Classic Universal generic cabinet – Good tracing candidate

The original Mr. Do! cabinet was housed in that generic Universal cabinet with the red, yellow and orange stripes. I don’t want to spend a night scanning a cabinet, stitching the artwork just to get authentic stripe sizes. I am just going to flip the cabinet on its side and trace it instead.

Note: Before you think it. Mr. Do! isn’t exactly your regular cabinet with stenciled artwork. Mr. Do! was either printed on a vinyl and then laminated, or was printed right on the laminate and then some sort of glossy finish was applied. Tracing this cabinet for stencils wouldn’t technically be authentic, but we need to get the artwork digital regardless and someday (read middle of next year) I will figure out a solution for the glossy finish.

I had already talked about using vellum for tracing earlier in the year when I highlighted the Scramble stencil artwork. But, to do it again…start by flipping the cabinet on its side. This ‘tutorial’ is more of a demonstration, I am sure most people know how to trace.

The vellum sheets I got from Thisoldgame.com came with plenty of extra length. I cut down the vellum close to the height of the cabinet so that I could tape it down to anchor it to keep the tracing from moving.

The vellum is cloudy, but not so transparent so it is hard to see where you have drawn your lines. I was lucky to borrow a large drywaller piece of aluminum from work that we use to cut fabric and use that as my straight edge. I also used a small triangle for the smaller straight lines. Here you can see some of my progress on the stripes, as well as the logo. I will probably reference an already vectorized Universal logo for adding to this pattern at the Illustrator stage, so I wasn’t worried about minutia level detail on tracing the lettering. All corners on the lettering of the Universal logo have a small corner radius, probably 1/16″ or smaller.

Beyond that, go through and trace all of the artwork. I actually went ahead and generally etched in the shape of the cabinet so we know the general placement of the artwork on the side. Make sure before you untape to gently lift up a side to really see what you have drawn and what you might have missed.

Here is what my final looks like;

I can’t stress this enough, but just because I am doing the tracing of the Universal sideart patten does not mean this is reproduced. It is there in case it makes sense to make some stencils, but without the glossy finish figured out, having this artwork as vector is premature.

What’s next for vellum traced cabinet artwork?

At this point I would suggest making a note of the colors of each piece of artwork. Maybe write a little ‘R’ (Red) in each shape, or whatever color. This is good to reference back later if a project gets shuffled, or if artwork is made into a stencil it is easy to know which color is which.

Then a grid will be drawn, and those sections scanned to make it easier to piece back as one side of artwork. I’ll either do that myself or send it off to Rich to do himself. We’d all like to see this happen a little more often, and it is so easy that any collector can do it and expand the available library of arcade game stencils. It would only take a couple of hours, depending on artwork complexity, and certainly shouldn’t take many months to accomplish. Rich had already talked about this process for stencils for Stern’s Scramble at Coinopspace.com.

Got a stenciled cabinet? Help us out. Sinistar cockpit comes to mind

You're reading Tracing stenciled arcade artwork with vellum is a post from: Jeff Rothe, originally posted on Rotheblog - An Arcade Game Blog. If you've enjoyed this post, be sure to follow Jeff on Twitter, Facebook, and Google +.

Easy as an autoplay checkbox

Having music on your profile page on a social network can add to the ambiance and personality that best reflects you. At least that is what people say.

However, on CoinOpSpace.com – arcade game social network, we don’t want users to feel any intrusion due to the music choices of another member. So, we’ve stated that the rule is, you can have music, but you have to turn the autoplay option for the music off. Member can choose to listen to your music if they want, and can access it from the main music repository on their site if they choose they want to add something to their profile that you have uploaded.

Turning off the autoplay is just a checkbox.

1. On your profile page – find the music module – click the edit button
2. Make sure to ‘uncheck’ the autoplay option – hit ‘save’

Here is what you will see on default after you have uploaded music. The autoplay option will be checked, just uncheck that option box and you’re all set.

You're reading Turn off music playing automatically in Ning is a post from: Jeff Rothe, originally posted on Rotheblog - An Arcade Game Blog. If you've enjoyed this post, be sure to follow Jeff on Twitter, Facebook, and Google +.

Simplified formatting – Power of ‘Latest Reply’

I am like everyone else, I hope that when I visit a forum thread that I have the option to go to the latest reply. This idea is really irrelevant when using RSS feeds, but regardless some leopards will never change their spots and adapt easier technology.

On Ning, and specifically on CoinOpSpace.com (Arcade Game Forum), you can view forum topics in two sections – On the homepage and under ‘forums’.

On the homepage, all of the topics are displayed with the latest replied to topic at the top. The homepage displays the 10 latest commented on topics. This can be changed in quantity up to a cumbersome 20 topics, and down to quite a few less.

To view the latest reply within that topic, all the user has to do is click on the Last Reply link underneath the topic synapsis to the right. If there is no Last Reply link, that means that the topic is brand new and there are no replies yet. Ning, like many forum softwares, lists the name of the forum where that topic came from right to the left of it to give a user a sense of the structure.

If you are within the ‘Forum’ tab you can also go to the latest reply, and this is to the latest topic. The current view displays the different forum categories that are available. This is important for the user so they get a scope of what is available to them for filing their post, and as of today this will continue to be the format for CoinOpSpace.com.

To see the latest reply on the latest topic, click on the Reply by XMember link. Once you choose an area to visit, just click on the same link inside on each specific forum category topic Reply by XMember.

Final notes

I certainly wouldn’t have chosen Ning if I didn’t feel like the necessary components to facilitate easy conversation were in place in the forum section. You won’t find emoticons, and a whole bunch of formatting buttons. The WYSIWYG for a forum post is very simple, bold, italic, underline, strikethrough, insert an image and insert a link.

One of my favorite things about the forum piece is that you can ‘feature’ discussions at the topic of the category views. I think that this is important if there is some ongoing topic that all members should see, regardless if they only visit one specific category or not.

The forum software won’t be for everyone, and I acknowledge that. But the forums are 1/10th of the big picture of the Ning platform, which is tighter integration of different kinds of user content. With so many features and a great search function, I hope that users can continue to adjust to a stripped down forum software.

You're reading How to use the CoinOpSpace forums is a post from: Jeff Rothe, originally posted on Rotheblog - An Arcade Game Blog. If you've enjoyed this post, be sure to follow Jeff on Twitter, Facebook, and Google +.

I did fail in my first attempt, but that misfire led me to the second attempt which I was really happy how that turned out.

CoinOpSpace.com Header Design

I was really inspired by a designer who has did an awesome Space Invaders montage / mural and has an amazing online portfolio. The one design in particular that struck me was the ‘CMYK’ design. I thought that for sure, this is what I wanted to use to inspire the base design for CoinOpSpace.

I spent a lot of time compositing the image with different pieces of arcade game artwork, using just the simple outlines. Well, while the piece is really impressive by itself, in both black and white and in color, the space I had to work with wasn’t jiving.

I was finding that the detail in the arcade artwork wasn’t working at the size I needed, I needed thicker lines, and more resolved designs. Without going through and taking days to redraw and resolve each piece of artwork to it’s essential pieces I decided to try something similar.

I had found that at a larger size some of the artwork piece worked. I dropped one color, the yellow, which was too powerful, and composited the new design. Click the image for a larger version.

Review on the CoinOpSpace.com Design

I will take some feedback, but in general I am happy with it. If there are really good ideas on changes for the layout, I will consider them. Leave a comment here or at the CoinOpSpace Design thread.

You're reading Design for CoinOpSpace Arcade Forum is a post from: Jeff Rothe, originally posted on Rotheblog - An Arcade Game Blog. If you've enjoyed this post, be sure to follow Jeff on Twitter, Facebook, and Google +.

I don’t know if this was purposeful, to save space on the server. That would make sense. But based on how truly crappy UBBThreads is as a forum software my guess is that this is default MO. At CoinOpSpace – My arcade forum and social network, you click a button to upload a photo, and you’re done. The way mom intended it.

Usability vs. Cost

If Klov.com did set up their forum to not store images to save space, that’s fine. That’s a decision you make. But it certainly makes it difficult for the user to have to take all those extra steps just to include an image in a simple post. I hand it to the Klov guys, they just deal with it graciously. Hats off.

Here’s a screenshot using the CoinOpSpace.com forums;

Hit reply, choose your image, and you’re done. No separate screen either to load up, a nice little AJAX window loads on top of the current post to make your upload that much faster. Ning software sizes the image for you, and inserts real HTML, not BBCode crap that you can then easily position your image center, left, or right. If you post a lot of images of your project arcade games, or items for sale, using CoinOpSpace.com can save you a ton of time. And headache.

You're reading Klov vs. CoinOpSpace (Ning) Round 4 – Directly upload images is a post from: Jeff Rothe, originally posted on Rotheblog - An Arcade Game Blog. If you've enjoyed this post, be sure to follow Jeff on Twitter, Facebook, and Google +.

Make your opinion known

Any and every opinion. Talk about integration between the terribly outdated VAPS, the forums, and klov.com. Ask for upgrades in search and the ability to actually add photos to your post inline without having to go externally, size them, and then link them into your post. Ask for the best in software, I would recommend choosing vBulletin for sure. Ask to make the dynamic post ids changed using mod-rewrite to have pretty url’s so that search engines can more easily find the forum, index it, and let general searchers stumble in and join. I mean, where is Klov in the Google searches? Not on the first page for ‘arcade forum’ or ‘arcade game forum’. Spam laden Gamehourz would appear to be our first choice.

The past track record doesn’t speak to Klov’s strengths. Maintenance has switched hands a couple of times over the 15+ years, I think that there has been an under construction sign on VAPS ever since I started collecting so that has been at least 3 years! Wow.

But, everyone should get a chance to improve, and I think this time the Klov forums will follow through with it. They know that if they come out, take feedback again, and then do nothing for another year they will just anger more people and more people will leave. Klov would be wise to set a specs document and timelines for completion. Set timelines for when feedback has to be in, set a timeline for when a final specs document will be published, and then set smaller benchmarks on when each improvement can be expected to be made.

I know these guys donate their services and their time, but that doesn’t mean they can sit on their laurels while arcade collectors are screaming for so much more.

If change is made, that is all that I ever wanted. I wanted someone to follow through with what they said they were going to do. I am not asking for a system that integrates artwork, a game database, a pcb database, etc. etc. on and on in three months. But what I am asking for is constant improvement. Small improvement, over time. What technical system is still viable after 5 years with little to no upgrade? Just about nothing, and that is what the klov forums are, not viable and a horrible time drain when they could be so much better.

The alternative – I got tired of waiting

As I said before, I’m not a programmer. I can’t tie everything together and make everything great. But…I work my butt off. I am trying something of my own, that may or may not take off. I have heard from so many guys that ‘We’d like this and that, we have the skills but we don’t have the time right now’ All I can think to do is invest an hour a night, and a year from now hopefully there will be a great site to visit. Otherwise, I technically don’t have the time either.

So, if you are looking for a forum that is miles above UBBThreads, as well as free blogs, image hosting, an online video gallery (Like our own little YouTube), integrated chat, game groups and more, it resizes images for you – no external linking, check out;

It’s like MySpace, but nicer looking. I am not saying it’s for everyone, but at least give it a shot. Poke around. You will find that it will make your collecting life so much easier.

We’d love to have the Klov guys throw their weight behind our forum, obviously. We are not nearly the size of them or have the retained audience, and we may never be. But our interaction features are so much better, and we could use some help. Greg McClemore is a database admin, so working together we could all make for a great site.

So, there are the options

Try the CoinOpSpace arcade game social network, or give all of your feedback to Greg to make the Klov forums better. He has mentioned a number of great things that an upgrade can bring to users. Otherwise, Greg, let’s pool resources and make the best community available. Let’s work out a deal with Quarter Arcade to use GGDB, improve on it, and dump VAPS altogether.

Change is finally coming, one way or the other.

You're reading Klov thinking about upgrading forum software – Voice your opinion is a post from: Jeff Rothe, originally posted on Rotheblog - An Arcade Game Blog. If you've enjoyed this post, be sure to follow Jeff on Twitter, Facebook, and Google +.

How to instructions for arcades to accept tokens

If after you’ve read this article and you still have questions about how to get your games to stop accepting quarters, here are a couple of links to Arcadereplay for other articles you can check out;

• Modifying Happ Plastic Quarter mechs for .984” token use
• Modification of Coin Controls Metal Quarter Mechs

Alright, on to the tutorial, written by Mike “Cadillacman” on the Klov forums.

How to modify standard coin mechs to use a 25mm token

As you can tell a token is slightly larger in diamater than the quarter, so modifications are necessary. Don’t be scared! It’s actually prtetty easy.

Tools Needed

• Screwdrivers – Good but small needlenose pliers
• File – Decent & small, preferrably with file edge on the sides of the file as well

Optional Tools (Highly reccomended)

• BEER!!!!!!!!!!
• BEER!!!!!!!!!!
• Uhm….more BEER!!!!!!!!!!

First off, I’m going to be showing you this with the Coin Mech Inc. coin mechanism. It’s a pretty standard unit. Most mechs are the same or similar.

Ok, so try to drop a token in. You will notice that the token stops before it really even gets into the mech. There are two “guides” (one on each side of the token) that I think are also there to stop oversize coins from getting in, therefore they stop your token. Do Not bend these. Trust me on that one.

Using your file, file the edge of these that the token is hitting. Keep filing a little bit at a time untill the token passes by easily. Do Not file so much that the token goes in all sloppy.

(Ignore the token in this pic, I was using it to hold back another part of the mech.)

So, at this point a token should go in, but most likely gets stuck in the cradle.

This is happening because of two reasons;

1. The brass “hook” piece needs to be filed and re-adjusted
2. The token usually hits the end of the “reject rod”

It is at this time that I remove the “brass hook”. One e-clip and its off. Save it, you will need it later!

Like I stated before, you need to file the end of the “reject rod” Heres a before and after pic.

You will want to file primarily at a 90 degree angle to the long part of the rod, as well as on the underside of the rod, but smooth the whole corner out while you’re at it.

Now clean the filings out and test. If you’ve done everything right a token should go through the mech easily, but will probably reject. This is for several reasons, one because the hook is missing, and because the mech will also need a few more mods. I have tried bending the cradle instead of filing the reject rod, and the result was me bending the cradle back to the way it was and filing the reject rod. It almost made the mech work worse when I bent the cradle.

The next step is filing and modifying the “brass hook”. Some peole just leave this out, but I’ve found the mech seems to work better with it in – but modified. I think this hook is designed to keep too small of a coin from passing through the cradle by locking the cradle. The problem is that the 25 mm token it too big, and maxes out this hook the other way. You need to file the part shown (the part that contacts the coin)

Before:

After:

I also file the sides and the other side of this part slightly, just to clean it up and give it slightly more “swing room” to accomidate this larger 25mm coin. Now you can Re-install the modified brass hook.

Again, try a token through the mech

If the token is again hanging-up in the cradle, then you will need to bend that same piece you just filed on the “brass hook” outwards sligltly(away from the coin) just slightly! It won’t take much. Be patient, this process may take a few tries.

Now you should be back to getting a token through the mech, but is most likely rejecting every token you put in.

Relax, it’s ok. Now for the easy modifications!

The next thing to mess with is this sheet metal thing. Somehow the coin hits it and it decides to reject or not reject.

I prefer to just remove it. Sometimes you can just adjust it. One screw and its gone. You can always save it for later if you want to go back to quarters.

Only one mod left! whoohoo!

See this little thing? (bottom part)

Somehow it helps the coin decide which hole to go to. You want to it to Not reject, so loosen up the flatblade screw, and slide it out as much as you can, while still letting the little metal finger at the end free-float, then retighten the screw.

At this point, you should have a working mech that takes 25mm tokens easily, and accepts them every time.

Additional Tech Tips

There is also an adjustment at the metal slug grabber. (Its a magnet) If your token gets hung up there, simply increase the gap by adjusting the magnet out further. This can be done by adjusting the flathead machine screw at the top of that part. The more you screw in the screw, the further away the magnet sits (increases the gap).

To change this mech back to quarters, re-add the small sheetmetal piece, re-adjust the bottom arm, and re-bend the hook part that you filed back previously (in slightly). Alternatively, if you removed the hook just re-install it.

With a little more finesse you could probably make it take both quarters and 25mm tokens, but I have had better luck just making them take one or the other.

Then there’s other types of mechs

First off, the “newer” coin controls mech.

This one only required adjustments, no file modifications.

Insert a token, it will most likely get stuck in the top of the mech. Adjust the white plastic piece with a flathead screwdriver, just a little bit of a turn at a time. Eventually you will get the token to go through the mech.

Now it may be rejecting alot or all of the tokens. Simply adjust the final reject/accept linkage (similar to the older coin controls 130 mech) and you’re done. This mech also has the same type of metal slug rejector magnet and adjuster. Adjust if necessary.

Up next, a plastic Happ mech.

Im my case, this didn’t take much to make it take tokens. I think its been messed with previously. Just a very slight filing of a few key areas mentioned in the first mech mod, (same as the old coin controls 130), except it did not even require that much work. This mech also has a similar reject / accept piece at the end, adjust as necessary to make the mech accept your token after it makes its way through the cradle and everything else first.

One website mentioned that some people have had to scrape out some plastic in this marked area, but I personally have not:

The final mech I have encounteredis the Simonex plastic mech.

If you have this one, pat yourself on the back. There are no moving parts in this mech! Its a pretty cheap and crude mech. Simply adjust the coin slot at the top so it will accepta 25mm token, and thats it!

This is a very hobbiest-friendly mech. It’ll take almost anything and since there’s no moving parts, it really can’t jam up!

That’s all there is to that mech. Very simple.

I’ve gone over all the mechs I’ve come across, most have a similar design.

Now, the other battle is getting the token into your coin slot on the coin door, and getting the token through the coin switch and out into your coin bucket. These slots were also designed for quarters, and sometimes a token will not fit.

First Up Standard Happ-type Coinslot

There is a small metal plate sandwiched in between the parts in this door. You need to modify that piece. Using your file edge, file out this hole (make the opening taller) It does not take much. You could also just remove this piece if desired. Your token should now go in and on its way to the coin mech!

Next Up – A Midway Type Coin Door

On my Mr. Do! (originally a Gorf) the slot was simply too small to accept a 25mm token, but only by mabye a 1/2 mm.

Again, using the file edge, file both ends of this slot so you make the opening slightly wider.

If you are careful doing this, nobody would ever know that you have modified it.

Now we have gotten the token into the modified coindoor slot and through the modified mechanism. On most modern doors, the 25mm token will exit right through the coin switch area with ease. On the older coin doors, you also have to do a little bit of trickery here too.

I have a midway door here that the token was hanging up at the switch. I remedied this situation by doing two things:

1. I bent the wire that the coin hits. Make it “hug” the left side of the chute as much as possible without dragging.
2. If that’s not enough, slightly clearence the right side of this chute using the edge of your file. It won’t take much.

It sounds like a long process, but I get most done in about 5 mins!! The first one does take awhile, then once you work through all the issues the next ones go alot easier.

Questions on making the token modification?

I think that’s about it. If anybody has a question when it comes time to do yours just leave a comment below. I hope this tutorial / how-to helps some guys out. I’ve done all the cursing and head scratching so you don’t have to!

You're reading Tutorial – Change your coin door to accept tokens is a post from: Jeff Rothe, originally posted on Rotheblog - An Arcade Game Blog. If you've enjoyed this post, be sure to follow Jeff on Twitter, Facebook, and Google +.

At the Arcade Game Collecting Community you can paste the embed code from YouTube or upload original videos to the site and those videos are then easy to find later with the search tool.

No more trying to find that arcade video you saw that ‘one time’

With a section all to itself, on the Ning arcade game forum there is a page just for videos with an image showing the video, the length as well as the tags associated.

The video storage functionality here isn’t going to wow you. It is a very simple version of many video sharing sites already online. However, the difference is that while you are using the arcade forum if you think of a video you’d like to link to or share, you can reliably use the general search feature. The search results will specify where it found the content you were searching for, in the videos section, photos section or even the forum – like it did here in my results in searching for that Seinfeld ‘Frogger’ video. This will be beneficial if and when the video section gets to be really extensive.

No more hunting through pages of videos at YouTube to find that one particular video to link to in your post. Plus, if you were the one who uploaded the arcade related video you can also narrow your search through your profile page.

Have an original digital video you want to upload?

You can do that too! Just like YouTube the Ning forum will convert your video to the most ubiquitous format for sharing on the forum.

However, I will say that the space is relatively limited, you could only store about 500 videos for free, so you’re probably best to just upload it and store it online at YouTube and then paste in the Embed code. You’ll probably get more views and comments that way from the general searcher.

You're reading Collecting videos at the arcade forum is easy is a post from: Jeff Rothe, originally posted on Rotheblog - An Arcade Game Blog. If you've enjoyed this post, be sure to follow Jeff on Twitter, Facebook, and Google +.

Your Website Needs to have an RSS Feed

If your website isn’t database driven then you may have a problem with this. Database driven websites usually have scripts in them that easily parse out and generate an XML RSS feed to read into other content aggregators. If you constructed your website with the blood and tears of regular HTML, then this might not work out for you. (You can manually create an RSS feed, but that is time consuming and out of the scope of this post.)

If your arcade blog / website is running WordPress, then you already have an RSS feed whether you know it or not. The feed is always located at this address;

http://www.yoursitename.com/?feed=rss2

Import that arcade information into your Ning profile

It’s so easy. First, if you notice after you create an account, on the left hand side you should see a module called ‘RSS’. If you want to do like Mikey (Me), you can put your RSS feed stories at the top of your page. If you notice, when you hover over the title bars of the modules, you can drag and drop them somewhere else. Most of them have this capability minus the sections on the top left, etc.

After you drag the RSS module to the top of the page, click edit and you can change the title to something more friendly than ‘RSS’. Right below that you add the URL for your RSS feed. Select the amount of items to display, hit ‘Save’ and you’re done!

You can add any RSS feed you want. You could even add in the RSS feed for the Google Groups if you want to keep up with the news there when you sign into your profile. Here is that address;

http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.video.arcade.collecting/feeds

As I mentioned before in the ‘Ning vs. Klov Round 2 – RSS Feeds‘ thread, the Klov forum is running such outdated software that it doesn’t have an RSS feed, so don’t bother trying to import any information from there.

Final notes on this short Ning Tutorial

Just another tip for customizing your profile. As always you can pop over to my Rotheblog profile and ask me questions, or leave a comment here if you can’t figure something out. I can try to help.

You're reading Using Ning Tutorial – Import an RSS Feed is a post from: Jeff Rothe, originally posted on Rotheblog - An Arcade Game Blog. If you've enjoyed this post, be sure to follow Jeff on Twitter, Facebook, and Google +.

Ever wanted your own arcade game website? Now’s your chance – for free!

I took an hour or so to whip up three custom arcade game banners for your profile. These are free for you to use, and to make it even easier I am hosting them here at Rotheblog.com for now. You are free to download and host them yourself if you want. They are 945px wide, which is how wide your profile page is, so if you save them out just don’t change the dimensions and they should work fine.

I just grabbed a couple piece of vector artwork for some favorite games – Agent X, Centipede and Donkey Kong and made some banners. For simplicities sake, here are some text links directly to the banners;

They aren’t amazing when it comes to design, I have seen worse, but they are mainly for new members to get used to how to customize their profile page.

Let’s Get Started

Pretty easy to do actually.

Step 1 – Click ‘My Profile’ at the top of the page
Step 2 – On the left you should see a thumbnail with navigation for all of your content – your photos, videos and blog. If you notice there is a link that says ‘theme’. Click that link.

Step 3 – Once you’ve entered your personalize theme area you will see a whole selection of premade themes at the top. At any time you can apply one of those themes. But, if you scroll down to the bottom you will see a split screen with a link named ‘Advanced’. Click ‘Advanced’

Step 4 – In the ‘Advanced’ section you can change a ton of stuff color wise and graphically if you know your CSS. It is almost limitless using the framework of HTML that is in place. If you know nothing about CSS, that is fine. Take the follow codes and paste them in at the bottom of the screen. I will give a short explanation of what they do.

#xg_masthead{
height:114px;
}

This will set the top portion to a fixed height. In this case I designed my banners at 130px which when you add in the top Ning bar you get a height of 114px visual area. You may need to make some small tweaks depending on whether the banner sits behind the navigation as a background or not. If that is the case, just lower the pixel height.

#xg_sitename{
display:none;
}

This hides the text for the community – ‘Classic Arcade Game Community’ and the tagline.

Now, you can also hide the Tagline for the website but a word of warning. The paragraph tag for the tagline also occupies space, so if you hide it height will be gone and your navigation will probably show at the top of the screen. If you decide to do this, modify the above line like so;

#xg_sitename, #xg_sitedesc{
display:none;
}

Then add padding to the top of the navigation div block based on how you have designed your banner. Change the padding to taste;

#xg_navigation{
padding:100px 0 0;
}

Only use the following code if you don’t like the main site background! I made a background that uses classic arcade game flyers, but you can always remove that background or link to an external image similar to the banners (which you’ll see below).

body, .xg_marginbg{
background-image:none;
background-color:#000;
}

This will set the main background graphic to nothing and the background color to black. Change the background color to taste and to match your banner.

Banner Codes

For each of the banners, here are the codes you will need. You only need one, so choose one banner and paste it in. If you paste more than one, the one that is pasted lower in your stylesheet will take precedence.

This code will replace the current banner image and background and replace it with the one that you have selected.

Agent X
#xg, .xg_headerbg{
background:url(http://www.rotheblog.com/images/ning/profiles/agentx.jpg) no-repeat 0 0;
}

Donkey Kong
#xg, .xg_headerbg{
background:url(http://www.rotheblog.com/images/ning/profiles/donkeykong.jpg) no-repeat 0 0;
}

Centipede
#xg, .xg_headerbg{
background:url(http://www.rotheblog.com/images/ning/profiles/centipede.jpg) no-repeat 0 0;
}

Pretty easy right? If you want to see more of what you can do, make sure to click on ‘Members’ and check out my Ning profile – ‘Jeff Rothe’ (Rotheblog.com). I customized ‘My Profile’ page to look very similar to my blog. I did some more advanced stuff, but I am more than willing to help anyone customize theirs if that means they will participate more in the community.

Questions?

This should give you some ideas. You can create your own banner, upload it to your own hosting and link to it. Design it how you like, improve a ton on these arcade game banners. If there is something that isn’t working right, maybe I left something out or something isn’t accurate in this short tutorials, let me know and I’ll make the correction.

You're reading Using Custom Graphics Your Ning Profile – Part 1 is a post from: Jeff Rothe, originally posted on Rotheblog - An Arcade Game Blog. If you've enjoyed this post, be sure to follow Jeff on Twitter, Facebook, and Google +.