Frequently asked questions

Why does nfty refuse my old archives? Archives written before schema version 2 are refused with a message naming the version, rather than read wrongly. Version 2 is the oldest nfty reads. Archives newer than your build are refused too: a field your build cannot see might change what the file means.

Does the same seed always give the same collection? Yes. The same book, seed and mode give byte-identical output on any machine, locale and CPU. Unique-only and allow-repeats give different collections from one seed. See Why a seed reproduces a collection.

I reordered my layers and the same seed gave different assets. Is that a bug? No. Each layer consumes one random draw in stack order, so moving a layer changes which draw reaches it. A reordered book is a different collection. extend warns when the book no longer matches the one that cooked the Set.

Why can't I make a 3D model from my soft-edged art? A model needs every pixel either solid or empty. A partly transparent pixel has no honest depth, so nfty names it and refuses. Use the opacity lock while painting, or snap existing art with nfty set voxel-ready. See Depth and Fix a 2D-only book.

The unique DNA count says "at least" or "at most". Why not a number? Some counts cannot be reached exactly. The wording tells you which direction the figure is bounded in, so nfty never claims more than it knows. See How uniqueness is decided.

Why is the count not just the product of my variants? It counts distinct fingerprints: legal variant combinations (rules remove some) times each colored layer's quantized color buckets. A layer that can be left out adds that case too.

How strong is a sealed .tin? The encryption is real (AES-256-GCM). The view-only mark is a policy: the format is open, so someone who holds the passphrase can get the files. A sealed export is a lock on a door, not a wall. See Sealing.

Can I recover a lost passphrase? No. There is no backdoor, and no command that unseals.

Why won't nfty resize my art? It never resamples a pixel. A wrong-sized picture is refused so you decide how to fit it. See Why nfty never resizes your art.

My canvas is large. Is that slow? Cooking and exporting scale with canvas area and asset count. Raise the worker threads in Settings or with --threads. A spritesheet is limited to 16,384 pixels a side, and nfty tells you the numbers before it starts.

Where is my work stored? Books and Sets are the files you chose. Recents, palettes and view choices are in a .nfty folder beside the program. See Settings.

Ctrl+click does not open the viewer on my Mac. On macOS, Ctrl+click is a right click. Use middle-click, or the pop-out button.

Why is the image library version fixed? nfty pins ImageSharp 3.1.11 on purpose; version 4 needs a build-time license key. Building with a different version is not supported.

What are the four downloads? Portable (unzip and run), single file (one .exe, slower first launch), framework-dependent (needs .NET 10) and single file for .NET 10 (one small .exe, needs .NET 10). See Install.