Gaming badges for the wall

[jakj]

You know how people put bumper stickers on their cars when they go on long road trips, showing off the areas they've been to? I decided to do the same thing for the games I play, on my frontroom wall, in a nice nerdy hexagonal tiling. Here's the ones I've done so far (probably about 1/4 done with the games I've already played, considering I have a backlog from when I was a little kid ), obviously downscaled. (They look much better not crammed into one animated GIF at 20% the size, as the originals are 600dpi.) Images retrieved using Good-Old Google.

Just thought I'd share. Maybe someone else will be inspired and do it too! It's very easy to do in GIMP with masks and Screen/Multiply opacity.

[Xylord]

A Backlog of all the games I ever played... Just thinking about it is ridiculous. This thing would look like a muffining encyclopedia. I can count on one hand the games I didn't play from those you've already done I guess we have the same tastes.

[Milk]

It's not hard to have the same tastes when you play good games :P

[freakachu]

progress quest! yes! I approve.

[Eldmor]

If I did this with my Steam library, I wouldn't have a wall or ceiling anymore. Just a hexagonal pattern of awesome.

[jakj]

That's the general idea. My ceiling is smooth paint without spackle, so I might end up walking it up that way. It's about eight square feet currently.

[Eldmor]

I just imagined doing this to a wall and some jackass saying "DO U CATAN". Silly board gamers.

:isaboardgamer:

[jakj]

Hero Quest, best boardgame ever.

[The_DarthMoogle]

My room is yellow and staying that way.

These are, however, incredibly awesome.

There's bound to be thousands of people, and dozens of game companies that would approve of you selling these laminated.

[freakachu]

Hero Quest, best boardgame ever.

you, sir, have exquisite and refined taste.

[jakj]

Added 20 more badges, mostly a few more MMOs and phone games with a few regular Steam games mixed in (and one for Technic!). About 2/3 of the way through the digitally-distributed or online-only games I've actually played (which leaves half my Steam library yet to play), and then there're all of the physical games (discs and cartridges), so perhaps my initial estimate was a bit low.

Thus, the wall begins! The Dig-N-Rig one looks weird because my printer started running out of ink on it, and I kept it because I like the goofy way it came out. Also, I really suck at keeping everything in line, so there's a giant crack running up the middle that looks like an earthquake came through. Meh, nerdiness is all that counts.

I was going to upload the PDFs for people to use, but then I realized so far I have almost 800 MiB of them. O_O So if anybody does actually want any in particular, I can put those up, but putting the whole thing up would take way too long.

[Eldmor]

Maybe create a public Dropbox or Google Drive with the images inside?

[jakj]

Oh, I can host them easily; It's just that I have less than 1 Mbit upload so it would take a horrendous amount of time to upload them, and I didn't want to waste my time if nobody cared. If there's demand, though, I could certainly put them up.

[Jay?]

I'm going to revive this just to say that I am definitely interested. Also, if you could post the format/tools your using, you could totally open it up into something that people could contribute to.

[jakj]

Hey, cool to know somebody's interested. I'll work on uploading the stuff, then, though the duration is undetermined due to it being currently over 800 MiB versus my upload at less than 1 Mb per second. The only tool in use is GIMP (and I'll upload the relevant .xcf) using screen opacity and layer masks.

[The_DarthMoogle]

What dimensions and psi are you using?

Thought I'd make some and add it to the eventual collection. Sins of a Solar Empire, X: Beyond the Frontier and DayZ anyone?

[jakj]

Upload complete! All the .pdf files are at http://j-a-k-j.com/Badges/ and are produced at 600 dpi/ppi.

Also at that location is Template.xcf, which is a base GIMP file containing a single layer: It is sized at 8.5 inches by 11 inches (US Letter) with a layer mask in the shape of the hexagon. The basic techniques are as follows:

• Duplicate the base layer and hide it, so you always have a pristine copy to fall back on. (Or, just keep a copy of Template.xcf somewhere, because you can just drag-and-drop it into another image to generate a copy of the layer.)
  
• The easiest way to position the image within the layer mask is to "Select All"/"Cut"/"Paste", at which point you can drag it around independent of the layer mask, and then anchor it when it looks right.
  
• To feather the edge of something, set your foreground color to black, use the gradient tool, select the "FG to Transparent" gradient, and apply the gradient to the layer mask.
  
• Small things, like flair and logos, don't need the layer mask applied necessarily: They can just be placed right on top. The layer mask is necessary only to cut off the edges of things.
  

When you want to print, you're going to do these steps:

• Save your .xcf first, then do NOT hit "save" again at all.
  
• Go through all layers with layer masks and say "Apply Layer Mask".
  
• Starting at the top layer and working your way down, select "Merge Down". "Merge All Visible Layers" may fail if you have used fancy transparency like Screen.
  
• Do NOT use "Flatten Image".
  
• Now that you have a single layer which is a single hexagon that is transprent all around it, go to Export To and use the ".pdf" extension.
  
• Close the .xcf WITHOUT SAVING, or choose to revert your changes to before you started applying layer masks.
  
• Print your .pdf.
  

And, of course, if you want something other than a hexagon, or you want to make it a different size, feel free to simply change the layer mask.

Note: Squares and hexagons are mathematically-proven to be the only regular polygons in the entire universe that can be tiled on their own. You can feel free to use any shape you want, of course, but if you use something other than a square or hexagon, you're going to either have gaps or have to use other shapes to fill in.

[The_DarthMoogle]

Heh, I may need to leave a tenner by the school laminator... :D

[Xylord]

Note: Squares and hexagons are mathematically-proven to be the only regular polygons in the entire universe that can be tiled on their own. You can feel free to use any shape you want, of course, but if you use something other than a square or hexagon, you're going to either have gaps or have to use other shapes to fill in.

My triangles feel offended.

[The_DarthMoogle]

My triangles feel offended.

Escher feels offended.

EDIT : Oh, regular. My bad.

[jakj]

My triangles feel offended.

Disqualified from the event due to rotation. :P

[Jay?]

small error, it's not just squares, it's quadrilaterals in general that can all tile on their own.

[jakj]

But non-square quadrilaterals are not regular. :P

[Xylord]

small error, it's not just squares, it's quadrilaterals in general that can all tile on their own.

But non-square quadrilaterals are not regular.

:iceburn:

[MrFly]

You know how people put bumper stickers on their cars when they go on long road trips, showing off the areas they've been to? I decided to do the same thing for the games I play, on my frontroom wall, in a nice nerdy hexagonal tiling. Here's the ones I've done so far (probably about 1/4 done with the games I've already played, considering I have a backlog from when I was a little kid ), obviously downscaled. (They look much better not crammed into one animated GIF at 20% the size, as the originals are 600dpi.) Images retrieved using Good-Old Google.

Just thought I'd share. Maybe someone else will be inspired and do it too! It's very easy to do in GIMP with masks and Screen/Multiply opacity.

ROTMG and Magicka are some of the best games I have played in my life (besides Minecraft obviously)