Unified system art Project

[SIMPLYAUSTIN]

Me being a Widescreen user it can be very frustrating getting everything together without it all looking squished. Almost every bit of the official art is 4:3 which is great if you have a cab. But lets face it, we all aint, and even those who do, still many use the 16:9 screens. Its easy enough to use bezels etc, but to get all the art to match, fit and most of all look good can be a pain. So here we are...

Im thinking I start putting together some sets. Sets of art for systems that are all complete (as can be), all sized already and set up so that all the user needs to do is drag and drop straight into the Hyperspin folders. Keep it all organized so that no one has to scour the entire internet just to get scraps from here and there. Not only that, but I want to pick the most popular style of art and have everything match that as close as possible.... whilst also keeping to a kind of global art style. Probably the best one to work with at the moment is the "Unified Megatheme".

I dont want just some random boxes slapped in there, with some random carts. Its all has to match the overall theme. Everything sized perfect and set the same in every theme. This is so the whole thing flows and looks more professional.

I know its no small task as art seems to be EVERYWHERE! Everything that we sync and everyhting that we use always comes from a 4:3 background. Dif variations of art etc etc etc. What I want to do is make the best sets available so we all have great looking systems without spending 4 years collecting the bits for it.

If we work together, we all profit from this. Sharing is caring!!!

One thing I will say. This is not packs for people to just leech and never give nothing back. You will have to have memberships at both here and Emumovies to take full advantage of these. (I dont get any money, but I hate leechers )

Here is a start and an example.The Sony Playstation. Theres still a long way to go with this. But as this system is soo large, its best to get an early start on it.

If I get any interest from this, I will make a thread for each system. We can all work together, pull together and share. Compile the best art we can have and then set it free into the world for us all to dance like the first day of spring

So write back what you think. Lets spray some of these ideas around and see if we can get our machines looking the way we want them (without doing everything the hard way)

Each system will have everything made for it. Its own...

Letters

Themes

Fades

Bezels

Box art

Cart/Disc art

Settings ini (Game names in correct font and size, shape and colour)

Controls

etc etc etc

All set up for the Widescreen lovers

Austin

[Styphelus]

I've thought about this but with BBB back and working on hyperspin again, I've decided to put any widescreen work on hold. It would be nice if someone would give us any direction of this and what the future holds.

Widescreen or not, it would be nice to have all that stuff in one place. Why not do this, have a 4:3 versions and a widescreen version. Once we can get everything for each system in 4:3. we can convert everything to 16:9.

[SIMPLYAUSTIN]

I know what you mean, but to be honest, Im thinking the new version of HS will be years rather than months (only my opinion and not complaining). And o be honest I want iot looking good before then. hehe

Yeah to be honest, I keep everything I do as...

Original Size - Mass folder with all art collected as it was

Same Size - 4:3 version that fits the themes

Widescreen resize - Sized to fit the theme on 16:9

It would not be hard to release both 4:3 version and 16:9 versions. The only thing that would need changing would be if the theme was an original 16:9 theme. But I cant see any issues with this. I remember Awakened did this with his theme.

The main point form this would be to have everything uniformal and complete as possible. Everything matching throughout the systems but individual to each system. Example all box art the same size, cart art etc etc etc.

Just the way HS should look.... professional and not a jumbled mess

[bclout]

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Current HS community challenges

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Thanks for starting this discussion. I am a relatively new member, so please take that into account. A couple of things about how this community works became more clear after reading this and the other the thread about the Hyperspin Project:

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-Official projects are run by a couple of individuals each, with the highest level of quality and skills and they can take years or are never finished/lost when interest is lost. They are done in secret, and some do not report their progress in detail much.

-FTP: is/was a mess to go through, but has great collections. However, directories can be deleted and be gone forever. The FTP is not intended to really share collections, other than those WIP by its members.

-Hypersync: Great system, very usefull to me, but is not updated or sporadically updated by 1 person. Not all types of art is available.

-Hyperbase live: in development, might be useful when finished, but not sure.

-Forum threads: lot of art work posted because of cooperative members of this awesome community, but how do you know you have everything? Or the newest? Also there are some great initiatives and alternatives started by members (HyperMamu, tools and utilities, Dougans C64, Unified themes, Controller images, etc. to name a few).

-Mega-links to great artwork, being dead and lost forever.

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However, the questions remain the same for me as a new member: where to get the art work for system x? Is it complete (as possible)? Is there more? Are people working on it? How far are they? What is missing? Are there alternatives now available?

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I got this idea from the other forum and links with your idea: how about making an Artpack thread for each system? With mega-links. Even if the link dies, a request for re-upload in the same thread can be sufficient, as the artwork has been shared with a lot of people in the mean time.

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Proposal:

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Thread title: [ARTPACK][uNOFFICIAL] System

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Database XML from source x with y games with naming convention N – link

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System theme – link

System theme alt – link

System theme alt 2 - link

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Wheels pack (not bordered) 80 of y games (80%) – link

Wheels pack (bordered)

Wheels pack (carbon)..etc

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Game themes 45 of y games (50%) - link

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Cart 2D

Cart 3D…etc (with some example pics?)

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You get the idea. Members can check what they have in their system, and download the missing stuff. Or post a new pack if they have more than what was posted (apparently something was missing). If it does not exists, the missing artwork is created / tracked at the other more specific threads.

That is also true for the database XML. You can post your own alternative XML with corresponding art work.

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Now members only have to go through one forum thread of the system they are interested in, and have a higher chance that they will find what they need and be up to date.

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Also some packs will not have the highest quality, but that will be up to each members`opinion to pass on it. Those members will have to wait for the official projects to finish. So no rules on quality, just one rule: share!

I think this will let the community grow and also invite more members to participate in making artwork. Looking at myself, I would like to make artwork, but I will never reach the required level needed in the official projects, for sure.

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My two cents…*

[SIMPLYAUSTIN]

Hehe, its a lot more than two cents I kind of agree and disagree with lots of it. A load of questions there, far too may for me to answer in this one thread and many with topics covered plenty of times in various threads around here.

First thing to point out. Im not just doing this to share a bunch of art for a system. Its the complete opposite It s bunch of art that matches the flow of the widescreen theme. Everything made to match and all of the best standard.

Secondly sharing. Yes I love to share and see no problem. I do agree that considering this place is sposed to be the hub for Hyperspin, its often the hardest place to find some of the best art thats out there. Hypersync has an update around once every 1-2 years, often half finished and most of the art that is made in projects does not seem to see the light of day. For themes, bezels, fades etc this place is amazing. A great bunch of artists knock them out almost daily to the highest standards and share almost right away. Cant thank them enough! However the way you seem to like it shared seems to be the way of "The French Site". There is loads of art over there. But when you make a system from it.... your system looks like a dogs dinner. Nothing matches and lots of mistakes... may aswell start from scratch the time it takes.

thridly... The art is to go with a theme. It wont have bordered, non borederd. Its will all go together and at best come in one of only two styles... Widescreen or 4:3. Thats the whole point of this thread? I dont want to share a thousand dif variations of SNES carts. I want o share one... resized to fit a certain theme in a style to fit the boxes, which are also sized tothe same specs for all the themes on the system. All place holders in the theme in the correct place due to its size and shape... etc etc etc. A complete setup of the most clean style. Put together by everyone, worked on by everyine to look the best it can.

Fourthly....Mega... not for me Im afriad. If its somehting I dont want HS to be in trouble for... example sharing a rom etc I will post from a Mega etc. But in terms of art etc... all done through the FTP. I dont get any money from anything to do with this place, hell Im not even an admin and have no sway around this place at all. But what I do, do is respect that you must be a member to help the community. So no Mega from me

My 2 cents

[dark13]

Austin, do you know how to use photoshop batches? I can give you a quick lesson trought teamviever if you want. Basically all you need to do to convert artwork to 16:9 is batching an image resize to 75% on X axis and launch it on a whole folder. If you want to keep spinning animations for cd and other stuff with the correct ratio... well, for that you need to create animated gif or import frames in flash to create a swf (in flash you cannot batch stuff like this). When using different aspect ratio SWFs are MUCH better than PNGs, so here's scripts for flash pro to convert PNGs into SWFs http://www.hyperspin-fe.com/forum/showthread.php?37342-Batching-PNGs-into-SWFs

For letterset I created a template http://www.hyperspin-fe.com/forum/showthread.php?38002-Letterset-template-for-hyperspin-%28variables-and-batch%29 . Just choose your font and layer option, export variables as files, batch a psd to png conversion and you're done. Letterset ACCEPT renaming trick, so you can convert them to .sfw and rename them with .png extension.

[SIMPLYAUSTIN]

That would be great Dark. I can do the batch thing with a few tools that I have. So for the normal art such as Wheel and box I can do that in a Jiffy. I just batch the width down to 75% of original size. As for CD's I thought I may have been stuck, so all I have been doing is resizing them.... does it have much impact the ratio?? im not sure, very confusing with spinning going on... carts I know just need the ratio.

As for .swf files.... Im lost then it comes to this. I know that the resize is much better. But Im not sure how to convert. Best option would be to make everything to the best size possible and then covert to .swf for usage??? I get lost with that one

[relic]

cool good job austin

[bclout]

Dogs dinner :-) yeah i guess that's not far from the truth. But i am one that likes the art to be over the top. I welcome your great initiative btw and wish you good luck. There are and have been great additions to the hyperspin project, and this will become one of them. I am finishing a bartop with a 4:3 monitor, but will keep a lookout when i will start work my normal pc with a widescreen. Cheers mate

[DamnedRegistrations]

Your PS1 preview vid there contains Cyrano's project boxes. Not supposed to be shared, remember? Though of course nothing is stopping you but there might be some unhappy folks

I have all my artwork widescreen fixed too. Lots of Photoshop batch jobs shrinking to 75%.

[SIMPLYAUSTIN]

Yep, understood and not done. I even touched base with a certain person and Im having talks. Thats another story

I do however have 4 Dif versions of this set. Qualiy is spot on. Im just tryong to go through at the moment to match US to US games, PAL with PAL and JAPs etc. I seem to have all the art bar 14 covers. 5 if I cheat and use other regions from the XML. It will take me a while to go through by hand but we will get there. But if all goes well we won need any of that PS1 id just a example I used as at the moment its the onlyu one I have worked on since my update of HLHQ, art wise.

Yeah, Im going through my sets at the moment. Resize and gathering as much art as possible ready for this. I will open a thread for each system, show the art, see if anyone has better or can make better. Then its a case of everyone teaming up to share, get everything matching, resize and package.

Be nice to have the best possible art all matching for each system

What system would anyone like to start on??

[EDIT]: I made the call and started on N64. Just getting all my stuff together now. I will open up threads with all the info etc to get this started.

[dark13]

If you use a spinning animation in HS on an resized artwork here's what you'll get during rotation

For flash swfs, you actually do not need to resize artworks into flash, what improve artworks on a 16:9 screen is the "smooth" flag in flash. I did some tests on my 1360*768 screeen and asked some theme makers to test the thing on a 1080p screen, the results are basically the same when an artwork is resized in flash or pre-resized in photoshop. All you need to do is install flash, launch my script and point to a folder of pre-resized .pngs, the script will automatically convert them in .swf using "smooth" option. Just one suggestion... test them. My flash 5.5 seems to have some problems so i moved to flash cc13. Some months ago it worked flawlessy so i guess some incompatibility with other softwares arise at a certain point (damn, I really need to reinstall OS)

[ePro.Dark.Angel]

This seems like a really good idea, would be nice to have a decent 16x9 set for us HTPC users, and one unified theme seems like the most professional way to go, was going to go the Kodi and Advanced Launcher route to get uniformity, but missed all the bells and whistles of HyperSpin, plus the artwork when done properly is second to none, some really talented artists on this forum, I myself have no skills in that field so rely on shared efforts. Hopefully these see the light of day, and at least the default main menu items get completed. I think if you can get PlayStation completed the rest should be fairy easy, as you say that set is massive 1000 plus games.

[SIMPLYAUSTIN]

If you use a spinning animation in HS on an resized artwork here's what you'll get during rotation

For flash swfs, you actually do not need to resize artworks into flash, what improve artworks on a 16:9 screen is the "smooth" flag in flash. I did some tests on my 1360*768 screeen and asked some theme makers to test the thing on a 1080p screen, the results are basically the same when an artwork is resized in flash or pre-resized in photoshop. All you need to do is install flash, launch my script and point to a folder of pre-resized .pngs, the script will automatically convert them in .swf using "smooth" option. Just one suggestion... test them. My flash 5.5 seems to have some problems so i moved to flash cc13. Some months ago it worked flawlessy so i guess some incompatibility with other softwares arise at a certain point (damn, I really need to reinstall OS)

Ah... now I think Im starting to get it. It doesnt spin as if an egg would look like spinning. But instead the art stretches as it meets the horizontal extremity points on either side, warping the picture in real time. Hmmmm interesting! So by converting it into .swf that would get rid if that error??? Yes, Im very much interested in a way to quickly change all the art in a folder to .swf

#i have Adobe Flash Pro CS6, however I have little or no experience in making this happen.

This seems like a really good idea, would be nice to have a decent 16x9 set for us HTPC users, and one unified theme seems like the most professional way to go, was going to go the Kodi and Advanced Launcher route to get uniformity, but missed all the bells and whistles of HyperSpin, plus the artwork when done properly is second to none, some really talented artists on this forum, I myself have no skills in that field so rely on shared efforts. Hopefully these see the light of day, and at least the default main menu items get completed. I think if you can get PlayStation completed the rest should be fairy easy, as you say that set is massive 1000 plus games.

Just going to make my way through the systems. Making sure that everyone has the best setup for each set. People dont have to have skills to help out. they just need to be able to share what they have and their point of view on how they like things to look. Be great to get all this smashed, as Im using this myself so I have a personal interest in this. Please feel free to get involved!!!

[THK]

-Official projects are run by a couple of individuals each, with the highest level of quality and skills and they can take years or are never finished/lost when interest is lost. They are done in secret, and some do not report their progress in detail much.

I hate the word secret on this, but yes, the are not visible to the general public, but there are reasons for this.

-FTP: is/was a mess to go through, but has great collections. However, directories can be deleted and be gone forever. The FTP is not intended to really share collections, other than those WIP by its members.\

Yes, the ftp is often not used as intended. Everything in the Gold section needs to be updated manually, and we've been lacking the members with the time/effort/energy to keep it up to date (take in mind, this has often been done by 1 person only), and after a while it has become more daunting to do. This all resulted in the ftp being far from optimal.

The ftp is going to change though. It won't be along in it current for for long if all goes according to plan.

Great system, very useful to me, but is not updated or sporadically updated by 1 person. Not all types of art is available.

-Hyperbase live: in development, might be useful when finished, but not sure.

The person who created HyperSync has left our community and not in a very pleasant way. HyperSync is there to bridge the gap until HyperBase Live works as intended. HBL will have an easier way for us to keep things up to date and is getting rid of some of the limitations of HSync.

Forum threads: lot of art work posted because of cooperative members of this awesome community, but how do you know you have everything? Or the newest? Also there are some great initiatives and alternatives started by members (HyperMamu, tools and utilities, Dougans C64, Unified themes, Controller images, etc. to name a few).

However, the questions remain the same for me as a new member: where to get the art work for system x? Is it complete (as possible)? Is there more? Are people working on it? How far are they? What is missing? Are there alternatives now available?

You will never have everything as HS is in constant development. Things that get announced can take a while to get released. New systems are added all the time, etc etc.

Frankly, I doubt anyone would actually want everything, but yes some manual labor is involved to figure things out. That's just the way it is, and this is mostly due to the constant additions of new things.

-Mega-links to great artwork, being dead and lost forever.

I got this idea from the other forum and links with your idea: how about making an Artpack thread for each system? With mega-links. Even if the link dies, a request for re-upload in the same thread can be sufficient, as the artwork has been shared with a lot of people in the mean time.

No mega links! We will remove it from threads/posts/signatures, in case of repeated violations, ban(s) will follow. We not going to allow this ever. Whatever good reasons you come up with, it's just not going to fly.

If people want to share things on their own sites, fine, though we prefer not to, is up to them and we can't stop them anyway.

Proposal: ..................

You are free to do this. If you want to start threads on all systems and keep the threads up to date, go ahead. But frankly, I think none of us are eager to jump on this administrative task.

Also some packs will not have the highest quality, but that will be up to each members`opinion to pass on it. Those members will have to wait for the official projects to finish. So no rules on quality, just one rule: share!

I'm sorry but

I think this will let the community grow and also invite more members to participate in making artwork. Looking at myself, I would like to make artwork, but I will never reach the required level needed in the official projects, for sure.

It will not let the community grow, most ppl are perfectly happy not to contribute anything or contribute in another way than artwork creation.

BUT if you want to do artwork, don't be scared (of the big bad harsh monsters like me), there are plenty of ppl willing to help. Most artwork creation doesn't require much if any talent, it mostly requires one to know how to use the proper tools, and this can be learned.

Trust me, you can easily spend just as much time on something that will turn out looking like nothing when just going about things (as will happen with no quality standard) as doing some of the high level shit we do (kuch.. ego... kuch). Just start out simple and build your way up to the level that you're satisfied with, we don't all have to redraw complex crap (but it is fun though!)

Just start with simple stuff, listen to the advice given by others aaaand, don't have too long toes, if you're easily offended, this (or the internet in general) just isn;t the place for you

[zero dreams]

Damn... I'm easily offended. I think I'll go now.

[bclout]

I am not easily offended, just pretty useless at the moment [emoji6] tnx for sharing your thoughts (and dedicating a huge amount of your time to this) cheers

[dark13]

Ah... now I think Im starting to get it. It doesnt spin as if an egg would look like spinning. But instead the art stretches as it meets the horizontal extremity points on either side, warping the picture in real time. Hmmmm interesting! So by converting it into .swf that would get rid if that error??? Yes, Im very much interested in a way to quickly change all the art in a folder to .swf

#i have Adobe Flash Pro CS6, however I have little or no experience in making this happen.

Not exactly... the problem is the circle is "warped" in photoshop or flash to match 16:9, so it's 75% on X and 100% on Y, when rotated 90° it will still be 75% on X and 100% on Y but with a 90° rotation the Y will take the place of X Even in flash if you use a 16:9 correction on the artwork it will mantain that costrain on X axis while rotating, so you will not see a circle in HS. To animate a perfect circle in HS at 16:9 you need to create the animation's frames in photoshop (you can batch it, I think it is even possible to create a gif with a batch) then import the frames in flash and create your animation OR import the .gif in flash to make a swf. The problem is this is a time-consuming process and there are thousands cds artwork so my suggestion is to simply AVOID artworks spinning in 16:9 themes If you prepare a spinning animation for a theme in swf, well, it's doable, but preparing, let's say, 1000+ animated cd artwork for ps1/ps2 would be a freaking nightmare. I can teach you how to make this kind of animations but believe me, the final result does not worth the time you would need to throw in it

[SIMPLYAUSTIN]

Now I get you. You have to alter each frame to compensate for the widescreen distortion which will appear once resized. Jeeeez, my head hurts just thinking about it. To be honst I dont think its too bad the way it does it at te moment, as due to it being so smooth, I think you would have to use a ruler to notice unless the image used was the size of the screen.

Converting all art (other than spinning discs) I think is the way to go with this one. Keeps the quality right?