[openbeos] Re: Icon Design Contest

  • From: Stephan Assmus <superstippi@xxxxxx>
  • To: openbeos@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Sun, 06 Aug 2006 13:59:20 +0200

Hi Michael,

> >> I wasn't trying to create guidelines. I was trying to suggest and
> >> encourage. I mean - you could take any one of the icons from the
> >> submitted sets and substitute it with any of the same type of icon from
> >> any of the other sets (i.e. replace stippi's "People" icon with any
> >> other "People" icon) and it wouldn't look out of place. That is a huge
> >> clue that the sets are all pretty much the same.
> > 
> > I'm sorry I have to say that, but IMHO this is a at least a little 
> > ignorant.
> > As long as you keep your idea of "innovative" vague, you might say 
> > something
> > like this, but below, you give some examples of what you would call
> > innovative, and then I don't accept this above statement anymore. :-)
> 
> Innovative means creating something different. I think that redrawing
> basically the same thing that we have had since 1991 is not innovative.
> The vector work that you did is innovative, in that I have not seen any
> vector format that does so much in so little space.

I certainly agree that simply converting the Be icons to vector format and 
only improving them a little here and there is hardly "innovative". You say 
my vector format is innovative, but do you know what has been done in this 
field before? I don't, and to be honest, I would not be surprised if somebody 
somewhere has done it before, even better. The same would be true about icon 
designs. It is totally unlikely that we can come up with any design that is 
radically different to anything anyone has already done somewhere (at this 
point in history). As I think about it, maybe this is an argument *for* 
sticking close to the BeOS icon look, for the same reason that we keep the 
window tabs. In any case, I agree one should never say "never", so I'm hoping 
for a positive surprise with regard to icon submissions, but I wouldn't be 
disappointed if we have "only" beautiful sets, no innovative ones. :-)

> >> 2D icons with a little thickness (think suncatchers lying on a table)
> >> Photo realistic icons, possibly modified with some effect (solarized?)
> >> Darker color schemes, to be not quite so cartoon-like
> >> More pastel colors instead of vivid
> >> Framed icons with faux-3d symbols bursting through the middle
> > 
> > All of these are not the least more "innovative" than any of the submitted
> > sets. Provided you accept the fact that the icons from the sets are not
> > interchangeable as you say.
> 
> I agree that these aren't particularly innovative ideas. What they are
> is something different. I was trying to point out the fallacy of the
> statement that there are only a few ways to make icons.

To be honest, I'm confident that all of these have been done before. I have 
certainly seen photorealistic icons, minimalistic 2D icons and 3D icons 
before. People spending some time with customizing their desktops have 
probably seen even more similar stuff.

> As far as the interchangeability - I may be the only one who sees it
> that way. I certainly haven't heard the roar of agreement that I might
> hope for. :-)

The statement was "ok" for the Mc Clintock icons and mine, but certainly not 
for the others.

> >> Animated icons are interesting, but space concerns...
> >> Rotating 3d models of icons (!!!)
> > 
> > Maybe interesting, but besides probably using too much space and resources
> > while being displayed, you would *very* soon realize how irritating 
> > something
> > like this on your desktop is. Rotating 3D icons would be like looking at 
> > an
> > ant hill from the top, only all the ants look different, which is even 
> > more
> > confusing. One could make it less stressful if only icons pointed at are
> > animated, or something like that, but then the whole idea which was the
> > innovation is lost. (Because we have 3D icons now, only they don't rotate
> > when you point at them.)
> 
> Agreed. Much like the throbbing icons that OSX uses. I did note that I
> am not an artist and I did warn that the ideas might not be useful. My
> only point is that people shouldn't think in such a box. I think that it
> would be sort of sad if, on bootup, you couldn't tell the difference
> between our desktop and Gnome or KDE or OSX.

Haiku having a distinctive look is very desirable for me too, that is one 
reason I don't prefer the Tango icons, even though they are really well done. 
If we want to be on the safe side with this, we should probably stick to the 
BeOS look... unless a better option comes along. I'm hoping that for many 
people, a switch to scalable, full color, yet efficient icons will be a nice 
leap forward. Haiku needs to uphold the values of "efficient", "fast" and 
"responsive", and that will probably be our biggest individual property. :-)
If one day people say "Haiku - it's BeOS, only without the flaws!" then we 
have accomplished something, IMHO. :-)

Best regards,
-Stephan


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