So the thumbnails...

 First of all if you haven't read this entry, please do - otherwise this might not make sense.

But I spent a couple of days updating the worst offenders among the thumbnails, - admitted, there might be some that went under the radar, - but from the best of my knowledge. These were those in the most need of an update. 

You can see them all here in this entry But I am going to run through some different approaches to thumbnails and why I did like I did; - in this post. 

This one is made with original graphic and a homemade vector layer of mine.  This is very often what I do, - I will edit the original banner, or a screenshot and add a visual vector layer I made myself. In this case the screenshots available is not great, - and the game is really not pretty, weirdly crude and too dark to get any decent screenshot. But the thumbnail is really boring too, however I did decide to use the original banner because it was after all the best graphic I could dig up unless I wanted to make my own.

I know I talked about this banner in particular in the original entry, And while I hate the random ass AI elf, I also hate the original graphic banner. So this is a screenshot I edited and color corrected, hiding the weird boarded up window with darkness and text. And like Fingerbones, this game is not exactly pretty.  But this screenshot, which is from the dev's itch.io page - did work as a thumbnail with some edits.

And this one, it was one of the worst ones imo. And this one I edited with two screenshots. Placing the monsters in the back, blurring the image. I edited the elf out of the background, and used that background as a vector, imposed over the blurry monsters. Then I reintroduced the elf, and added a flare effect to his lantern. And finally I muted the entire image with some color correcting and structure vector layers.  - this is VERY often what I do, I'm gonna show you another example of it below.

Here I did the same as with the Lake of Voices, - and while these are just the newest examples, - trust me! This is actually what I usually do when I make thumbnails.

And this is also something I often do, - here we have a screenshot that I edited. And as you can see I removed the weird shadow man in the door, and I also applied some vector layers for structure and vibe. But where it is different from the others, is because I used the title text from the original, isolated that and used it on the screenshot thumbnail. - Honestly sometimes I just hate the typography the original banner has, - or I simply can't isolate it nicely no matter what I do. And then I will either just pick whatever font I think is best, or try and find something that resemble what was used on the original banner.  In this case of course, I could easily isolate the text, and I think it's a great stylistic choice as well. - I do try to make the thumbnails in a way so people will recognize the game in some way by the banner graphics alone.

Right, here is a thumbnail where I just used a stock photo from the internet, and slapped text across it. I don't do this very often, but it does happen.

Here is a banner where I made the "object" with Gentube, - isolated it and introduced it on a background I created with some color and structure layers on a mono color background. - As I said, this is absolutely a viable solution when you have a game without any graphics (or any useable graphics). I will still argue this is definitely both more fun and creative, to make a custom thumbnail like this with AI components, - than to do as I did with the Sheep of Burrow farm (I mean to just take some stock photo).

Speaking of stock photos, here we have two stock photos that I edited to look like one. I'll show you the original stock photos below (these are from befunky btw)

This is also a method I go to, when I need to come up with something myself, - in this case it's two stock photos, but often one of these layers could be a nature image I made with AI as well. Because I do actually make plenty of those images like patterns and nature stuff that will work when imposed as a vector layer. But in the name of this transparency, I would mention one of the visible layers are created with AI. - you can download the dark woods background on this blog here

Now, this example is a mix between the background of blurry monsters from the lake of voices, and a treeline image that I created with AI. (and no, again, this has nothing to do with the dev) I just think it looked awesome, - and I did use this image, and didn't credit the gamedev. Mainly because you'd never know if I didn't tell you, - but also because I honestly don't think they'd care about  the mention. But of course if it was obvious what the background was made of, I'd credit.

So this banner is terrible, but so is the game. I used the same stock photo as I showed you above, with the pine trees, and imposed on the original graphics. But then I added that weird ass doll. And I am snowing you because I made this other graphic to show you.

I made this to show you, the doll is in fact a stock photo I isolated and edited, and it's not made with AI. I do that sometimes as well, - so even if it might look like AI, it doesn't have to actually be made with AI.

Here is a version where I used the original banner with a screenshot, and if the banner is very simple like this, - it's easy to edit into something else. So in that aspect it's very much like the Stillwater banner.

Okay this banner isn't special, it's basically the same as the Sheep of Burrow Farm. But I noticed something funny when I uploaded it.

This was a graphic made on the old banner I made, - I mean before the AI image I had before. And look at that, - it's seriously the same stock photo of a staircase, it's honestly random. I didn't know this, and only found out because I went looking for something else in the video. 

This is an alternative version of the banner, but I just wanted to show you something, - and figured it was easier to see on this version without all the grunge distortion.

This is the original stock photo by the way, maybe it's easier for you to see it's the same staircase now.

Here I isolated the twins in the screenshot, used the actual "logo" typography from the original banner. But made the background with my own vectors and stock photos. This is not a solution I use often, but sometimes it's just the only one I can come up with. You can find this background on the blog here

There's also times where I would just use a graphic from the game and write some text on it, like this.

Here I just did a light edit of the original banner.

These are the different methods I can think of, - and as I said. This is all about transparency, and why I showed you all these changes I made, - as I said you can find them ALL in the 'updated thumbnails' link to your right. 

But I also did make a whole bunch of these new thumbnails into desktop backgrounds, so you can go look there if you want to. 

There is a whole bunch of AI thumbnails, or AI-mixed media thumbnails left, - and that is because I like them. I am not done logging them, but I will be adding a text in the description, mentioning I made the thumbnail with AI. - Because that is really what it's all about here! And I realise I call it 'disclaimer', but I don't mean that as some sort of public service, - I mean it as; I made this with AI, end of.

As I said, I'm not done logging them, - but all these are custom created thumbnails, - and I fucking like them, so they stay. There might be more than these, or I KNOW there's more, - but for now this is just what I logged.

And I DID actually change the 'chatroom 203' thumbnail, but since I replaced one AI thumbnail with another AI thumbnail, I didn't really mention it, - but just in case here is the card for that.