Find Cover Image

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The Find Cover Image Screen

When you are looking for a cover image for your game, you can search for it using Google Image Search. Select the album and right-click. From the menu, choose: Search Cover.

Game Collector will then open the Find Cover Image screen. From the results on the left, choose an image and click the Use This Image Button on the right to add the cover to your game.

Figure 1: Find Cover Image Screen - Game Collector 4

When you find an image with both front and back cover, you can crop the image right here! Just point, click and drag your cursor over the part of the image you want to keep and click Crop. When okay, click the Use This Image button.

Cropped off too much? Just select the image from the Search Results on the left and give it another go!

Edit Search Criteria

When finding a cover for your game, Game Collector might add a barcode or the phrase 'DVD' to the game title to provide for better results. When no (or poor) results are found, you can edit the Search Criteria manually in the text field and hitting the Search button.
Figure 2: Edit Search Criteria - Game Collector 4

Cover Search - powered by Google

Even though our Game Database is growing rapidly, it might occasionally occur that you need to search a cover image of your own. Or perhaps you want to add a different cover image to your game.

Game Collector 4 has a built-in Cover Finder for your games. This Google-powered image search will greatly speed up your looking for missing (or incorrect / preferred covers).

The new Find Cover Image tool can be popped up from multiple places in the program: in the Main Screen, on the Cover Tab in Edit Game Screen and, you'll love this, straight from the Add Games Automatically Screen.

Adding or changing a cover image has been made easy, fast and fun!

Find Cover Image from Main Screen

When browsing your games in the Main Screen and you want to add (or change) a cover image for one of your games, right click on the missing thumbnail and select: Find Cover Image, or simply click on the missing image to open up the Find Cover Image Screen (see Figure 4: Find Cover Image Screen).

Figure 3: Find Cover Image From Main Screen - Game Collector 4

Find Cover Image from the Cover Tab in the Edit Game Screen

When you're in the Edit Game Screen, you can add or change the Cover Image on the Covers Tab. Click the Find Online Button to open up the Find Cover Image Screen (see Figure 4: Find Cover Image Screen).

Figure 4: Find Cover Image Screen - Game Collector 4

Find Cover Image from the Add Games Automatically Screen

When adding games to your collection automatically, you can open up the Find Cover Image Screen (see Figure 4: Find Cover Image Screen) by clicking on the Search For Cover link when a Cover Image is not found in the Game Collector Database.

Figure 5: Add Games Automatically Screen - Game Collector 4

Alternative ways to add your own Images

When adding a new game to your collection, Game Collector will automatically retrieve a whole lot of information from our databases right to your computer. But sometimes you might want to add your own cover image to one of your games. Or perhaps you've found a different image, that's more to your liking. Here we go...

Adding an Image from your Hard Disk

When you want to replace a cover of one of your games, you need to go to the Edit Game screen (select game and click Edit > Edit game) and go to the Covers tab. Click the Browse button and search for the image on your computer.
Figure 6: Browse for Image on your Computer

Note: Images you add manually are NOT transferred or copied to the Images folder of Game Collector. So, to keep things tidy and organized, save your images in the default Game Collector folder. This way you make sure, that when creating a Backup, all images are being copied.

Updating a Cover Image from the Collectorz.com database

Our databases are constantly acquiring new images and up-to-date information. Updating information from our database is easy. Two steps (three clicks) is all it takes.

• Hit the Clear button
• Hit the Update button

Note: When updating, don't forget to Clear/Update the Back Cover as well.

Drag-and-Drop

Another very easy way to add/change images for your games is the old Drag-and-Drop routine. You can Drag-and-Drop an image file from your computer or from a website.


Figure 7: Drag and Drop from your Desktop

Figure 8: Drag and Drop from the Internet

You'll notice that Game Collector will prompt you to make a choice. Choosing "Copy dropped file to default image folder, then link" will, well, copy the image to the Game Collector Images folder. This is highly recommended.

Please note: Different browsers may behave differently. If one browser does not allow you to drag and drop the image, please try a different browser, or drag the image to your desktop first, and drag it from there.

Simply linking to the dropped file just creates a link to the location of the image. If you drag and drop an image from the Internet, you will loose your images, once the online image is removed. Renaming or moving a linked image from your computer (outside the Game Collector images folder, will also result in one of these:

More Image Settings

You can tweak the default settings to fit your needs by clicking the Settings Button in the Edit game Screen. When not in Editing Mode, click: Tools > Options > Images.

Figure 9: Image Options Screen