Last year, I wrote a PHP, GD, and MYSQL powered hockey title generator. It reads data from a MYSQL database containing player info and stats, pulls logos and portraits from my hard drive, and spits out a .tga file that’s ready to be loaded into our video switcher’s title memory. I’ve been making constant improvements ever since.

Coming in to the 2009-2010 Hockey Season, I decided to give the RPI TV Hockey Titles a makeover. Sure, they looked a lot better, but the 45-degree-rotated-right-angle look didn’t match with the rest of the RPI TV titles. I also made the switch from Franklin Gothic Demi Cond font to Gotham Bold, which had readability improvements but created space issues.

So now, I’ve gone back and combined elements of the 2009 titles with the 2008 style edges-with-a-slope-of-2 and white-gradient-fading-upward design into one glorious bastard child. Gotham Bold goes on a diet to become Gotham Narrow Bold. Font size increases due to the new found horizontal space.

Here’s all the various iterations of my PHP-generated titles below.

2008 version (160 pixels tall, takes up twice as much memory in the video mixer’s memory):

2009 Rev 00:

2009 Rev 01