I’m curious what others are doing for taking pictures of there CRTs. If you’re using an iPhone do you use a third party app to try and adjust shutter speed?
I’ve just been taking as many shots as possible until one turns out decent but I wasn’t sure if there’s a more consistent way.
I usually use an app called Manual on iPhone. It allows you to adjust the shutter speed. It wasn’t free but it was pretty cheap and worth it.
As others will tell you, it’s generally easier after adjusting the shutter speed. Myself, I think it helps to take pictures in a dark room so the CRT is the only light source.
Okay awesome, thanks for the tips!
Musha (Genesis HD Model 1) on Trinitron KV-C27
Super Ghouls 'n Ghosts (SNES 1Chip-03) on Trinitron KV-C27
Thanks for the tip on Manual Peagles! I just trusted you and went to buy it, will be testing it out soon!
Here are some previous scanline, CRT pics I’ve taken:
Those all from the same tube? That Thunderforce shot looks insanely sharp.
Oh, just checked. Thunderforce III is from an amulator on a LCD. My bad! That’s why I took away a TMNT Hyperstone Heist pic too. Sorry about that!
Here are some scanline pics using emulators or newer ports:
So much goodness… 
Another old one, from RetroGAF:
Super Street Fighter II: The New Challengers - Mega Drive (J) + OSSC
How’d you get the scanlines on Shinobi? Are there scanlines in the emulator on the disc?
All these 3 packs, I think the Monster World one is the same too, have a great scanline option imo. Plus you can pixel tweak, while keeping the aspect ration right to get a complete fullscreen of each game. Super sharp picture and they include all versions, JP, US and EU. Let’s you choose which one etc.
If you choose Alex Kidd with JP it boots with a Sega Mark 3 logo for example. SoR JP verison have differences for each region too. Super Hang-On on the Alex Kidd/Revenge of Shinobi collection has a 3D mode for 3DTV’s and it’s own arcade resolution.
Really well made collections!
Some Xbox screenshots, not sure how the scanlines sync on minimized pics not viewed at the same resolution as I played the games at etc, but they look sharp and correct on my TV. Try opening them fullscreen to see the scanlines:
The menues are really cool too:
Even with the pics maximized and zoomed in, the fake scanlines do not line up at all with the original pixels— notice how a line of pixels is split in half by an emulated black line, instead of having the black like between each emulated scan line like it should be. Seems like bad implementation in the emulator.
Yeah it’s far from perfect. But I feel the games look better with them on though. You can adjust the size of each game, so I would think you can align them correctly with the pixels though.
Yeah looks like they drew an overlay of scanlines spaced equally apart, which would probably fit with the (I assume) default size of the play area, in which each emulated pixel would have a uniform height. In your images the play area is zoomed to fit the screen vertically, so each emulated pixel has a different height, but the fake scanline overlay isn’t scaled accordingly. Maybe that’s a good decision since the alternative would be to have unevenly spaced black lines, but it bothers me anyway. Personally I would play with the play area unzoomed, so you have uniform pixel height and (presumably) properly aligned black lines between each emulated scanline.
Yes, I think the default zoom will be correct. I’m sitting quite far from the TV so I wanted to zoom in, althouh I mostly play these games on a CRT and a Genesis anyhow. There’s the convenience of save states though, which is nice.
I’d say for people wanting in on these collections and want the best scanlines: keep the default size for each game, then they should be aligned correctly.
You can do that. M2 always provide a ‘dot by dot’ option with their emulated releases, so you can have native resolution/screen ratio, with even scanlines that are placed as they should. They patched that setting in, with their Neo Geo Station series, then included it by default ever since.
Not sure if it’s still an issue, with those SEGA compilations and the more modern PS4 ShoTriggers (as I play M2 games in ‘dot by dot’ mode only), but running Neo Geo Station games with any degree of zoom also resulted in noticeable screen jitter.
