The Mapping Manual

# Background Images

Now comes the most fun part of mapping before we actually begin mapping: picking a background image to represent your mapset. Many mappers spend hours picking the "best" background image for their set. Generally, the background image for a mapset should depend on the song, such as:

  • If the song comes from a source, it is highly recommended to use a background image that relates to the source.
  • If the song does not come from a source, it is then highly recommended to use a background image that best conveys your interpretation of the song's feeling.

As these are simply recommendations, you are realistically allowed to pick any background image you want to use. There is no one stopping you from using an anime background on a non-anime related song. Sure, you may get a few off-handed comments from other mappers in the community, but at the end of the day, this is your choice.

As for this module, we're going to stick to what is "recommended." In this case, we actually can search this song on the internet and see the video that was uploaded to accompany this song here.

Let's grab the image of this song! Fortunately, a simple search will show the exact we need here. Download it, and drag it into the song's osu folder. You can navigate to the song's osu folder by clicking looking in the top left of the editor: File -> Open Song Folder. Once it has been dragged in, go back into the editor and click on the 'design' tab. On the top right, click on the 'Background Image/Video' button and select the image that we have just downloaded and dragged in.

# Colors

Recall that in the last section, we skipped over the 'Colors' tab of the song setup because we did not have a background image. Now that we do, let's reopen that tab by clicking 'Song Setup' -> Difficulty. It is generally accepted to use colors that are similar to the background. For this part, use your own judgement and select at least two colors to use.

Try to keep the 'lum' field of the colors to be between 50 and 220.

# Source?

Another important thing to note is to save the link of where you found a source, if it does not come from the source itself (e.g. you picked a background image that came from pixiv). This is because it is recommended for mappers to link where they got the art from! For this song, we got it from the original music video. Just keep that in mind for later.

# Rules

There are a few rules when selecting a background image. Not every background can be used. Generally, art that cannot be used include:

  • Art in which the artist has explicitly stated that do not want their art in other media other than where they posted
  • NSFW and borderline sexual content especially involving characters that appear to look like children
  • Blood/gore
  • Promotion of illegal activities (e.g. drugs, violence, etc)

Just use common sense as to which types of background images would be acceptable. If you're genuinely not sure of the image should be used, play it on the safer side and don't use it.

There are other trivial rules as well, which can be handled manually.

  • The size of the image cannot exceed 2.5MB; this can be solved by lowering the quality of the image or the size.
  • The size of the image cannot be larger than 2560 x 1440; this can be solved by resizing the image.
  • The extension should be either .png or .jpg; this can be solved by re-encoding the image into that file format.

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