Spire

About that cover art, Not only have I finally returned (yeah I'm terribly sorry to everybody about the wait!! ), but I've also completed the artwork and already sent in the final version (with a completed track list) and thumbnails to Blueberry on Sunday. So it should be available any time now. I really wish I was around during the release but that just did not work out. Still, I am to blame for not regularly checking my PMs here on the site during that time. So for that I'd like to convey my apologies to everybody!

Well, sounds like that might be a while

I just changed that because I thought it looked/fit in better, and I also thought it was kinda difficult to make him out in that other pose. But in light of your comment, maybe I was wrong about all of that? Also, after hearing Hadyn's mix, I've decided to revise my vote, if thats ok. I just edited my original post to avoid confusion.

Besides said remixes, my choices are: Ross Kmet - nautic lava Ichitootah - s3k sessions Hadyn - Heads Up For Tails Akumajobelmont - Water On The Dancefloor GaMeBoX - Frozen Lavareef My apologies to Rexy for mislabeling your track. Consider it fixed! Missing Frame- Seems like a bit much to release it all in different formats like that though. I think It might be best to release only the CD labels in JPG format and everything else as PDFs, how does that sound? Squishymon- You're right, I was kind of going for that steel/chrome look but I've since changed my mind. Unfortunatly, It just didn't seem to be matching very well with the front covers. [Edit: Revised my vote to include Hadyns mix]

While you wait for Snappleman's response to that question, heres something to chew on: Besides the track list on the special disk cover (since the wip tracks haven't been selected yet, ofc), I think my album art set is pretty much complete. The whole thing totals into 11 seperate files for the entire set! , but I guess thats just what you get for a 3-disk, 2-case album. This will (hopefully) be my final update so any nitpicking is welcome! I'd also just like to make sure I've labeled everything correctly and I'm not missing/forgetting anything. Main Album Front|Front-Inside|Back-Inside|Back Special Album Front|Front-Inside|Back-Inside|Back CD Labels All 3 Disks (final version each disk will be in it's own file). The small lines in the corners indicate bleed edges, so the edges won't actually extend out that far once you cut it to fit into the case. Also, Theres a few more things I was wondering about: 1. I was thinking of releasing these in PDF format with embedded fonts since I did these entirely in Illustrator. Like JPG format, pretty much anyone knows how to open them up and print them, they are roughly the same file size as the 300dpi jpgs are, they can be printed out at any dpi (though raster effects are locked at 300dpi), and unlike JPG format they are entirely non-lossy. The one thing I think I'd have export to JPG, though, would be the disk labels so that they can be used with the various types of CD labeling software people have. So, would PDFs be acceptable or do you just want everything in 300dpi JPGs? 2. Am I also going to need to create a booklet for the album? If so, what information do I put in there?

Well, I was going to actually try applying the chrome to the S&K Emblem (afterall, the original emblem from the game had similar effect on it) as well, so the inside would match the front.. but I just tried it and it looks terrible on the front cover. I guess I should have realized before hand that the styles would just contrast eachother way too much. So, yeah, I'm not so sure I wan't to leave it on those inside pieces anymore.. we'll see though.

Actually, I've been working on a much more detailed chrome effect. It takes a lot longer to do, and its kinda tedious, but I think you'll like the results. Sonic|Knuckles|Tails|Mecha-Sonic And also, heres one final attempt at making a Tails drawing that fits in with the rest of them. If no one likes it, then I'll just go with the flying Tails.. I've gone through 15 different poses for him and I'm pretty much out of ideas at this point. I just get the distinct impression from all of your comments that something just isn't right about it (and I can see that myself as well) but I can't really see what else I could do.

This is about as good as I could get the balancing Tails to look:

Oh yeah, I also wanted to post this: Its supposed to be sort of a chrome bevel around the character, and each one would have a different type of background overlay taken from the game (I used mushroom hill for this one). And I'll keep trying with that balancing stance, but I can't promise anything.

Heres some new ones, and I also tried adding in some eyes to the original ones as well. I wanted to get the balancing stance on there too but I just couldn't get it to look good. I may try that one again later.

Wow, well in that case, I guess I'll keep working on these Heres the other images I came up with for Tails, I could also go back and try other stances for Tails (or redo one of these) as well if I need to.

Glad to finally hear some positive comments on the emblem! I spent a while on that so I'm glad it turned out well. Heres some inside pieces I put together.. its just an idea I had. I overlayed them over some pictures in photoshop to give you an idea of what it would all look like when put together: Disk1/Sonic|Disk2/Knuckles|Disk3/Tails|No Disk3/Mecha-Sonic The words on the left edge are also supposed to show through to the front cover if you use it with a clear jewel case. I should look something like this: Front(Main)|Front(Bonus) The images of sonic, knuckles, tails, and mecha-sonic were formed by live-tracing the original sprites in Illustrator, though it was no simple task as I had to (sometimes heavily) modify the sprites in photoshop to get them to trace correctly, as well as some further editing beyond that to smooth it out. I have 3 different traces for each character so if you don't like any of the ones I used I have other ones that you might like more. So what do you think? If you like the idea, I'll see if I can do something better with them than just dropping down a shadow like that. If not, then I'll just forget about it and move on.

I think you may have mis-understood my post. I didn't mean to say that I wasn't willing to re-do my emblem (quite the contrary!). What I meant was that I actually just finished re-doing it yesterday [after I posted the images of the 2nd cover, which still had the old version of the emblem on it]. Maybe its just confusing because I haven't actually posted an image of my new version of the emblem yet... I was saving it for the next time I update on my progress, but here you go anyway. And here is the old version again for comparison. By the way, it seems no one has actually commented on that second album cover yet. Should I be taking that as a bad sign?

You did an awesome job on that emblem Protocol, its spot-on to the original and definatly better than the one I was using! Thanks a lot for the offer, but unfortunatly, I already re-did the whole thing because SnappleMan had asked me (via PM) to make it more accurate. I started working on it just after I posted that 2nd cover, and finished it up Saturday morning. Had you posted sooner I probably would have just used yours. It's REALLY too bad, too.. because I could (and probably would) have easily imported your SVG into Adobe Illustrator and taken it from there, saving me a lot of time. If you ever get board again, though, you should try your hand at your own cover. It can make for a pretty fun project if you have the time for it.

Well the spring spheres are also that color in the bonus stage so it actually works both ways

Too late! Heh, actually, I think the gold disk might work out just fine if used along with my idea for the 2nd set of album art. Why choose which one of the spheres to use when I could just put one on the cover, and the other on the disk?: What do you think? I suppose I could put the star sphere on the CD too, but I think this is probably the best way to go so long as I'm already putting it on the cover. Of course, if you don't like the new cover, then I can always put the star sphere back on the disc itself and I'd just have to come up with something else. Also, do I need to label the fronts with 'main track' and 'bonus track', or will the track lists on the backs suffice?

Actually, thats the way it looks on all the jewel cases I've ever seen. On the hinge-side it should be right-side up, but on the other side it's always up-side-down.

Well, I've tried that before, but unfortunatly the bright orange tiles confilct just as badly with the brighter text as the darker tiles conflict with the darker text. I could make it fade into a bright white, that would probably do the trick, but then it doesn't really fit in anymore. However, I think I found a solution anyway. If I just put a very thin, 0.25pt outline along with the gradient it appears to be much more read-able. Still not as legible as I'd like but it seems to be working, what do you think? Back Edit: And while I'm at it, heres some changes I made to the front that will hopefully help make the rounded-rectangles fit in better around the title. Front I think it also helps it match the back better as well.

Actually, the copy+paste error I was referring to earlier was caused by me copying the same textbox over and over - the font was leaving too much space between lines so I had to put them each in seperate boxes. I still typed out everything, which is why there were so many spelling mistakes . JackR: Have you seen the new version of the front cover? I believe I've already addressed the "grey lighting" issues with the logo, but maybe I'm just misunderstanding you. Jontilton: I couldn't use the "&" on that cover because of font size issues, it just won't fit in there. But don't worry - I'm going to be re-arraging the text boxes later, though, and hopefully I should be able to solve that problem in the process. q-pa: I like your idea! how's this? Nineko: Aesthetically, I agree with you on removing the desaturation box on the track list; however, having the text directly on the background makes it a bit too illegible I think. The contrasting colors just seemed to confuse it a bit too much. Maybe I'm wrong though? Here is what it looks like without the grey boxes. I'm just not sure about that bottom-right corner :/

Another update: Front|Back But this time I've made a lot of changes. Either I've improved it substantially, or completely butchered it ..although if no one likes it I can always go back to the way it was before. The new rounded-rectangle style I put over the title/track list is based on the blue-sphere counter from the special stages. The font I used isn't quite accurate to the game but seems to similar enough: Oh yeah, and I realize that on track 18 I couldn't quite fit in "BrainCells+SnappleMan", I'll be able to fix that later, it's just going to be a bit of a pain the way I have things set up right now. BTW: Thanks a lot for all the feedback thus far. I really appriciate it! I wasn't even sure if I wanted to finish this at all before, and hadn't even touched it for months, but now it's turned into quite a project.

Oh sure, but you totally misspelled "housethegrate". I've been playing around with the S&K emblem quite a bit actually. I think I'd be reasonably happy with the way it already looks but I'm still looking for something else that might look better, and while BLueBeRRy's did an excellent job with his logo, I think it would really clash with the colorful background that I already have on my cover. I might post some of my variations later and see which ones people like the best. Also, I'll be sure to try that font, thanks!

Well I'm very glad to see that you guys like my ideas. While I would of course prefer to keep it exclusive to my design, you may absolutly use the blue/red sphere idea on the official CD labels, thats ok with me. I've followed some of the suggesting and removed the directional blur effect from the background, as well as the shadows behind the titles. I seem to be hearing conflicting opinions on that Andes font though - I did initially choose it because it was used in the game itself, but I think it also just seems to fit in well with the rest of the design. I'll consider looking into alternative fonts, but most likely I think I'm just going to stick with it. Front Back Also, I apologize for the mistakes on the track list.. I guess I made a copy+paste mistake on track 21. But hey, I spelled Hadyn's name correctly the first time so that has to count for something right?

More album art... And Hello, by the way, I'm am indeed new here (long-time lurker, but never posted untill now etc etc..) but I've been anticipating this project for a long time and one day I just had a sudden urge to load up Illustrator and make blue-sphere-special-stage-themed album art for it (I did it a while ago actually, but never got around to posting it untill now). So here it is. I think it turned out pretty decent.. but really it's my first true attempt at album art so it could just be the newbie in me calling out and telling me it looks good when it really doesn't. If anyone really is interested in this Album art, though, please let me know and I'll take it to the next step and clean it up, finalize it, and set it up in the proper dimensions/resolution (I realize it's way off the way it is right now). It's all been created from scratch through Illustrator so doing that should be a breeze. I'd also, of course, be willing to impliment any suggestions or criticism anyone might have. Of course, if no one likes it at all then I could also just quietly back away and return to my reclusive watch over the happenings of this forum and probably never be seen or heard from again