Hey OhhNoYouNintenDidnt,
Thanks for the feedback. Most of those issues were born out of, ahh, a lack of time? I'm trying to fit these in with my regular job, so I've developed a workflow that is kind of quick. it mostly works fine for me and my needs, but I'm seeing I need to pay attention to the details a little more. Obviously, as when you do work for yourself you can get away from imperfections, but as always, when it's for the larger crowd, it needs perfection.
With my short time frame to work on them, mainly I was trying to hit the biggest offenders. I do want to contribute though, because I've made great use of this resource and would like to give back.
I'm going to work on the cover that banisher supplied and see if I can't get a better impression from you guys. :p
Tell me about it man, fitting in doing these to the very high standards necessary......around the real damned world (why dont people understand it takes times and so leave you the hell alone!?!? ha ha), and you are totally right about the difference between what you can accept when youre just making them for yourself and THEN when you realise how bad they are when a get into making them for the community!........man, my early covers are EMBARRASSING!! and I am slowly going back to them to get them up to the standards that I now HAVE to make them too every time (even for myself.
).
But as I said, those standards only came from people here pointing out the little details I used to either skip or miss.........in the end, of course, it takes a lot of time and effort to go for perfection (when you cant just dedicated huge blocks of time to them) but ultimately it feels great to know that you have produced something fellow community members want/need and that it is the best possible version of it available ANYWHERE!
And you have also started out doing this for the same reasons as I did, which is that feeling that you have gained/benefited so much from the guys here that you want to start giving back!
I should be able to clean it up really nice, but it'll just take a little more time then I have been giving to them. I'm going to do some research to see what I can do about fixing the halftone on the images. I'm not a big fan of the blur/median/noise reduction methods in Photoshop. I really started looking closer at some of the other covers people have done. With the methods that people use, it works, but it also leaves this certain look to the image that I'm not always excited about. That's when you're viewing it up close though. Printed out, I hardly notice. - I wish I had the time to just recreate the artwork, ha, but that'd take forever and a half.
Each to their own man, so long as the issues look of them is ultimately great and the cover admins are happy to have them hosted on THEIR website (which is the ultimate reason for the high standards, as poor quality covers on this site, being the most reliable, comprehensive and well know and respected cover site in the world for games........reflects on them/the site's reputation if they are a bit ropey and not looking like people put full effort into them), then all its all good!
Here's the Faceball cover. I noticed a few things I can clean up, but I've got to work on some other things so I'll have to set it aside for now. Let me know what you think!
I developed a method for reducing the halftone pattern that seems to work well and produce smoother results.
Now I think I'm going to have to buy this game too, hehe. I did make the cover, sooo might as well put it to use. :p
Faceball cover
Looks better, and I like the new method for reducing the grainey/moire effect..........but there are still quite a few areas that need cleaning up, do you want me to be specific? (dont want to patronise you if you are aware of them but just didnt have time to address them, ha ha) so you can see PRECISELY what we are talking about here?
Let me know and I shall get really specific like how under the spine logo there is a faint red bar that obviously should not be there and between a lot of the white lettering on the back there are little flecks of "stuff" all over.........there is more, ha ha, sorry.
Anyway, really glad you have taken all this so well and am willing to work with us to get these up to the standards.........to be honest, and if you think about, it would be pretty crap to put all the effort and time you are doing.......only to have them not go anywhere/be hosted on the site for the whole world to easily see/access/use for the sake of a few more details being sorted out.
Many thanks man, look forward to tackling the missing covers list with you!
