Tips for making a conversion? (+HUD face question)

[Cosmic Grain]

I've looked around online for tutorials/tips related to making full conversion wads but it seems there's not much information available. So I really just wanted to ask if anyone here has experience with making full conversions from Doom 2, and any general tips they might give. I know my way around GZDOOM Builder(well mostly) and I know how to insert custom stuff with Slade, but...

I'm feeling intimidated because I don't know where to start when it comes to a total conversion. Is it all just about replacing textures and such, deleting existing stuff first, or...? Also, I heard you can distribute as a standalone game, like there's a way to package everything to where anyone can play the wad without needing to drag it into a sourceport. Is this true? It would be convenient for getting more people to play the mod. That might be a dumb question but it's worth asking.


An additional question I have is: How should I go about putting these HUD faces I've made into the wad? What I mean is, I made them rather large(oops?), so they're gonna need to be scaled down in some way. They're basically all variants of this(Note that the final graphic will likely be cropped closer to the character's face, meaning the shoulders and antennae will be left out):

Spoiler

I ask this because I want to find the method which results in less quality loss/blurring, and scaling the image down to 24x29(Doomguy face sprite size) in GIMP definitely messes it up. Orrrrr is it possible that I'm basically screwed for making it so big? Erm, anyway, help/tips are greatly appreciated!

[Bauul]

While I'm no graphical designer, I did read once in a similar thread that scaling images never works correctly. The target size is just too small (or more accurately, the individual pixels are relatively too big). Working with just 696 individual pixels is an entirely different skill from working with the 264,000 pixels you used in the image you posted.

I think the character design would work at that small scale (the bold colors and clean lines should help) but if I were you I'd almost try designing it from scratch at the right size, using your original design as a reference.

[Cosmic Grain]

So on a completely useless note, just wanted to say that I'm currently struggling on whether this wad is gonna be a full or partial conversion >.>

Anyway... In hoping to find a nice way to scale the face images without having to start from scratch I came to this point:



Don't mind the offset for now, just the face graphic itself. It looks like it hasn't been distorted really but I must ask... Any opinions? It would help.