And More: Share and Tell - Imitating The GTAV Title Logo Style [Commentary]

I recently created a logo for The Blog, done in the style of the GTAV game logo (Grand Theft Auto Five Title Logo, seen Left). I had a lot of fun figuring out how to imitate the look of it and wanted to share a bit of how I did it, in case others want to give it a try too, or just to enjoy the 'Behind The Scenes' story of things... Originally I was creating this to be used on Headers for posts here at The Blog (since I was playing GTAV lately), but I also put it on a Wallpaper posted at The Blog's Flickr page - but then decided that from now on, I will not put 'my logo' on Wallpapers that I want to share with everyone, I will just use whatever game logo the game is at the time, reserving 'my logos' mainly for use here [I was feeling bad for 'forcing them onto others' if I were to put them on Wallpaper for sharing with everyone...]


Just below this paragraph then, is The Blog logo, re-done in the style of the game logo from the game GTAV (Grand Theft Auto Five)... Created entirely in Corel's Paint Shop Pro, I first had to find a font for the lettering. I found a few of them (Pricedown is one, GTArussian is another, the name of the last one escapes me at the moment). I typed out each word separately, so that I could place them really close together (like the GTAV logo has for its' words), overlapping some of the 'tails' of the text (which was fine, for me). The "B" behind the ribbon was something else... Baskerville, that's it.

My version of The Blog logo, done in the style of the GTAV game title logo
(Click to see Full Size)

The ribbon was its' own element, blanked out (white with no text), placed on top of the "B", which itself was made in layers of outlines and a Gradient, using the original game title logo ("GTAV") as the source for the green shades (clicking with 'the dropper' on the far sides of the green area in the "V" in the GTAV logo). The spiral design was found online by an anonymous maker [let me know if it is you, I'll give you Credit!], which I had to colourize and then placed in a way that was similar to the GTAV logo, on a layer below the text "B" vectors, so that it 'shows through' within the "B" area.

The text on the ribbon was made with a font that escapes me at the moment, but the colouring for it was hard to figure out, as it looks like it is directional (as though a light were casting highlights from one direction). I figured out to use the Bevel effect in the Layer Styles of Paint Shop Pro, to emulate a light source coming from the bottom-left, for the text 'The Blog'. It turned out great for imitating the lighting on the text 'Five' in the GTAV game title logo ribbon! The hardest part was getting it to 'curve'. I don't know how to create a line and make the Text follow the line yet, so I simply used the Mesh Warp function, to 'move it around' manually and get it to seem at least a bit like it is curved.

A few layers of black and grey for 'outlining' the text and entire composition (made by 'expanding' the selected text and then Filling with Black or Grey, moving the white text in front of it each time) and it was complete...

I'll mainly be using it in Headers and Screenshots in posts almost exclusively here, at The Blog. I just thought that some might like to hear a bit of 'Behind The Scenes' or 'Commentary' about it - hey, there are a lot of people that (like me) watch Commentaries! Haha

I hope you enjoyed my little Share and Tell - and if you play GTA Online - See You In The Game!


Original GTAV game logo design by Rockstar, Take-Two Interactive

[Personal Note/Declaration: I am not associated with, nor do I receive anything in any manner or form, for mentioning Corel or Paint Shop Pro. I am merely an enthusiastic user of the program (I have played with it off and on since it was owned by JASC). For fairness and completivity, I shall mention another great graphic editing program, The Gimp (now just called GIMP?) - which is Open Source and entirely Free - all of the steps above can also be performed with this free program]

Happy New Year from The Game Tips And More Blog! [NewYears' Greetings 2017]

"Happy New Year 2017 Greetings"
by The Game Tips And More Blog
(Just Cause 3 capture, Highest Settings and FXAA, with Text and Effects added)


I personally wish you all much better things in 2017!


[To help celebrate the end of a crazy 2016 (for almost everybody, it seems) and the beginning of a hopefully-better 2017, this was simply a fireworks celebration captured in Just Cause 3 (Highest Settings, FXAA). I then added a 'crowd' overlay that had a bit of 'glitter' effects in it (used with License from CyberLink's PowerDirector 12) and put some Just Cause 3 - styled text  on top of it all (using a free font called "Dirty Old Town" which looked somewhat like the JC3 font and another one whose name escapes me at the moment). Lastly, I put a "Text FX" Overlay effect to show the year, an effect that was also in PowerDirector 12. As always, it was seemingly simple to think of, but took longer than expected to complete the composition (almost a day late for NewYear's, heh). 
HAPPY NEW YEAR ! ]


Game Material by Avalanche Game Studios (avalanchestudios.com) and Square Enix (square-enix.com)
Captured and Edited by Troy from The Game Tips And More Blog

Battlefield 3 - A Fan Created Video Montage - Munenushi Discovers C4 (in HD)

Some versions of the 1812 Overture have guns, some have cannons - this one has explosions.

I have played the Battlefield series since it's inception and I have always loved C4 and how the game handles it. Someone in BF2 called when you load a vehicle up and ghost ride it into the enemy 'Jihad Jeeps' and someone else called them 'Kamikaze Karz' and the other team usually calls them 'A Cheap Trick'. In any case, I have had tons of fun 'blowing things up good', whether it's chasing enemies down with a vehicle, running up behind them and planting some directly on their tank/plane/etc, or dropping a few down and laying in wait like some crazed-soldier-ninja-but-not-really -  it's all a compliment towards a great aspect in the game that DICE has developed and the associated physics in their game engines.
I wanted to share some of these explosions from BF3 with you (to the tune of The Year 1812 Festival Overture in E flat major Op. 49 Finale, by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky) so I put together this short montage.


For friends around the world:
世界中の友人のために
1812年序曲の一部のバージョンでは、銃を持っている、いくつかの大砲を持っている - この1つは爆発しています。 楽しむ
Für Freunde auf der ganzen Welt
Einige Versionen der 1812 Overture haben Gewehre, einige Kanonen - dieser hat Explosionen. Genießen
對於世界各地的朋友
1812序曲的一些版本有槍，有炮 - 這其中有爆炸。 享受
للأصدقاء في مختلف أنحاء العالم
بعض الإصدارات من مقدمة 1812 ديهم اسلحة وبعض المدافع لها - هذا واحد والانفجارات. استمتع

दुनिया भर के दोस्तों के लिए
1812 ओवरचर के कुछ संस्करणों बंदूकें हैं, कुछ तोपों है - यह एक विस्फोट है.  आनंद लें 

Pour les amis du monde entier Jouir  
Certaines versions de l'Ouverture 1812 ont des fusils, certains ont des canons - celui-ci a des explosions.
Для друзей по всему миру  пользоваться 
Некоторые версии 1812 Overture есть оружие, у некоторых есть пушки - это одно имеет взрывов.  

YouChoob seems to have recompressed it and it lost a lot of quality... will look into that sometime.
Also, Public Domain music gets flagged and requires advertisements?

Regardless, here it is:

The Game Tips And More Blog Presents

A Battlefield 3 Fan Created Video Montage

Munenushi Discovers C4 or: How To Explode Your Way To The Next Rank With Composition C

Enjoy and See you in there!