"Polygon" Widescreen Theme Development (HTPC / UNIVERSAL) [W.I.P] (UPDATED 08/20)

[tcmt]

"Polygon" Widescreen Theme (HTPC / UNIVERSAL) [W.I.P]
 

///For the release/announcement thread for this theme go to: http://www.hyperspin-fe.com/topic/27257-polygon-widescreen-theme-htpc-universal-basepak-released/ ///

 
i like to use this thread for documenting my theme creation process. there are two reasons for that. first it just kind of feels nice to have a place where i can see all my progress and secondly my work is constantly open for feedback from you guys (which might help keeping me busy working on the theme instead of procrastinating)
 
So i present to you "Polygon - A HTPC UNIVERSAL WIDESCREEN THEME FOR HYPERSPIN"

 

 

 

 

 

  
 
HISTORY OF THE THEME:
 
i started this project after i looked into emulationstations layout and general theme and i wanted to make something similiar in hyperspin, just because i think it is a better frontend. only problem was i had zero experience with any editing or animation software. my experience was limited to a few basic things in gimp. three weeks ago i never even touched any adobe product.
but then i began to learn using after effects and with the help of so many great resources on the net (mainly youtube) i was able to quickly learn how to use after effects to manifest my vision.
my first attempt was this...
 

 
...which was quite similar to the look of emulationstation. and by creating that prototype i learned alot about AE and hyperspin itself. for example i learned how to make custom override transitions etc. etc..
 
after that i consumed a lot more tutorials and info on AE and general motion graphics/animation and i created the polygon animation that now plays at the beginning of the theme after a tutorial from videocopilot. i liked that animation so much that i decided to build and customize my hyperspin theme around it. and thats when i came up with what you can see above.
 
 
People i like to thank and/or give credit to:
 
-The AV Archivist and Simply Austin for getting me back into Hyperspin and giving me the idea to create my first custom theme
-dark13 for the awesome conversion scripts and wheel images
-james baker for his work on hyperspin cinematic which technique and script i used in creating my own backgrounds
-the hyperspin community for being very helpful with questions i had the last couple of days.
-VideoCopilot: tutorial on creating a polygon animation
-AA VFX for animated background (https://www.youtube....er/dvdangor2011
-ECAbrams for AdobeAE tutorials
 
 
cheers
tim

[damageinc86]

I like the simple and clean look.  Nice job!

[tcmt]

quick update. did some work on the main menu. i created a quick mockup of what i want to integrate into hyperspin:

 

 

colours of the background will be system specific. the screenshot on the top right will go through different shots of games of that system.

i want to use the black bar at the bottom for some additional short info (probably by means of some icons). 

a controller input info like i did on my first test (see post#1) will be integrated as well.

 

i'd like to give the selected system more focus (on the white bar) but don't want to use a pointer. if someone has a nice idea of how to archive that, let me know. i welcome any suggestion.

 

but for now just this quick mockup. let me know what you think.

 

cheers

tim

 

 

credits for this mockup go to:

 

-dark13: wheel images

-AA VFX for animated background (https://www.youtube.com/user/dvdangor2011)

[tcmt]

UPDATE 06/22

 

did some more work

 

 

- screenshot gallery animated (top right): shows shots for system

- custom controller info animated (xbox, psx, nintendo style)

- did a custom outline sketch animation (bottom right): shows an outline of the system

- finetuning of arrangments and positions

- misc. details (vigniette, logo background, ..., ...)

 

 

things to do:

 

- short system info (manufacturer, year, system type, generation etc.):

  i'm thinking some kind of icons for those infos, like little buttons with a year numer or a "gen3" or something similiar

- sound fx

 

im going to integrate the theme via the excellent hyperspin cinematic script/code (thanks and shoutouts to James Baker)

 

thats it for now.

 

have a good one

 

cheers tim

 

 

 

 

credits go to:

 

-dark13: wheel images

-AA VFX for animated background (https://www.youtube....er/dvdangor2011)

[SkyHighGam3r]

I'm not a fan of all the text and history info, etc. That's just all personal preference though ( You can see how simplistic my themes are )

That being said, the art, animations, layout, and color schemes all look great so far. I'd love to see more of this as it evolves.

[gigapig]

Really nice, anyone would think it was a different front end.

[xALPHAxOMEGAx]

beautiful work :] 

[tcmt]

UPDATE 06/24

 

 

first let me thank you for all your feedback and kind words! i appreciate it alot

 

 

here is whats new:

 

 

- added sound effects and music (not to sure about that one for now)

- added some short info (release year, console gen etc.)

- as always finetuning

 

this is probably now close to completion. at least for my initial vision. 

 

 

so next i converted the theme to a new system (changed colours, pictures, animations etc.) and here is what came from that

 

 

lastly i patched together a quick setup and integrated the themes into hyperspin via the excelent "cinematic code" (hyperspin cinematic). did a quick recording of that too. so here is what it looks in hyperspin itself at the moment (NOTE!: the audio and framerate are quite glitchy on this recording. that doesnt happen with hyperspin itself. its just that my screen capture software probably isn't very good)

 

 

 

next is probably just going to convert the preset to all kinds of systems...

 

 

thats it for now. feedback is, as always, greatly appreciated. and thanks for all your time!

 

have a good one

cheers

tim 

[tcmt]

*edit sorry double post for some reason

[ninja2bceen]

How did you do this?

[tcmt]

How did you do this?

 

the whole "trick" is to use james baker's awesome hyperspin cinematic intergration of full hd videos into hyperspin.

 

so basically i just design, create and render a composition like this:

 

 

 

next is use james bakers method of create a "cinematic path"

(for info on that here is his video [all credit goes to james baker for his excellent work]):

 

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtLYPToFotA)

 

finally i create a theme with hypertheme using my "cinematic path" and put everything in place.

[relic]

looks awesome when can we have a download pack of them all in 1 that would make my day

[thatman84]

That's fairly amazing from zero in a month or so!!

[tcmt]

looks awesome when can we have a download pack of them all in 1 that would make my day

 

well if there is genuine interest, i guess whenever (or if at all) i'm done at some point with the main menu. one thing to note tho: i'm probably just going to release the mp4's. so everyone can create their own .swf for theming (see james bakers hyperspin cinematic on how to do that)

[tcmt]

UPDATE 06/26

 

n64 and psx version:

 

 

 

 

also redid the outline sketch animation of the consoles on all previous themes. found a better looking way (which is also quicker! yay)

 

cheers

tim

[imdavid555]

Wow these look amazing! +1 on making a pack!

 

On the bottom left, could we get EU, US, and JAP release years aswell? 

[tcmt]

UPDATE 07/03

 

started working on the system menus. here is what i got:

 

first a capture of what hyperspin looks like atm for me (shows the system menus in action):

(sorry for the mouse cursor on screen. it was a long day)

 

 

next the individual mp4 i used to create the cinematic videos:

 

 

 

 

as you can see, i try to continue the HTPC-feel on the sub-menus (system menus). meaning a universal look with lots of info and stuff.

it's overall fairly customizable, for example the white gradient that runs over the screenshot-collage in the background can be changed to darker colour for other systems.

lots of work is to be done tho, like tons of finetuning to make this look nice (the colours don't always work together as of yet and there are tons of visual glitches).

 

but overall i got my presets ready to apply to all the systems and games. and i think the overall look of the theme is established by now.

 

cheers all, have a good one!

tim

[tcmt]

Wow these look amazing! +1 on making a pack!

 

On the bottom left, could we get EU, US, and JAP release years aswell? 

 

 

for the main menu i might add all the release dates. for game themes probably not, as they took enough time already. 

one thing i might do tho is to just release my aftereffects files, so everyone (that has access to AE) can modify my "presets" the way they like and make their own cinematic videos/paths this way. 

Thank you for your feedback. It's very appreciated!

[tcmt]

UPDATE 07/04

 

some more work on the system menus (mostly finetuning)

 

-changed the system logo overlay (top left)

-changed wheel background bar colour slighly and added a slight gradient

-added a custom arrow animation for the wheel

-animated the rest of the artwork

-hopefully fixed a visual glitch that happens when you change games

 

 

feedback always welcome. cheers!

 

tim

[tcmt]

need some feedback guys. which one? with or without glow?

 

without glow:

 

 

with glow:

 

 

 

might seem insignificant for some but i'm really struggling to choose what looks better. hope you guys can help.

 

cheers

tim

[gigapig]

Tricky but I think without, I like the dots doing around and the glow detracts from that.

[BiLbOBaggins]

need some feedback guys. which one? with or without glow?

 

might seem insignificant for some but i'm really struggling to choose what looks better. hope you guys can help.

 

cheers

tim

Tim, I prefer the glow.

 

Really nice work!

[Styphelus]

These are really nice, unlike those "other" cinematic themes.

 

The only thing I'm not crazy about is the background music.

 

Well done!

[BakerMan]

These are really nice, unlike those "other" cinematic themes.

 

The only thing I'm not crazy about is the background music.

 

Well done!

I'd like for you and I to have lunch together.

 

I think we could be really good friends.

 

  

 

(That's me patting you on the head)

[tcmt]

UPDATE 07/07

 

ps2 version

 

 

psp version

 

 

 

now that i did a sketch of my sub-menu design and saw that main-menu and sub-menu styles kind of work together, i'll continue and finish up the main menu first, before i put more work in the sub menu themes. i made a list of 16 systems i want to cover. after that i might make additional ones if there is interest. 

 

on another note, if anyone's got some knowledge or skill on automation in after effects (replace footage, text etc. with info from a ods or xml [kind of what dark13 and billy do], let me know, i know there are some AE scripts (that cost money) but im really not the most talented when it comes to things like that.

 

cheers

 

ps.: i personally really like those "other" cinematic skins