My small collection

[Moviefan2k4]

No covers on mine yet, since I have to tweak most of them in Photoshop (and even overhaul a few)...but here's my NES collection cased up.

Why would you need to tweak or overhaul them? I already did that, they're good to go.    lol

I measured the cases myself, multiple times...and your sizes are off. The correct dimensions for the inserts are 11 & 9/16 by 6 & 15/16 inches, or 3470 x 2080 pixels. Because of this, I've been building my own templates, transplanting your work with mostly-slight modifications.

[e_brugal]

No covers on mine yet, since I have to tweak most of them in Photoshop (and even overhaul a few)...but here's my NES collection cased up.

Why would you need to tweak or overhaul them? I already did that, they're good to go.    lol

I measured the cases myself, multiple times...and your sizes are off. The correct dimensions for the inserts are 11 & 9/16 by 6 & 15/16 inches, or 3470 x 2080 pixels. Because of this, I've been building my own templates, transplanting your work with mostly-slight modifications.

For CGC or UGC?

[Moviefan2k4]

For CGC or UGC?

Custom Game Cases, made by Shadowfox.

[Grim-83]

@MovieFan2K4 I like your cases as they are  but many of the cases on here are for UGC and should be ready to print right off, like I have

[Grim-83]

second attempt at storing my PSP, this time in cases the same size.

[Moviefan2k4]

@MovieFan2K4 I like your cases as they are   but many of the cases on here are for UGC and should be ready to print right off, like I have

I'm a real stickler for details; it comes with having an obsessive personality due partly to Asperger's. As a result, I often tweak whatever cover I download to fit the case better, instead of having it shift around. The biggest problem I've come across is that Shadowfox's cases have wider panels, and slightly different spines than the Universal cases. For a CGC, the panels are 5 & 1/4 inches wide, and the spines are 1 & 1/16 inches. That totals 11 & 9/16.

[e_brugal]

For CGC or UGC?

Custom Game Cases, made by Shadowfox.

That's weird, because I modified Captain skyhawk to make it look as the retail one, no dimensions altered, and print it and it was perfect

[Moviefan2k4]

The recent CGC covers are 3430 x 2100, which is about 1/16 inches too tall and about 1.5 mm too short. I know that seems unimportant at first glance, but if you don't want your covers shifting around the measurements should be exact as possible. I learned a long time ago, not to trust most manufacturer's insert dimensions for their cases; every cover I made wound up being sized wrong after printing. I went through all the chaos, with printer settings and different resolutions...wasting some money and a lot of time before finally doing the numbers myself. I found one of Shadowfox's cases at a gaming convention this past summer; my recent order confirmed they're identical. I used a standard ruler and a pencil, with a couple of sheets of paper...folding each one to get the snuggest fit with no bunching or wrinkles. Once I get my paper from Red River next week, I'll print off a revamped cover to show you the results.

[sheep2001]

1.5mm too tall, and 1.5mm too short at the same time. Mmmmm....ok.


A small difference in size allows for any tolerances involved in the manufacturing process.  Do you reprint all your retail Dvds, blu rays, and games?  As there are similar tolerances involved for those.  Also, depending on who manufactured the DVD case you could be looking at a lot more than 1.5mm difference from case to case.

[Moviefan2k4]

No, I said 1.5 mm too short, and 1/16 inch too tall. That height difference is negligible I guess, if you want part of your artwork going past the clear sleeve. My main concern is the width, because it offsets the spine and shifts the cover around in the case. Movie studios do this all the time, but their covers can be as much as a quarter-inch too small in that regard...which annoys the hell out of me.

Another thing I stumbled across with some of the CGC covers, is the poor scans for some of the back panels. The text looks blurry, those moire patterns are all over the place, and the pictures have zero detail in them. With emulators being so prominent today, there's no excuse for leaving crappy screenshots on the back. While retyping the summaries and such may be a slight pain, at least the results look far more professional...which is what seems to be the goal for most around here. If you're going to mimic the retail look, don't rely on scans alone. Its a good starting point, but I rebuild a lot of things from the ground up.

[sheep2001]

1/16 of an inch equates to about 1.5mm.  Well, 1.588mm to be exact.  Not sure why you are using both metric and imperial in the same sentence.

In an ideal world we'll take new screen shots, and retype back texts, but to be true retail, the screenshot needs to be at exactly the same point in the game, and sometimes removing the text from a rear scan is just not possible if there is a detailed image behind it.  Why don't you share some of your work if that's what you are doing?

Shenske single handedly rebuilt every nes cover for CGC's.  using new scans where possible - by his own admission he said some still need new source material, so if you are in a position to supply that, or you have the time a Photoshop skill to completely rebuild some covers, we'd all love to have it available.

[Moviefan2k4]

I guess I don't place the same importance on the 100% retail look, compared to some people. I still have a very clear attention to detail though; here's a mockup I've been working on for Super Mario 3. The whole panel is custom; nothing scanned at all. The screenshot elements were taken from a website called The Spriters Resource; still working on the third one, though. I also completely retyped the summary, changing some words to help it fit the blocked area better.

As for my use of technical terms, I was trying to explain the risk of the cover shifting around, versus a snug and proper fit. 40 pixels doesn't seem like much, but its over 1/8 inch at 300 dpi. That can cause problems, similar to cutting the cover too far if you're in a rush. Better to do things right from the outset, than try to fix it later.

I know all of this probably comes off arrogant, but I don't mean it that way. I didn't realize the discrepancy between my measurements and Shenske's until recently, so I re-checked mine multiple times to make sure.

[wiggy]

I guess I don't place the same importance on the 100% retail look, compared to some people. I still have a very clear attention to detail though; here's a mockup I've been working on for Super Mario 3. The whole panel is custom; nothing scanned at all. The screenshot elements were taken from a website called The Spriters Resource; still working on the third one, though. I also completely retyped the summary, changing some words to help it fit the blocked area better.

As for my use of technical terms, I was trying to explain the risk of the cover shifting around, versus a snug and proper fit. 40 pixels doesn't seem like much, but its over 1/8 inch at 300 dpi. That can cause problems, similar to cutting the cover too far if you're in a rush. Better to do things right from the outset, than try to fix it later.

I know all of this probably comes off arrogant, but I don't mean it that way. I didn't realize the discrepancy between my measurements and Shenske's until recently, so I re-checked mine multiple times to make sure.

]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v54/moviefan2k4/Photoshop%20Projects/SMB3_CGC_mockup1_zpsn8je2qpq.jpg[/]

Yes. This.

Also, like sheep said, look at any retail cover. As in actual retail. There needs to be a margin for error with regards to variations in the sleeves on the cases themselves.

You're technically doing it wrong.

[amace04]

No covers on mine yet, since I have to tweak most of them in Photoshop (and even overhaul a few)...but here's my NES collection cased up.

Why would you need to tweak or overhaul them? I already did that, they're good to go.    lol

I measured the cases myself, multiple times...and your sizes are off. The correct dimensions for the inserts are 11 & 9/16 by 6 & 15/16 inches, or 3470 x 2080 pixels. Because of this, I've been building my own templates, transplanting your work with mostly-slight modifications.

I've found this to be the case as well.  I'm using UGC, and every single NES case is made slightly too wide (lengthwise).  I'm not super picky, so I just trim it a bit more along the ends.  No big deal to me though.

[sheep2001]

That's because they have changed the dimensions of the ugc's since the project started.