Pixel Art Themed Bartop Arcade

Divenburger

Gorgeous work, to be honest I registered just to comment on the artwork, it's exceptional, I've been scouring the net for ideas on my own build, and I must say I haven't seen any that I like this much.

Are you at all thinking of publicising this design? I'd love to use this for my own build. Perhaps you could send me an email on gqc-cleaning[at]hotmail.com and we can talk more?

Thanks!

Capeman

@Robster1727 I designed the artwork myself and found a local vinyl sign printer to print it on outdoor adhesive vinyl with a gloss finish. Its very easy to find a sign printer in almost any town. Just look up sign graphics or vehicle graphics, or if your in the states, look up the FastSigns franchise, they are in every major city. Just ask what their vinyl printer's max resolution is (over 200 and your in the clear) and you could always ask for a printed sample to see materials. You don't need a specialized "arcade panel printer" doing overpriced work over the internet, those guys are just sign printers who found a niche.

Capeman

@MaTTyDredZ Thanks! For the wood grain on mine, I used 3M wood grain vehicle vinyl. There are lots of brands out there but the 3M has a nice textured feel to it and a nice matte finish. I used something similar to this, but you might want to click around to find the style you like, there are lots of different wood grains, colors and thicknesses of material out there. I recommend paying a bit extra for better quality.

https://www.amazon.com/Marine-Teak-3M-Grain-Vinyl/dp/B0074PW5XE

MaTTyDredZ

@Capeman SUPER helpful. I was designing wood grains in photoshop using seamless textures etc, but could never get the color and scale just right... this is THE solution... made my day here!! Thanks again!

ShdwKnt

what kind of display are you using in this..

Capeman

@ShdwKnt I got a 17" lcd, dell branded I think, from a yard sale for $5. You can get really good, older 4:3/5:4 aspect screens at PC Liquidators. I really suggest using 4:3 or 5:4 ratio screens since all old games run in that ratio. I never understood why some makers put 16:9 displays into their cabs just to have the left and right quarters showing black bars at all times.

Here is a good resource, the prices are great because most are used: http://www.pcliquidations.com/c295---lcd-monitors?criteria=555

Robster1727

@Capeman many thanks for the advice on the side art please can I ask how did you create the marquee print?

Capeman

@Robster1727 Marquee is slightly different. Sign printers cary special plastic designed for backlit displays. Its basically just translucent (not transparent) plastic. Just get a non-opaque vinyl graphic printed and have it applied to backlit plastic material. All sign printers will know what you're talking about if you word it similar to how I said it, haha.

Robster1727

@Capeman thanks for all of your help

MaTTyDredZ

@Capeman Hey Capeman... Question of the Day :)
If you don't mind me asking, what did you use for speaker grills? I cannot for the life of me find 4" black grills online unless they are from china, and will be here in 5 months. It looks like you are using The gameroomsolution Bartop kit, or similar? which is crazy if thats the case... looks like you may have even cut the entire piece out for the actual speakers? I can't tell. All I know is that it looks awesome!!!

I have a great bit if anyone reads this... I just received a Hardware scan line generator... My Hyperspin setup and all the crappy scanlines via software were letting me down... to be honest I didn't even know this even existed until recently.... so to all of you who don't know about it, I will say this.... get one!! Total game changer to say the least... It's been the one thing that's been making me crazy, and this cheap device overrides the I/O. ABSOLUTELY BRILLLIANT.... all my games look and feel 100% authentic now. I got mine at focus attack website... can't say enough about it. Wowwwwww.

Kung Fury cab getting close!!!

Capeman

@MaTTyDredZ I am using the ArcadeForge bartop kit from this link: http://arcadeforge.net/Arcade-Bartop/ArcadeForge-Bartop-DIY::239.html

The speaker grills were part of the kit if you add on the Arcade Extras option, adds on the grills, speakers, backlight for the marquee and other fun doodads. They are metal with a black matte finish, ill take a close up photo tonight if I remember. If they are not on that site as an individual part, Im sure you could email them and ask what the part is, the guy who runs it Jochen is really awesome and super helpful.

But now that I think of it, I don't think the speakers in my setup are 4" so that might not do.

I get all my other buttons and joysticks from Focus Attack also, they are great.

hatfield44

Thank you for sharing this! That is the best graphics I have seen on a cabinet! I am completely ganking your idea and side panels! (hope you don't mind) I took your side panels and replaced the pacman grid, then made my own marquee, control, and front panel based off your idea. I had a buddy print them for me on automotive wrap vinyl ( except the marquee is on regular white back vinyl) and then laminate them for me. They came out good, but I don't know how much light the marquee will let through. I am still trying to decide if I want to do something for the screen bezel or just leave it black. I will post a pic of the cabinet when I get it finished.

Capeman

@hatfield44 Not sure how you're going to get a good print upscaling a 750px wide jpeg with heavy anti aliasing and low jpeg compression... but you do you, man.

hatfield44

I know nothing about graphics, compression, etc... so I just set the image interpolation too "nearest neighbor" and winged it . The side panels still have a small amount of the yellow from the pacman grid that I was too lazy to get rid of so some of the characters "got the glow" like Bruce Leory.

I am sure it is not quite as crisp as what yours turned out to be, but I am happy with how it turned out! . I didn't think it would be legible at first so had a buddy print a test run. Probably didn't help that I also had to warp the back since my cabinet has a vertical back, but the characters pretty well look how I remember when playing them growing up. May be that my vision is worse than when younger as well.

Here is a pic of the actual vinyl.

akid1

Hi Capeman!

do you have any intention on sharing your printing files?

I would love to use them on my cabinet <3

Cheers from germany!!

Capeman

As a designer and maker of things, i have always had a fascination with arcade cabinets. To take your favorite nostalgic memories and combine them with your own building and technology skills to make something truly unique and cool. It's a large and expensive undertaking which forces you to test your knowledge and learn new skills.

I posted my work here to show the culmination of many months of effort to a crowd of peers that would appreciate my unique build approach. And I am overjoyed at the amount of positive feedback i have received from the community as a whole. Thanks everybody!

I don't mind makers drawing inspiration or appropriating ideas from my work into their own, but i never posted here with intention of having everybody's project look identical to mine. So to answer the queries about sharing my photoshop files, my answer is that i prefer not to.

The fun in this whole endeavor is making something special you can call your own and be proud of. One of the main reasons i'm part of this forum is to see everyone else's awesome work, it'd be boring if everybody was just making the same thing.

I guess my challenge to everbody is to show us your creativity, there are lots of ideas out there that haven't been made yet.

I am more than happy to help anyone with any questions they may have from the artwork, making and technical sides of putting together a cab like this. And if anyone is interested, I can post a tutorial on how to collage pixel perfect artwork and upscale to high resolution with no quality loss if people want to make artwork similar to mine with a cast of your own favorite characters (or levels, or items, or backgrounds).

goodpi31

Oh wow that looks awesome.

RanxJ

Very very very cool! Amazing inspiration for my bartop!
Congratulations man!

KaToy2k

@hatfield44 can you share that print file?

KaToy2k

@capeman i understand you not sharing your print file. Can you please share the asset artwork files? I am a designer and i would not know where to obtain all those files. I am also interested in a tutorial on how to collage pixel perfect artwork and upscaling with no loss in quality. My guess is that they are all vector files.