NCAA Football/Basketball, Madden, NBA 09 Custom Covers

[bigmike]

Okay so I used to make NCAA Covers all the time, but I never made them very clear and they were very pixelized, I think I made a post showing one of them one time and it led to me being a jerk to everyone and acting like a real jack last time but I have gotten better with my designs and I can take C+C now. I am not going to take request, as I highly doubt I will get any but if people wanted too, and they thought this was good enough I will. I made a John Parker Wilson Cover. I used paint.net and photosuite4 to make this. please tell me how I can make it better. Thanks!

[AHcreative]

Basically find a more clear picture and PS3 box template.

[bigmike]

Basically find a more clear picture and PS3 box template.

Yeah I have one but I dont know why that is the way it turned out, but I will try to fix that.

[Cola]

they look unclear and pixelated to me...the player, the cover, the NCAA logo, the stadium pic in the back...all of it. why do you have transparency on the game title?

[bigmike]

they look unclear and pixelated to me...the player, the cover, the NCAA logo, the stadium pic in the back...all of it. why do you have transparency on the game title?

Well see the picture started out not pixelated and so did the cover template, and while used the programs I used, when I put John Parker on the stadium it made the stadium picture screen through him a little bit thus making it pixelated, guess I am never gona get this right until I get photoshop

[jake22]

i think it would look better with no team logo

[BJBerthiaume]

I like how it looks kind of cartoonish. It is a little choppy though.

[AHcreative]

they look unclear and pixelated to me...the player, the cover, the NCAA logo, the stadium pic in the back...all of it. why do you have transparency on the game title?

I think that's the problem. The ENTIRE thing is transparent. Look at Wilson's helmet, you can clearly see the stadium through it, as well as the field through his jersey and the football.

[bigmike]

they look unclear and pixelated to me...the player, the cover, the NCAA logo, the stadium pic in the back...all of it. why do you have transparency on the game title?

I think that's the problem. The ENTIRE thing is transparent. Look at Wilson's helmet, you can clearly see the stadium through it, as well as the field through his jersey and the football.

Yeah that was the clearest I could get with this program, I might take the stadium out and try not to make the NCAA 09 part transparent, but like I said before I probly won't ever be able to perfect it unless I get Photoshop

[gingerbreadmann]

they look unclear and pixelated to me...the player, the cover, the NCAA logo, the stadium pic in the back...all of it. why do you have transparency on the game title?

Well see the picture started out not pixelated and so did the cover template, and while used the programs I used, when I put John Parker on the stadium it made the stadium picture screen through him a little bit thus making it pixelated, guess I am never gona get this right until I get photoshop

No. Photoshop is not some magical program that makes anything look good. Too many people think that and thus we have the millions of Photoshop hacks that populate the world today. It won't look any better with Photoshop unless you know what you're doing in the first place. You have to figure out what is going wrong with your process and fix it, simple as that. You program can't just cause the cover to be sloppy, choppy, and pixelated. I used to have a whole covers thread going (that I really should get back to), well guess what? I have never spent a dime on or pirated any graphics software ever. I just took time to really get to know the program I'm using, in this case GIMP (which is free and does absolutely anything you would use that Photoshop can; which is why I decided to learn it) and try to make the best quality work I can. Take time to find good pictures or ask for good resources, find a clean template (that are all over the place or I could even give you one) and figure out how to make it clean. It should come quickly with a bit of practice and effort. If you know it is messy and will not be received that well here, don't post it. I'm sure you can take a look at this and compare it with the real cover and see a few major differences that are not due to you making up your own style. I know you do a lot of great work with Paint, and I know you can learn another program well too. I respect how you tried again after the last incident and I'm sure you can handle this the right way, but saying things like that pisses me off a bit. Sorry. And don't think I'm trying to discourage you from trying things like this. Just take the time until you honestly think it is satisfactory and it is your best, and I seriously doubt you really think that.

So sorry again for the rant. Just try to find the general idea of what I just said.

[MVP]

they look unclear and pixelated to me...the player, the cover, the NCAA logo, the stadium pic in the back...all of it. why do you have transparency on the game title?

Well see the picture started out not pixelated and so did the cover template, and while used the programs I used, when I put John Parker on the stadium it made the stadium picture screen through him a little bit thus making it pixelated, guess I am never gona get this right until I get photoshop

No. Photoshop is not some magical program that makes anything look good. Too many people think that and thus we have the millions of Photoshop hacks that populate the world today. You have to figure out what is going wrong with your process and fix it, simple as that. You program can't just cause the cover to be sloppy, choppy, and pixelated. I used to have a whole covers thread going (that I really should get back to), well guess what? I have never spent a dime on or pirated any graphics software ever. I just took time to really get to know the program I'm using, in this case GIMP (which is free and does absolutely anything you would use that Photoshop can; which is why I decided to learn it) and try to make the best quality work I can. Take time to find good pictures or ask for good resources, find a clean template (that are all over the place or I could even give you one and figure out how to make it clean. It should come quickly with a bit of practice and effort. If you know it is messy and will not be received that well here, don't post it. I'm sure you can take a look at this and compare it with the real cover and see a few major differences that are not due to you making up your own style. I know you do a lot of great work with really good with Paint, and I know you can learn another program well too. I respect how you tried again after the last incident and I'm sure you can handle this the right way, but saying things like that pisses me off a bit. Sorry. And don't think I'm trying to discourage you from trying things like this. Just take the time until you honestly think it is satisfactory and it is your best, and I seriously doubt you really think that.

So sorry again for the rant. Just try to find the general idea of what I just said.

Good rant, but that bolded part is quite deceiving. GIMP can only do the basics of Photoshop, things that you will see all over the internet (signatures, avatars, wallpapers, photo-manips, etc), but Photoshop is waaaaay beyond that. I know what you mean, and you of course were referring to the work made on this specific forum, so I guess I'm just nitpicking. And I guess most people's perception of Photoshop is becoming a pet peeve after myself being brainwashed in Colour Management courses and finding out the deeper, production process side of Photoshop.

But all in all, good rant.

[bigmike]

they look unclear and pixelated to me...the player, the cover, the NCAA logo, the stadium pic in the back...all of it. why do you have transparency on the game title?

Well see the picture started out not pixelated and so did the cover template, and while used the programs I used, when I put John Parker on the stadium it made the stadium picture screen through him a little bit thus making it pixelated, guess I am never gona get this right until I get photoshop

No. Photoshop is not some magical program that makes anything look good. Too many people think that and thus we have the millions of Photoshop hacks that populate the world today. You have to figure out what is going wrong with your process and fix it, simple as that. You program can't just cause the cover to be sloppy, choppy, and pixelated. I used to have a whole covers thread going (that I really should get back to), well guess what? I have never spent a dime on or pirated any graphics software ever. I just took time to really get to know the program I'm using, in this case GIMP (which is free and does absolutely anything you would use that Photoshop can; which is why I decided to learn it) and try to make the best quality work I can. Take time to find good pictures or ask for good resources, find a clean template (that are all over the place or I could even give you one) and figure out how to make it clean. It should come quickly with a bit of practice and effort. If you know it is messy and will not be received that well here, don't post it. I'm sure you can take a look at this and compare it with the real cover and see a few major differences that are not due to you making up your own style. I know you do a lot of great work with Paint, and I know you can learn another program well too. I respect how you tried again after the last incident and I'm sure you can handle this the right way, but saying things like that pisses me off a bit. Sorry. And don't think I'm trying to discourage you from trying things like this. Just take the time until you honestly think it is satisfactory and it is your best, and I seriously doubt you really think that.

So sorry again for the rant. Just try to find the general idea of what I just said.

Yeah, thanks I get what you are saying, I know photoshop isnt a magical program like you said . The program I use though doesnt have as near as much options. I just wanted to post this to see if yall could maybe tell me what I need to work on and everything. Is GIMP a free download, if so I may try to download it and like you said get used to it. Thanks!

[gingerbreadmann]

Good rant, but that bolded part is quite deceiving. GIMP can only do the basics of Photoshop, things that you will see all over the internet (signatures, avatars, wallpapers, photo-manips, etc), but Photoshop is waaaaay beyond that. I know what you mean, and you of course were referring to the work made on this specific forum, so I guess I'm just nitpicking. And I guess most people's perception of Photoshop is becoming a pet peeve after myself being brainwashed in Colour Management courses and finding out the deeper, production process side of Photoshop.

But all in all, good rant.

That's not true, unless we have different definitions of "basic." Which I think we do I didn't want to say everything because obviously there is a whole 'nother side to this, the printing side, which starts with CMYK support and goes to places I have no damn idea exist But other than that, for someone not doing professional quality printing or CM, plus a few extra features that can be done in GIMP just in different ways, it can do everything PS can. And maybe a few things I've never seen, but you obviously understand what I meant(adding to that and that type of personal usage probably makes up 99% of usage anyway, hence our differing opinions of "basics"). I have worked with both but I will defer to your knowledge here because anything relating to Color Management makes my head spin

Oh, and thanks, and you're welcome Mike.

[bigmike]

Well this is a bit of a update, I think it looks a LOT cleaner, altough it is still not perfect, but tell me what you think of this.

[crashcarson15]

Much better!

[bigmike]

Much better!

I am working right now on getting the dark line around the NCAA 09 thing off, so another update will be up soon.

[BroadwayBlueshirt]

Take that bowlcut-sporting SOB off of it.

/grumbling bitter UGA student

[BJBerthiaume]

Wow that looks way better!

[bigmike]

Okay here is my final update, I think it looks really good, compared to the first two, I got that dark line that surrounded the NCAA 09 banner off, so tell me how good this is, and if someone thinks it is good enough I can take request.

[BJBerthiaume]

Yep, you did a great job of making these better, nice job man.