Assets within universes are for uploading all of the different music, pictures, and other content needed to build out universes and connected games. This can be anything from a scene's artwork, music, images for handouts, battlemaps, and other files needed for running games in Alchemy.

Article Information

Category	Universe
Targeted Profiles	Creators & Gamemasters
Requires Alchemy Unlimited	No

What are Assets?

Assets are a term broadly used for any external files that can be used in Alchemy to contribute towards either a universe or a game's experience.

Below are several examples of assets within Alchemy.

The castle image used for a scene's background.
A city map given to players as a handout.
A volcano battlemap planned for a future encounter.

While assets can be uploaded to these universe objects individually, they provide two main benefits when uploaded in the assets tab.

Assets uploaded to a universe can be referenced when creating other objects in a universe. For instance, a scene’s background image can be uploaded from the creator’s device or from an image already uploaded to that universe’s assets tab. For areas that cannot accept an asset to upload (such as an item's image), the asset can still be downloaded to any machine from the assets tab in the universe and subsequently uploaded in the correct place from there.
When building universes, the assets tab can serve as storage for all of the files that have been used. This way, if something needs to be used or referenced later, the exact files can easily be found to make any modifications.

Uploading Assets

Uploading assets is a fast process that can be completed within seconds.

Any creator can navigate to a universe they have edit permissions for. Within the universe, navigate to the 'Assets' tab.
Select the 'Upload Assets' button. This will prompt a window to select a file on the device to be uploaded to Alchemy.
Once the file has been selected, Alchemy will begin uploading the file and it will be available after the upload completes within a few seconds.

Uploading Multiple Assets

Multiple assets can be uploaded at once. When selecting files on the device to be uploaded, multiple can be selected. While they upload, a small progress indicator will be present in the upper right of the page (replacing the 'Upload Assets' button) and will show the number of assets successfully uploaded at that point in time.

Once an asset has been uploaded, it is available immediately to be used within a universe. Additional information can be added to the asset by selecting the uploaded asset in the Assets tab to bring up the asset's edit modal. The lock slider can be unlocked by selecting it; revealing new fields that can be edited for the asset.

Field	Description
ASSET NAME	Input a name for this new asset. This name will reference this specific asset in other areas of the platform.
ARTIST CREDIT	Add the name or source of any creative works uploaded as an asset.
ARTIST LINK	Add the source link for any creative works uploaded as an asset.
METADATA TAGS	Add tags to reference this work when searching assets in a universe.
MOTION OVERLAY	Toggle the asset to be selectable when adding motion overlays to a scene.

Next to the lock slider in the asset's modal, the asset's overflow menu can be opened revealing the following menu options.

Menu Option	Description
Copy Link	Copies a link to the asset that can be opened in a web browser.
Download	Download the asset to a local device.
Add to Module	Toggle the modules within the universe this asset should be available in.
Delete	Permanently deletes the asset from the module.

Asset Best Practices

The maximum file size for any asset uploaded into Alchemy is 30 MBs.

Performance and Assets

A good rule is to keep file sizes as low as possible to provide the best experience as larger files can impact in-game performance. For instance, we speak to many maximum sizes of images below, but a 1920x1080 (16:9) image will fit the same as any other image with a 16:9 aspect ratio (and will run better on older devices).

We have no specific programs to recommend for converting file types or compressing files, but a quick web search can yield several tools to help with these processes.

We always recommend doing research and vetting external programs for these purposes thoroughly to ensure they are secure and deliver a quality expected from the tool.

Below are helpful thoughts, best practices, and notable callouts to keep in mind when uploading new assets to a universe to be used in specific ways.

Audio Files

For any audio files in Alchemy, it is highly recommended to upload tracks that loop every few minutes as opposed to tracks that may be several hours long. Longer tracks take more time to load and may not play as quickly as expected for all players.

Article Covers

We recommend .webp or .webm files with a maximum resolution of up to 3840x2160 (a 16:9 aspect ratio). More common image types such as .jpg or .png work as well.

Battlemaps

We recommend .webp or .webm files with a size of 140dpi (the number of pixels per inch). More common image types such as .jpg or .png also work as well. The minimum size for an image with grid is 70dpi. These images would need to be upscaled to the max size in order to fit the Alchemy grid or tokens properly.

Handouts

When the handout is displayed in a modal, we recommend .webp or .webm files with a maximum resolution of up to 1360x1360 (a 1:1 aspect ratio). More common image types such as .jpg or .png work as well.
Full-screen handouts can have files much larger and in different ratios. We still recommend files with a smaller size to ensure performance is not impacted when the image loads.

In-Line Symbols

In-line symbols can be added to articles using markdown. The maximum resolution of these images is currently 40x40 (a 1:1 aspect ratio). We also recommend using a transparent file type (such as .png) for the best results.

Motion Overlays

For any asset used as a motion overlay, we recommend a 16:9 aspect ratio .webm file with transparent overlays that add to the ambiance of a scene's background image. Generally, overlays should not feel in the way of a scene's background image.

Portraits

We recommend .webp or .webm files with a maximum resolution of up to 1360x1360 (a 1:1 aspect ratio). This would provide the most detail in the image while keeping the image centered since it will be uploaded in a square ratio.

Scene Background Images

We recommend .webp or .webm files with a maximum resolution of up to 3840x2160 (a 16:9 aspect ratio). More common image types such as .jpg or .png work as well.

Universe Logo

Universe thumbnails accept many different aspect ratios. We would recommend a transparent image that uses one color which contrasts the Universe Thumbnail image.

Universe Themes

For more information on specific assets related to creating a Universe Theme, check out our Universe Themes article.

Universe Thumbnail

We recommend .webp or .webm files with a maximum resolution of up to 3840x2160 (a 16:9 aspect ratio). More common image types such as .jpg or .png work as well.

Still need help?

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