is too big or too small.
Load image in GIMP.
Scale it up or down by % say 101.4% or 99.75%. etc . until you get it right..
Save and reload in FG and check.
takes a few goes.. but seems to work a treat.

Of course Mr FG developer/.... please give us invisible grids? Seems to have been asked for for years.

[Trenloe]

HI. I struggled with this over the years. but just made a good solution i think.
...
Interesting... seems pretty hit and miss having to do it a few times to make it work.

You can do this once outside of FG by following this video: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/filelibrary/tutorial/xorne-rescale-1a.wmv or by using Valeros's very handy tool: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?19813

Some more info in this thread: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?23254-Grid-sizing

[ddavison]

One other thing to note on maps with grids pre-placed on them is that the grids in a lot of products we receive for conversion do not actually have the same dimensions in both the X and Y direction. They are close but not exactly. When you measure out 10-20 squares in Photoshop or paint.net to find out how big it is prior to re-scaling, you need to do the measurements separately for width and height. Within Photoshop, you can unlink the x and y dimensions and rescale them individually to different amounts.

As an example:
Map 1 - 20 squares horizontally measures 545 pixels and is set to 10 feet per square. That is 27.25 pixels per square. If I want the new pixel per square to be 50 pixels (exact) per square, then I need to resize it to be 366.9724777%
For the vertical dimensions, 20 squares were actually 547 pixels and that means the height dimension needed to be adjusted to 365.6307129%.

That small 2 pixel per square drift gets magnified on a large map.

I find that when I do that, the new map now lines up perfectly across the entire thing.

[hawkwind]

HI. I struggled with this over the years. but just made a good solution i think.
Set pull up map in FG.
Set a grid as close as you can.
See if the grid is too big or too small.
Load image in GIMP.
Scale it up or down by % say 101.4% or 99.75%. etc . until you get it right..
Save and reload in FG and check.
takes a few goes.. but seems to work a treat.

Of course Mr FG developer/.... please give us invisible grids? Seems to have been asked for for years.

plus one for this or better still be able to set the transparency of the grid