> Alright, let's let you be the client for a few moments then. Don't > respond to the list with this, as it is clear that your thoughts require > a good deal of fleshing out before they can be implemented in a useful > manner. Feel free to privately email me your responses. > > Nacho de los Ríos Tormo wrote: > >> I said the orange disks are too featureless and so they don't stand out >> from each other, which defeats their purpose. >> > > 1) Define featureless with greater clarity. Do you mean the > visualization of the memes chosen? > 2) What is their purpose? Is their purpose to be an icon unto > themselves or more of a simple branding? In this light, specifically, > what would be a more appropriate alternative? > OK, i'll try to define "featureless". When I say an icon is "featureless" I mean that the image has been oversimplified to the extent that it lacks too many of its original features to make it easy to recognize.
As a case in point, take the emblem for "presentation". The pie chart it tries to represent has been reduced to an outline that resembles a pacman figure. I have mentioned the lack of colour and contrast as a problem, and here that problem is evident: if instead of the pacman outline we had five different-colored sectors, it would be a lot more evident that it meant to represent a pie chart, and it would also stand out from the orange-disk uniformity. As for their purpose, I believe it is to label inidistinct icons so as to give an idea of their purpose or contents in just one quick look. That is why I believe the emblems should be really different to one another, or the clue they give need too much observation to gather and in the end it is just the text label that gives the content away. What would be a more appropriate alternative? I've said it many times: More colorful, more detailed, more contrasty icons that could be told apart in just one glance. The original gnome emblems were a lot better in this respect, and the set that was offered at the start of this thread is better too, in my view (of course). > Ugly is a relative term. Describe exactly which emblems you dislike > and suggest another option that is easily rendered within approximately > 50 pixels squared. Remember -- easily recognized is based on your > experience and culture, so be careful with your choices. > > I have described the emblems I disliked one by one, and said why. Somme application of color would make a lot of them a lot easier to understand and recognize, and may even make them prettier (which is a relative relative term!). You seem to agree there is a problem picturing things in 50 pixels square. Well, it is evident that picturing things in 50 square ORANGE pixels is even more difficult. Here are some examples: * Color the piechart with a few color sectors. * Color the brush and paint blobs * Color the pencil so that it looks like a pencil, not a door. * Illustrate the photographs just a bit, so that they don't just look like three rectangles. * Redesign the box in the package emblem. It really does not look much like a box. It may be that applying color in the images will break the uniformity of the orange disks, and color images inside orange disk may even look ugly (dare I say?), but then something would have to be done with the disks themselves. >> I said their problem is one of lack of color and detail >> > > 4) See (2) above. Do you mean color within the iconography or the > overall emblem? > 5) See (2) above. How much detail should an emblem offer within the > clearly defined technological limits? > How much detail? Not much, but more that what we've got now. We are not limited by technological restrictions, but the artificial limit to only use the orange color and the decision to discard all detail. >> I said that some of the Tango icons also lack detail and contrast and >> that also makes them difficult to recognize. I pointed to two that I >> believe are bad choices (the shredder and the crumpled paper). >> > > COMMENT) Tango icons are all 100% identifiable to the people who created > them. Do you mean recognizable to someone outside of the Tango project? > If so, define the audience that is having trouble identifying the > items. Is it an ethnicity issue? Education level issue? > Technological issue? > Yeah, and when my 3-year old nephew draws a squiggle in a piece of paper he recognizes it as an airplane or a horse. I don't mean the tango artist draw like 3-year olds (and in fact I think that 98% of their work is great), but that you tend to recognize what YOU have drawn, even though others might have real difficulties. Here we're not talking about pleasing ourselves, but being as universal as possible. Also only said that SOME of the Tango icons have problems. I profoundly dislike the crumpled paper icon because a) it takes hard observation to deduce it is that and b) it is a confusing metaphor for anybody in any culture, especially when sitting side by side with a trashcan, a red cross and a shredder. As for the shredder, there are ethnicity, technological and education level issues that make it a very bad metaphor. Shredders are not household items in every country, not everybody in every office has access to one in most places, even if they've seen one and know what it is, and youngsters may have never seen one in their life. On top of being a very bad metaphor, the Tango shredder is a very bad icon, because a shredder itself has not much detail, so after iconification nothing much remains to recocnize it. And the low contrast plays against it. I don't mean bashing anybody, or offending anybody. If I chose the wrong tone, I apologize. But that does not mean that everything we've got is dandy, and that if I don't agree the only thing I can do is submit my own work. Regards, .Nacho. -- ubuntu-art mailing list ubuntu-art@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-art
