Has anyone ever made or come across templates for CD and cassette outlines for any graphic editing software (photoshop, paint shop pro, etc.)?

The problem is that i want to do some mass scanning of some CD and cassette covers, and I would like to do it as efficiently as possible, hense instead of manually cropping the images that I could just scan the artwork and have a template (CD or cassette outline) to position the artwork in.

Is this realistic? or anyone have some better suggestions?

Thanks

Allright, this might not be exaclty the sollution you where looking for, but anyway.

Am not sure wether yo are planning to scan seveal covers at once, or just on at the time.

If it is just on eat the time. Why don't you create a template out of 1-2mm thin cardboard.It should be exactly the size of your scanner plate Try to gat a good quality, Then cut out the exact shape and measurements of a cd cover place it on your scanner plate and put the desired cover inside.


As soon as you want to scan a few covers after each other, you can just set the scan area in your scanner driver to the exact area once (do this by making one or two previews). You can then scan as many cd covers without having to make new previews and the image size ahould already be cropped to the right measurements. Just always leave the template in place. You might even fix it with a bit of cellotape, just make sure you don't stick it to the glass.

As I said, maybe a bit more of a hammer and nail approach then you where looking for, but might as well work.

I assume the images aren't something that you could just search for on Amazon? I wrote a tool myself to do just that: http://www.slothradio.com/covers/

@picmixer - Well it does seem like more work since I'm dealing with cassette covers that have 1-5 sections so I would need cutouts for those and the cardboard always seems to shift a bit leaving those long white triangles. Since I thought a template in PSP would be limited to the exact dimentions of the covers the most you would have to do is position it correctly in the template.

@slothdog - I like you page but these are cassette and CD covers which you would not find online. (is it possible?!)

I've found when scanning a CD booklet the optimal resizing that comes very close to the original size of a CD booklet should be 457 high x 457 wide in pixels for one side. If you want to have a folding CD booklet it would be 457 high x 914 wide in pixels, such is the case if you scan the whole width of a booklet.

I forgot to tell you. I have an audio cassette template I made which I use with MS Publisher 98, if you have Publisher installed and want it i can e-mail it to you.

The template is based off a standard size TDK style audio cassette template and case, it is as close in size as I could get with Publisher. The template won't work with slim-type cases.

If you like envelopes, check out thi page

@Andavari - sure, that would be great - maybe not exactly what i need but it is something to start me off - the email is: doublejcream@yahoo.com
thanks

@PatchWorks - thanks for the link but I'm looking to scan the artwork not print it out.

Do it properly: Use a vector editing program like CorelDRAW or Illustrator - I do templates for my cutted paper and adjust the scans i CorelDRAW. Of course you could just use a program (i know the author of www.cdcovers.cc made a pretty good one with lots of templates) which does all the work for you

Is there a program that will automatically find, and then crop (+rotate to vertical) the CD or cassette inlay within the sea of white that is the underside of your scanner. You know, pretty much what the "auto frame" button in the scanner driver should do, but doesn't!

If that could be scripted somehow, it would be great. You can't just align the inlay with the side of the scanner because you lose the edge; and I've tried with paper templates, and I've always got those long triangles of white! An intelligent, automatic solution would be great -it can't be rocket science - "look for the 12cm square that's not white - crop it"

Cheers,
David.

Simply Great!

Hi.
I'm with odyssey.
I made myself a template for "standard" cd covers in CorelDraw 10.
With a guide line an "marks to cut" in the corners... It is not a fully
automatic process, but it's pretty time saving...

This evening I'll post a link here, maybe someone be interested in
making its own...

Regards.
b:.

For those of you maybe intersted in the Corel 10 template
can you download it here:

Corel Draw 10 simple CD Cover Template

Is pretty simple, it has three layers:
1. Marks for cutting (PRINTABLE but not EDITABLE. To cut the final print)
2. Border guidelines (nor PRINTABLE neither EDITABLE. To guide you positioning the bitmaps)
3. Image layer. Here you must position your images.

After make a lot of tries the best dimmensions for covers (that fit in most standard CD cases)
are.
Front cover: 120 x 120 mm
Back cover: 150 x 118 mm

Process:
1. Make sure you are in the "images layer"
2. Activate the "snap to objects" option (this usually makes it faster)
3. Import or drag and drop your images
4. Put the recomended dimenssions (front: 120 x 120mm, back 150 x 118 mm)
5. Move the images to their place
6. PRINT

Give it a try.
Hope you'll find it usefull.
Best regards.
b:.

Thanks bodhy

I was still hoping there was a bit more easy way to scan in the artwork, but thanks very much for the file and your work

I'm sure it will be very useful when I'm ready to print the covers