Comments on first draft of marquee.

[marcoval]

Here it is, the first draft of my MAME machine's marquee. Comments from all are welcome and appreciated.

[Jakobud]

Loose the poem thing.

[Pixelhugger]

Cool. I'd put Scottish Ninjas and Mame on the same line and make them a bit more prominent with the running ninja separating them. The poem does feel a bit out of place as a block of type but might work well as a line running along the top or bottom like a border. I'm a broadcast designer, so print isn't specifically my domain, but I've got some ideas if you're interested. I like what you've done so far  Could you post another JPEG without the type so I can play?

[Brax]

Loose the poem thing.

Loose? *sigh* The internet generation......

It's LOSE.


As for the Marquee I love the concept but the others are right, it needs some tweaking. How about having the figure offset to the side, maybe where the text is then make the test bolder and fill up the rest of the space. I DO like the text though, maybe as a border like has been previously suggested.

[Brax]

Ok, I was able to look at it all at once and I have other thoughts.

It not all that bad as is. At the very least move the text up so it's centered. (vertically, not horizontally)
It'll cover the sword slightly but don't worry, your eye will still know it's there.
(magazines do this all the time, it works fine)
Basically make your text as big as possible to fill the space once it's centered. It's a unique design.... go with it.

[Frostillicus]

I would lose the poem, but if you keep it I'd fix the typos and make the font bigger/easier to read.   Maybe sharpen up the scottish ninja a little.  any chance you could post it a little smaller - my desktop is currently 1280x1024 but I'm having a hard time seeing it in a full window.

[Chris]

If you're going to light this marquee up, you may want tno consider reversing the text, using a dark border with light letters rather than the other way around.

--Chris

[marcoval]

Cool. I'd put Scottish Ninjas and Mame on the same line and make them a bit more prominent with the running ninja separating them. The poem does feel a bit out of place as a block of type but might work well as a line running along the top or bottom like a border. I'm a broadcast designer, so print isn't specifically my domain, but I've got some ideas if you're interested. I like what you've done so far  Could you post another JPEG without the type so I can play?

I acutally just downloaded it from the scottish ninjas site. It's on the main site under Aidan's character bio. However here it is anyway since I had plans to change it. I'm also considering the similar background of the other ninja's bios.

[marcoval]

Thanks guys, this is helping quite a bit. The intro just has to stay, so I'll try the border idea. It's just such great text, and on the actual falsh movie after the narrator says those lines, Aidan pops in and in a heavy scottish accent says, "Aht's right ya stupid bastard" Hillarious.

Brax - I like both ideas but really have no idea how to implement them Don't have amazing PS skills so I can't move the ninja who is in just an all together inconvenient place. But having him charging out at you is such a cool concept. I have considered a picture that has his face profile on the far right side. I'll play with that and I'm also playing with the border idea, a bit more work but I think it will indeed work better to make it balanced. You are right, I wanted to avoid covering the sword but I think balance needs to be the primary focus.

Frostillicus - Yes, the poem must stay, but I am also considering putting it in other places on the cabinet. Readability is really what I'm shooting for and since my color printer at home isn't working and I don't have one at work I haven't been able to get an idea what it will look like lighted. I like Chris' idea of doing it white fill with black borders. Also, while the font is cool, it doesn't convey large blocks of text well, I may consider doing a different font. As to how to sharpen the ninja up, I wish I knew how! It is unfortunately a blown up JPEG which I really wanted to avoid. Fortunately the original art is intended to be a watercolorish like fuzzy look anyway, but blowing it up just makes it look a bit too fuzzy. Printed out, in greyscale it doesn't look too pixelated, just undefined. Ideas?

Chris- Good idea, I tried that on it and it looks good.

Here is another (Smaller) ninja who's art seems a bit more condusive to this idea.

[Cue-Ball]

Frostillicus - Yes, the poem must stay, but I am also considering putting it in other places on the cabinet. Readability is really what I'm shooting for and since my color printer at home isn't working and I don't have one at work I haven't been able to get an idea what it will look like lighted. I like Chris' idea of doing it white fill with black borders. Also, while the font is cool, it doesn't convey large blocks of text well, I may consider doing a different font. As to how to sharpen the ninja up, I wish I knew how! It is unfortunately a blown up JPEG which I really wanted to avoid. Fortunately the original art is intended to be a watercolorish like fuzzy look anyway, but blowing it up just makes it look a bit too fuzzy. Printed out, in greyscale it doesn't look too pixelated, just undefined. Ideas?

You need to read Frosty's tutorial on vector graphics.  It will solve all your problems.  No more pixelation on the character or the font and you can make it any size you want.

[Frostillicus]

Frostillicus - Yes, the poem must stay, but I am also considering putting it in other places on the cabinet. Readability is really what I'm shooting for and since my color printer at home isn't working and I don't have one at work I haven't been able to get an idea what it will look like lighted. I like Chris' idea of doing it white fill with black borders. Also, while the font is cool, it doesn't convey large blocks of text well, I may consider doing a different font. As to how to sharpen the ninja up, I wish I knew how! It is unfortunately a blown up JPEG which I really wanted to avoid. Fortunately the original art is intended to be a watercolorish like fuzzy look anyway, but blowing it up just makes it look a bit too fuzzy. Printed out, in greyscale it doesn't look too pixelated, just undefined. Ideas?

Yes, like Cue-Ball suggested, read the tutorial on vector graphics.  Look for it in the Misc section of the Downloads on this site.  I like you are considering putting it other places.  Perhaps a monitor bezel? CP corner? How about having it as your boot screen, if it's readable at the monitor resolution you will be using.  I like to think of marquees as just a giant word (ASTEROIDS or TEMPEST, for example.)

[shmokes]

You really should be flexible.  The text is cool, but if it doesn't belong on a marquee it doesn't belong.  I think it might work well on a monitor bezel.  Look at games like Donkey Kong where there's lots of artwork and text going around the monitor.  It might work there.  

To put things in perspective I've got a really really cool, antique looking chrome blender.  It looks fantastic sitting on my kitchen counter.  I'm not going to mount it to the front of my car as a hood ornament, though.  If I had plans to mount it to my hood and someone said, dude, that isn't going to work, it doesn't look good can you imagine me saying, "The blender stays, man.  It is just so cool it has to stay."  There is a place for everything.  The place for that poem is not on your marquee.  I'd feel fine if you proved me wrong by perhaps turning it into a boarder, but I'd bet that to make it look good you'd have to make the text so small that nobody would ever read it and you obviously don't want that.

[marcoval]

You really should be flexible.  The text is cool, but if it doesn't belong on a marquee it doesn't belong.  I think it might work well on a monitor bezel.  Look at games like Donkey Kong where there's lots of artwork and text going around the monitor.  It might work there.  

To put things in perspective I've got a really really cool, antique looking chrome blender.  It looks fantastic sitting on my kitchen counter.  I'm not going to mount it to the front of my car as a hood ornament, though.  If I had plans to mount it to my hood and someone said, dude, that isn't going to work, it doesn't look good can you imagine me saying, "The blender stays, man.  It is just so cool it has to stay."  There is a place for everything.  The place for that poem is not on your marquee.  I'd feel fine if you proved me wrong by perhaps turning it into a boarder, but I'd bet that to make it look good you'd have to make the text so small that nobody would ever read it and you obviously don't want that.

Yeah exactly. I should rephrase, I am flexible on taking it off the marquee but not off the cabinet in general. It has to be prominent and something that someone notices on the cabinet. The Marquee is just the first thing I've worked on artwork wise. I have CP layouts, but no artwork on it yet.  It also may be surrounding the CP, or,  if I can work it I'll have the boot screen have something along these lines. Problem is it works best as a slide show and I don't know if I can do that as a boot screen.

[wee beastie]

I think you can keep the chinesey font, but try a little variation.  Don't do all the text in the same font.  Also, try to make some light colors on the pic so there is a contrast between darks and lights.  Otherwise, nothing stands out...