When the megapack started out all those years back, it was based on SI's licensed cut-outs, which included collars at the time. Moreover, it was felt that having a cut without a collar led to a chicken-neck effect, which was not considered ideal.

As a result, the decision was taken that all cut-outs have to include a collar within 2-3 pixels of the chin, and there's never been any reason to change the policy. We have developed techniques to enable this when collars are lower, as outlined in the first post of this thread, and we expect all cuts to include collars, so as to have as much of a standardised approach to cut-outs as possible. It's necessary because we have decided that it is, and it is a cutter's responsibility to make sure collars are included in cut-outs 👍

It stands to reason that once an image is downscaled, then it will lose quality. The top cut is more than good enough to use in-game, though, once the below tweaks are effected.

That said, if there's some snow in the hair (which is what we call the white in the hair in the screenshot on the top), there are techniques displayed in the main post on how to easily spot it and quickly clean it. There's also no collar in the cut, which will mean it will get rejected and not added to the megapack. If you want your work to be added to the megapack, then you need to understand that you must follow our guidelines. If you ignore our guidelines, then we will have to ignore your work, unfortunately, which would be a pity given it's otherwise very good.

I think it'd be best if you had a look at the main post of this thread, which outlines the guidelines for cutters (on cropping, snow and collars, amongst others) and has video tutorials to explain how these outcomes and techniques can be achieved.

If you have any questions on them, feel free to ask 👍

I'm in bed right now and will need to look at it in Photoshop to give a definitive assessment, but it looks excellent at first glance 👍

new question: 

so I've been having some quality issues with a few pictures so I tried to use a AI Enhancer (letsenhance.io) to upscale with surprisingly good results, is there other alternative websites or stuff that could be used for free without a credit limit, so I can up the quality for future cuts?

thx for the help on advance.

As a rule of thumb, we don't tend to recommend the use of image enhancing software, since the sources we use are generally of good enough quality not to need further enhancement.

can I get some feedback on this please?
is the hair “snow” or light reflections ok? or would it need refining?

what about the neck sides, are they acceptable?

 

With seeing the source image, it's hard to tell if it's snow or not, but I'd clean it up anyway to be sure.

As for the collar, it looks fine, but if you nudged it up, I'd suggest nudging it very slightly less so far up, maybe a couple of pixels less.

Looks perfectly fine tbh.

Made a quick video on how I cut using Photopea:

@mons Your videos in the opening post are unavailable because they're archived?

Erm, showing fine for me 😕

Anyone else having issues with watching it?

@mons Working again for me as well, weird.

@mons  what u mean

You should leave only 2-3 pixels above the top of the head and the same amount beneath the chin. In a case like this, watch the video tutorial on collars from the first post (there are also written guides) which explains how to nudge the collar upwards to include it within the cut in cases where the collar is lower down than the 2-3 pixels required.

I've uploaded a cut for this source here so that you can compare them and see what I mean 🙂

Also, when uploading a cut in this thread, please also upload the original source so that we can tell what was the quality of the original.

Very good otherwise 👍

How do you properly resize a normal cutout face to the icon variant? The direct rescaling from 250x250 to 25x18 makes it look hella wierd in game. Is there a guide on that precisely? I have Photoshop at my disposal

Use the image size funtion to downsize it to 18x18. Use the canvas size function to get it to 25x18.

i think the face is dark how do i light it up what is the exposure ratio

I have actually already replied to you, explaining how to do so here 👍

Hi everyone, trying to join in and help cutting out faces.

Is this acceptable?

Also is the second attachment ok?

Is it an upgrade?  (To understand better your standards. Originally it was rejected, but it was probably due to you guys having a lot of work and not having time to small updates on the faces)

Cheers

@Duracell.88 Good first cuts 👏

This one could be cropped a little bit closer to the chin, 2-3 pixels of space is enough. Then it will probably be added to the pack

The second one was rejected because the source image had been enlarged, but the cut itself looks fine

Thanks for the input, I am onto it.

EDIT:  Like this?

About the second one, I can't see the enlargement, what are the main tips to spot it for future images like that one?

So in the end you don't think the one I cut out is a better upgrade? I tried it in the game, and honestly it looks better, aswell as updated, don't get me wrong, you're way more experienced, I am just trying to undersand, so I don't bother you guys with rejected cuts in the future.

What an enlarger does is take pixels from the original image and then ‘guess' what the pixels around those would look like in a version of a bigger size

So if you zoom in here you can see that the hair looks a bit weird, as well as the skin of the face that has some kind of waxen look

Then again if you scale the image down to a 250x250 cut it's less visible, but we would still like to avoid it. If you upload the cut on his timeline it will probably be added 👍

Ok, thanks for the tips. I can definitely see it now that you mensioned it, it looks like stamped from somewhere else:

Going to spend the afternoon cutting some images and uploading them. Is there a easy way to see to pending ones by date or something like that?

Thank you again for the tips, and bear with me, if some of them aren't perfect, just trying my best to help 😀

@Duracell.88 You can see all pending packs and individual requests here

From there you can even filter for specific nations/leagues, or just use the ‘browse' option at the top to find things

Always great to see a new cutter joining in the fun 🙂 Don't have much to add to what Drafter has already said.

You can see the pending individual images sorted by age oldest at the top on this page: https://sortitoutsi.net/graphics/submissions/1/queue?type=source&status=pending&inpack=no&game_item_id=&submitted_by_id=&sort=submitted_at-asc&submit=1 

There are a number of pending packs too, this is the page which lists them: https://sortitoutsi.net/graphics/submissions/1/collections?status=pending You'll have to toggle through the next button to get to the oldest.

I would suggest asking for feedback and refining your technique before getting started on any packs just yet. Whatever you do, you should mark the image(s) you're working on so that nobody else happens to be working on them at the same time 👍

Ok Mons, thanks.

Some feedback on these ones:

In this type of images, where the jacket/shirt is too visible, should I cut it out  ?

It's fine, but if you want you can use Photoshop (or which ever image editor you use) to remove it and leave a small bit as a collar.

Just a small thing to add - be to sure to keep a little bit of the collar in the image.

Here's a video of the process on how to nudge the collar upwards: