Icons for game folders

[jurassicman]

Hello guys, I've looked on the Internet for this but I haven't found any hints.

As many of you, I guess, I like to install my original games with WHDLoad.

After that, I like to replace the standard "folder" icon (.info file) with an Icon that shows front/back of the original box of the game.

I've found on the Internet some archives with great icons done in that way. These icons show the front cover of the game box and if you click on the folder you can see the back.

Unfortunately some icons of games I own are missing and I would like to "create" those icons for me and for the other people that could like them.

I tried to do so but the results were really bad.
I have the scans of front and back of the boxes (it is often possible to find them on the Internet as well) but when I create the icons the colors are terrible, also the size is weird and I am not able to define it.

I don't remember the name of the program I used but for sure there are many. Could someone tell me the best program to use to create icons and instruct me on how to use it? Is there already an "how to" somewhere on the Internet?

Thanks for reading!

[AMIGASYSTEM]

If you have to do them on one side, and you have the New icon.library and OS updated, simply convert images into the format PNG and rename extension a .INFO, you can also associate the new cone with the old one WHDLoad without you changing the Toltypes, look at my video.

[ Show youtube player ]

[PeterK]

Create two high quality (TrueColor) PNG images of your xyz scans with the same size (up to 256x256): front_xyz.png and back_xyz.png.

Copy front_xyz.png xyz.info
Join front_xyz.png back_xyz.png to xyz.info

You can now use that icon xyz.info directly under AfA_OS or Scalos or you can convert it into the OS 3.5 icon format with my icon.library by a simple snapshot or use CopyIcon to drag&drop the images to another icon.

[jurassicman]

@AMIGASYSTEM
Thanks mate, I already knew that I can drag and drop an image in the "information panel" but that way the icon has only one picture and I want an Icon with front and back.

@PeterK
Thanks Peter. I use OS 3.9 so I'll have to convert the .info file created with the "copy" and the "join" command as you suggested. I already have your icon.library on my system, how can I use it for a "snapshot"? Could you, please, explain better that step so that I can try it later when I am in front of my A1200? Thanks in advance!

[PeterK]

Originally Posted by jurassicman

... how can I use it for a "snapshot"?

"snapshot" can be found in the WB icon menu (and also in the window menu).

But on WB 3.9 you can simply use "Icon Information" to load your existing WHDLoad icon and then drag&drop xyz.info over the old image. That should do it, too. You would not even see the annoying "Icon format change" requester.

[jurassicman]

Originally Posted by PeterK

"snapshot" can be found in the WB icon menu (and also in the window menu).

But on WB 3.9 you can simply use "Icon Information" to load your existing WHDLoad icon and then drag&drop xyz.info over the old image. That should do it, too. You would not even see the annoying "Icon format change" requester.

Excellent, I'll do so.
The only doubt I still have is about the size of the icon, I guess it depends on the original size of the png files. In order to have the "normal" rectangular shape of a box instead of a square I think that I'll have to use two images with the correct size.
I'll do some tests and I'll let you know how it goes. Thanks for now!

[PeterK]

The size of Mad-Matt's Box Icons is limited to maximal 128x128 pixels. But he has used ImageStudio to resize and convert them into the Amiga IFF format and then imported the 2 optimal dithered 256 color images into IconEdit. My method is a lot easier, but the resulting quality is not perfect, of course.

Box Icon collection assembled by Mad-Matt. ImageStudio used to resize/colour convert images for use with Iconedit.

Scans used from multiple sources including own game boxes, google, moby games and Hall of Light.

Icons are in 256c Coloricon format (os35+ required). Will work well with any existing Exotica game icons. Most are in 128x100, but some are 100x128 and 128x128 for mostly cd32 covers.

I advise making use of Peter Keunecke's Icon Library update for viewing the icons in highest quality.

Icons are designed mainly for use with WHDLoad, but can be used for anything you wish.

[jurassicman]

@PeterK
Hello mate!

Yesterday I tried to make an icon using your method (copy .png .info and join .png to .info) but after the join I had an info file only with the second image. It seems that the join overwrites the previous image instead of attaching the second image to the first one.

Maybe I did something wrong. I tried again with the program I used in the past (iconian) but I still obtain bad results. Once created the info file the colors aren't very good, the size is smaller than I want and everytime I try to enlarge the size (increasing the buffer from the program settings) Iconian crashes...

As far as you know, is there a program for Linux/Windows able to create info files?

[PeterK]

Sorry a thousand times, jurassicman !!

I should better have tested my instructions before making wrong suggestions.

You only need the following instruction:

Join front_xyz.png back_xyz.png TO xyz.info

... or you can use the method described by Mad-Matt (see above).

[jurassicman]

Don't worry PeterK!
I'll try your new instructions later this evening and I'll let you know the results!
Thanks for your help.

[AMIGASYSTEM]

Originally Posted by PeterK

Sorry a thousand times, jurassicman !!
Join front_xyz.png back_xyz.png TO xyz.info

Thank you PeterK, i did not know this, in life there is always something to learn, since there is no GUI to do this, i enjoyed creating two different ways, see video

[ Show youtube player ]

[PeterK]

What a nice "Magic Bin" animation, I could watch it for hours ...

Yes I know, there are lots of "Split&Join" tools on Aminet to make life easier.

[AMIGASYSTEM]

Originally Posted by PeterK

Yes I know, there are lots of "Split&Join" tools on Aminet to make life easier.

Yes, but not everyone accepts names and extensions various, "JoinSplitter" unites anything, just add or drag

[jurassicman]

@PeterK
Your method works well, thanks!
I made 2 nice icons so far (for "Indy Heat" and "Advantage Tennis"), I have a list of icons to make, when I finish I'll share the icons here!

[AMIGASYSTEM]

Bene jurassicman sono contento per te (ci conosciamo?)
----------------
Well jurassicman I'm happy for you (do we know each other?)

[jurassicman]

Originally Posted by AMIGASYSTEM

Bene jurassicman sono contento per te (ci conosciamo?)
----------------
Well jurassicman I'm happy for you (do we know each other?)

I don't think we know each other... I'll send you a PM to chat a bit in Italian. Thanks for your help in this thread!

[jurassicman]

At the end I figured out how to avoid Iconian crashes on my system and I am using it.
I had to setup two tooltypes:

* USERHEIGHT = <value>
Defines the height of the user buffer height.

* USERWIDTH = <value>
Defines the width of the user buffer width.

I chose 128 and 128 and on my Linux system I resize appropriately the image in png before copying it on my Amiga.

This way I am able to make nice icons with two images.
The method with the "join" command usually works but sometimes the icons I made had a garbled image as second image.

Due to the limited set of colors I use (16 with fullpalette) some icons aren't very good if I don't "adjust" earlier the image on my Linux box. For that I use gimp "Color Balance" and "Brightness-Contrast" and after some work I am able to obtain decent results.

Hope this will be of any help for someone else too!

[PeterK]

Originally Posted by jurassicman

The method with the "join" command usually works but sometimes the icons I made had a garbled image as second image.

Could you please upload such a pair of images where the selected icon looks broken. I would like to find out what's going wrong.

[jurassicman]

Originally Posted by PeterK

Could you please upload such a pair of images where the selected icon looks broken. I would like to find out what's going wrong.

Sure, I'll post some pictures here soon, not today unfortunately because I'm quite busy.

[jurassicman]

@PeterK

There we are, sorry for the delay.
You can see the icons I'm making with Iconian and an example of a garbled back of an icon made with the join command.

As I said it doesn't happen every time, I was able to make a few good icons with the join command but I now switched to Iconian since it always gives me the expected result.