My plain-looking CPO design needs more razmataz. Suggestions please.

[Timstuff]

I'm working on a Metal Gear Solid-themed CPO, and I know basically what I want it to look like. However, it unfortunately lacks the kind of visual flair that I associate with the better CPO's I've seen on the better BYOAC units. I'm usually pretty good at drawing and using photoshop and illustrator, but in this case I'm kind of stuck scratching my head. I don't want something that is so busy that it distracts from the actual buttons, but at the same time I'm quite aware that what I have is WAY too boring to leave as-is.



If it looks like there's a lot of empty negative space, there are actually going to be a lot of buttons and other components in place, so it's not actually as bad as it might look initially. However, even with the buttons in place, it looks very dull, unfortunately. That checker-board backdrop just isn't doing it for me, so I'm hoping someone here has a suggestion for a better effect that I can use. I need something that will activate the negative space and look aesthetically pleasing, without distracting too from the images of Solid Snake and Liquid Snake. Thanks in advance!

[Timstuff]

Alright.. Admittedly, I am very shy about using raster images, ESPECIALLY when they are far from the ideal resolution for large prints (and lets face it, the files are huge and hard to work with). But HOT DANG, I don't think I can pass up the chance to use this painting as my CPO, even if it means sacrificing some image sharpness.



I think that this is the solution to my problem. I had to move around some of my control components in order to preserve the image visibility, but that only took about 5 seconds.

[ivwshane]

I think you have a winner with that second one!

[BORIStheBLADE]

I actually like both of them, but the second is better.

[Timstuff]

I've made a few more tweaks to my CPO. First of all, I did a bit of airbrushing in Photoshop to remove some of the more noticeable pixelation, so now it should look pretty nice when it gets printed at 300 DPI even though it started out as a PC wallpaper. Also, my brother suggested I change the color of the overlays to a bluish-green hue, to make it look kind of reminiscent of the menues in the Metal Gear Solid games. I think it was a good idea, because it seems to mesh with the rest of the CPO a lot better now.

[Portnoy]

Awesome!