Transfer one idea to the next theme

[SpykSaturn]

Wasn't sure where to post this so I figured this would be a safe place. I have a theme for the Saturn I believe I got from Austin. It is for the Sega Saturn. One thing in particular I like about it is the spinning disc going into the box. I can not for the life of me seem to track it down and transfer it over to the Sega CD. Could anyone tell me where that SWF file would be located or if it's even transferable from console so console? I was lucky enough to find some great Sega CD artwork on here. Now I would just like to manipulate it to do what I would like. Plan on redoing the boxes to look more like a jewel case but other than that I am loving what I have found. Thanks guys!!

[Rowr14]

I'm not sure I follow 100 percent what you are trying to do but i'll explain some of whats going on and you can give me feedback based on that?

HyperTheme is a program that comes with the hyperspin install that you can use to create themes, you can open themes other people have made and check out how they have put them together. (Just remember the files need to be stored in a zip file, and when I say stored they need to be stored not compressed or they wont open in hypertheme.)

In hypertheme there is a variety of animations and effects you can apply to images. I would guess he is applying the spinning effect to the cd artwork.

Honestly I think it was the same effect in that video that got me enquiring and involved in this malarky, here is the first theme I made when I was working it out.

Try opening that up in hypertheme and having a play around and you will start to understand what you need to do. If you want help with this project I am happy to help as I wouldn't mind a Sega Cd theme with spinning discs.

Remember if you get an error saying it cant parse the xml when you open a theme, rezip the theme with the compression set to 'store' and try again.

[SpykSaturn]

Ahh very cool. I haven't messed around with hypertheme too much but good to know these things are reverse engineer-able. Thanks for the tip

 

[SpykSaturn]

So when I try to open I get an error that says error parsing zip. 

[SpykSaturn]

Good news. Didn't need to reverse engineer it. Program is pretty awesome. Only question I would have is do I need to do this for every game?

[Rowr14]

1 hour ago, SpykSaturn said:

So when I try to open I get an error that says error parsing zip. 

Yeh I was afraid of that. As I said you will need to rezip the contents to a zip file and set it to store.

47 minutes ago, SpykSaturn said:

Good news. Didn't need to reverse engineer it. Program is pretty awesome. Only question I would have is do I need to do this for every game?

There are tutorials around for this program somewhere. Basically you can make the theme for whatever you want.

If you make them per system, you check a box on the left in hypertheme that doesn't include the image for the artwork layer. That makes the theme pull whatever images are stored in the same Artwork numbered folder in your hyperspin media folders that correlate to the game name in the xml. That's how the box art, disc art etc is 'pulled'.

Or you can make themes per game if you desire, there are thousands made for Arcade games in particular.

If you are trying to replicate the saturn theme you mentioned to a sega cd theme, it's likely just a case of changing the background and header art and letting the program pull the images provided they are the same size.

Anyway, searching for tutorials for hypertheme or tinkering around is the best way to learn.

[SpykSaturn]

Hmm thanks for the help I am almost there. The only issue I am having at the moment is finding that button you were speaking of.

[SpykSaturn]

Is it the button that says don't include in output?

 

[Rowr14]

Here.

Just a warning, this program can be very unstable and buggy. Some effects will sort of break or crash it. Sometimes what the program displays is different than what you will see with the final theme.

It's definitely worth checking some tutorials.

[SpykSaturn]

Yeah see I tried that and its doing great with the box art but not so well with the CDs. Haven't had much luck finding good tutorials. 

[Rowr14]

That said there is some cool stuff you can do and if you think outside the box you can do some neat stuff.

A few things you will find handy

- play with the video options, you can have the video display under the art and wheel layers. Also you can add a separate image as a video frame. 

- the artwork layers will layer over each other from 1 - 4 so plan which art you want where, also there is a button to switch artwork layers (which occasionally causes me to need to restart the program, but anyway). The video will by default layer over the first artwork layer but not the next 3 i think, so you can use that to your advantage.

[SpykSaturn]

I take that back I found good tutorials but I was able to figure it out before looking. My problem is I hit that button and it doesn't want to load. I also had a problem with any artwork from file 2 showing up regardless of clicking the button so I switched around some files for the art. 

[Rowr14]

Yeh unfortunately sometimes it just gets confused or whatever and artwork layers lock up and all you can do is restart.

Your best bet is to load up themes that you like how they work and see how they are doing things. Then when you create your own theme try and put it together in simple steps adding the layers without clicking around too much and save in case it crashes.

It's worth mentioning you can edit the theme.xml that saves in the zip file to get 100 percent accuracy. Once you understand what is going on you can edit most of the theme in the xml and just use hypertheme to check some stuff. Also make sure you are loading your theme up in hyperspin, as I said sometimes hypertheme shows different to the output. You can actually drag out the xml file edit it and put it back in the zip and then just reselect the wheel in hyperspin to see changes in real time.

[SpykSaturn]

Still getting that same error even after rezipping it... man this is frustrating. 

[Rowr14]

here I will take another screen shot, I banged my head for a while trying to work that one out.

[SpykSaturn]

Looking at the .xml and it all seems to be in order from what I can see. Now that does not mean I am right lol. There may be some key phrase but it all looks to be in order. 

[Rowr14]

Open your zip, when you drag the file in there you will get this, select the store option from the drop down.

Best to drag everything out of the zip, select it all and zip it too '...' then name it and select the store option same place. If one of the files in there is compressed it wont open it and you will get the parse error.

[SpykSaturn]

We are in business now! We look real good. Thank you!!!

[thatman84]

FYI I could never get 7z to store the files and work with HT. Always have to use WinRar. Although I hardly use HT.

theres no solid guides on the site iirc. One handy thing was Jhabers created some reference blank video flv files for use with building themes. iirc there's an issue with saving/displaying or loading mp4's in HT. 

[Rowr14]

3 hours ago, thatman84 said:

FYI I could never get 7z to store the files and work with HT. Always have to use WinRar. Although I hardly use HT.

theres no solid guides on the site iirc. One handy thing was Jhabers created some reference blank video flv files for use with building themes. iirc there's an issue with saving/displaying or loading mp4's in HT. 

I think you can rename the .mp4s over to .flv in file explorer to get them to work nowdays. There may be more of a trick to this though, maybe you need vlc installed or something.

But yeh the program is finicky with video.

[SpykSaturn]

I actually just downloaded a test video and put it in the video file of the theme I was creating. Seemed to work fine. I made sure the demo video was a .flv. Suggestion if you do that though, don't get Test Strips..... it has that awful noise that goes with it. 

[Rowr14]

41 minutes ago, SpykSaturn said:

I actually just downloaded a test video and put it in the video file of the theme I was creating. Seemed to work fine. I made sure the demo video was a .flv. Suggestion if you do that though, don't get Test Strips..... it has that awful noise that goes with it. 

Haha, yeh get a test file you can deal with the music and sound for long periods of time without losing your mind for sure.

[SpykSaturn]

So you inspired me to mess around a bit and I played around with the tool and up scaling as well. Really learning a lot with gimp. I want to give some wheel art another shot now as well and start making them look shiny with some gradients. Thanks again for the help. Truly inspired as all can be right now. 

[Rowr14]

Awesome! Glad I could help.

Looking forward to seeing your stuff!