Runcommand System Splashscreens!

[Rookervik]

Oh gawd, I will have to re-do all the pixel run commands now. LOL. That can wait til I edit the consoles. :D

[meleu]

@Rookervik if you did "carbon-friendly" launching screen, what picture would you use? The system logo at the top, the controller at the center and the message at the bottom?

Maybe we can find some ImageMagick trick to automate this task...

[Rookervik]

@meleu Right now just all the controllers and logos need to be converted to PNGs.

Then I'd have to spend some time thinking about how it should look. And go over it with buzz since that's his chosen theme.

[meleu]

@Rookervik said in Runcommand System Splashscreens!:

Right now just all the controllers and logos need to be converted to PNGs.

You can do it from command line on a Linux box (with ImageMagick installed). The command is simple as that:

convert controller.svg controller.png

Before using this command I had to install librsvg2-bin:

sudo apt-get install librsvg2-bin

Then I'd have to spend some time thinking about how it should look.

As you said you don't plan to make Carbon splashscreens due to the number of systems, I remembered the ImageMagick tools and thought "If the splashscreens are simple enough, maybe we can automate their generation with some ImageMagick wizardry."

I'm not an ImageMagick wizard and I'm not really sure if this is possible, but I can do some research on this topic...

[Rookervik]

Well once the images are all converted you can run a Photoshop script to create everything. I'll have to dig out my linux laptop and see about converting all the SVGs that way. Doing them all in Illustrator is a massive bummer.

[meleu]

@Rookervik if you're brave enough to believe me :) , the following commands convert all the SVG files below a directory level to PNG. Actually it won't convert but creates a new file with PNG format, and leave the original SVG file untouched.

EDIT: don't forget to install librsvg2-bin before!!

sudo apt-get install librsvg2-bin

And yes! I tested these commands before posting here! ;-)

# create a temporary directory in your home dir
cd ~; mkdir tmp
 
# copy the theme files to another place
cp -R /etc/emulationstation/themes/carbon/ ~/tmp/
 
# create PNG files from the SVG files
# the -verbose option isn't really necessary, it's used just to let you
# see that something is happening
for svg_file in $(find ~/tmp/carbon/ -type f -name '*.svg'); do convert -verbose "$svg_file" "${svg_file/%svg/png}"; done

Hope it helps! :-)

[meleu]

By the way, here are some examples of what I could get with my initial research on ImageMagick commands and the respective command line (these commands were executed after the conversion from SVG to PNG):

convert -size 800x600 tile:$HOME/tmp/carbon/art/carbon_fiber.png -gravity center ~/tmp/carbon/nes/art/controller.png -composite nes.png

convert -size 800x600 tile:$HOME/tmp/carbon/art/carbon_fiber.png -gravity center ~/tmp/carbon/nes/art/system.png -composite nes2.png

convert -size 800x600 tile:$HOME/tmp/carbon/art/carbon_fiber.png -gravity center ~/tmp/carbon/nes/art/system2.png -composite nes3.png

[herb_fargus]

@meleu I used imagemagick to generate grids of sprites I ripped from Bomberman

I wrote up a bit of a guide here:

https://github.com/HerbFargus/Atomic-Bomberman/wiki/Sprites#create-montage-with-imagemagick

Personally I think the run command launch images should have the carbon background instead of just black ;)

[Rookervik]

@meleu Those look slick already. And use the carbon fiber. Just need some nice text saying to press X or 'any key' to configure run command.

PS, it does seem "X" is the most-correct button to press if you need to get into the run command editor. Any other button seems to be ignored (on a joystick)

Might want to test 1080p versions of these and see how long it takes to load them. I fear it might take long enough to load them that they might just flash on the screen for a split second before the game launches.

[daeks]

@meleu wow, I already love your third image :) I am happy to see that there will be something for carbon as well in the near future.

edit: I played a bit with imagemagick on windows: https://github.com/daeks/retropie-system-splashscreens-carbon
Each folder contains an autogenerated launching.png. The parameters used are stored in convert.bat

[meleu]

@herb_fargus

Personally I think the run command launch images should have the carbon background instead of just black ;)

But it's already carbon. Maybe are not seeing because you're on mobile?

@Rookervik

Those look slick already. And use the carbon fiber. Just need some nice text saying to press X or 'any key' to configure run command.

Could you make an image with the text with a transparent background (just like the controller lines)? You can choose a font that pleases you...

With this I can make the launching images for carbon...

it does seem "X" is the most-correct button to press if you need to get into the run command editor. Any other button seems to be ignored (on a joystick)

Actually runcommand gets input from the 0 and 1, and unfortunately the manufacturers don't have a standardization about these numbers. I have several joysticks here and the <ENTER> button (button 0) differs in all of them.

The "a" on the text should be an indefinite article, not the A button of the joystick. :-)

[meleu]

@daeks said in Runcommand System Splashscreens!:

edit: I played a bit with imagemagick on windows: https://github.com/daeks/es_launching_carbon
Each folder contains an autogenerated launching.png. The parameters used are stored in convert.bat

Wow! It's exactly what I would do!! I think I don't need to spend more time with it! LOL :-)

Thanks for sharing!

EDIT: And you used the command line to add the text. Good catch!! :-)

[daeks]

@meleu glad to hear that you like it :) anyhow it is not final as it still struggles about some issues:

• logos which are too big (edit: fixed)
• logos which are black or transparent (like game&watch or gamecube) are just shown as black image

[herb_fargus]

@meleu ah my mistake yes I was on mobile. I see it now.

@daeks there is a pull request for game and watch:https://github.com/RetroPie/es-theme-carbon/pull/19 I haven't gotten to testing it yet

[daeks]

@herb_fargus thanks for your hint. As I have seen the PR will merge a new system3.png to the repo. Is there a way to rename it to system.png? Currently there is no further logic in my batch to create the launching.png. It just takes the system.png as @meleu has done it.

[meleu]

@daeks C'mon dude! Rename it on your end! ;-)

[daeks]

@meleu I'm lazy :P - Renaming is not really a problem, but in case of any updates, it has to be renamed all the time. Just designed the script to be adoptable easily for other themes as well.

[meleu]

@daeks said in Runcommand System Splashscreens!:

Just designed the script to be adoptable easily for other themes as well.

Yeah, I was thinking in doing such thing in bash to let the users execute the script on the rasp, but unfortunately the theme makers don't have a standardization for the file names...

[meleu]

@herb_fargus said in Runcommand System Splashscreens!:

there is a pull request for game and watch:https://github.com/RetroPie/es-theme-carbon/pull/19 I haven't gotten to testing it yet

I've tested right now and it's fine. The red game and watch logo looks fine with a carbon background. I think that renaming system3.svg to system.svg is reasonable too...

[daeks]

Anyhow, I created new fixed launching images for G&W, GC and Steam. Currently I see no issue anymore. :)

edit: Images are also compressed by default to reduce filesize. Changing the background from carbon_fiber to carbon_black reduces the filesize significantly. It can be changed in the batch file.