New Celestia 1.7.0 icon vote

[FarGetaNik]

--Edit--
Added after 4 minutes 10 seconds:
Sorry if I post twice, but something went wrong... next try.

FarGetaNik, splash resolution is 674x491. So I gave you a sign in the right resolution

Not really, here your image in the resolution you posted, vs. the splash image. It looks a bit more blurry even at full resolution:

But first of all I am interested in the icon. Does anyone make a nice icon?

So I guess you still don't like my latest icon, even with a black framed "C".

[Alexell]

FarGetaNik,

So I guess you still don't like my latest icon, even with a black framed "C".

You did not send me icon with a black framed "C".

[FarGetaNik]

Thanks, this is certainly better

You did not send me icon with a black framed "C".

I posted it in the thread a few posts ago... But here it is again:

Celestia-C4.zip

(125.9 KiB) Downloaded 369 times

Celestia-C4-background.png (39.22 KiB) Viewed 8493 times

[ulfg]

(edit: removed post about a suggestion with examples of a more abstract logo for an icon)

[FarGetaNik]

Our Saturnian "C" stared out as a "scientific accurate" icon and gets more and more stylized. As long as it is still recognizable I think it's ok. I think we should at least keep Saturn's ring poportions, they are pretty close to the golden ratio, which makes our icon more beatiful

Most of your variations seem too simplistic to me, I think Saturn should still be plastic and not flat, but maybe it's a good idea to make it more abstact. Bring some color and detail in (maybe the cassini gap instead of a random one, or different colored rings... ). Rotating the C a bit is a nice idea.

But maybe someone else should decide, I'm convinced of the icon I made

[Alexell]

I posted it in the thread a few posts ago... But here it is again:

Celestia-C4.zip

Not pretty. Did he not see? Rings are not smooth, all blurry ...

ulfg, Very interesting idea. But in my opinion, it is better to keep in the icon is something of the space, rather than abstract.

Added after 4 minutes 26 seconds:
FarGetaNik, please try to make the rings one big wide ring of Saturn. But beautiful. I'm talking only about the size of 16x16 and 32x32 (for now). If one ring will turn one color and smooth, will look good both on light and dark backgrounds.

[FarGetaNik]

Not pretty. Did he not see? Rings are not smooth, all blurry ..

Sorry, I seriously don't know what you are complaining about. Of course the rings will look blurry when scaling them down to 16,24,32 px. I used interpolation for downscaling, without interpolation it will get pixelatied and noisy. Maybe completely opaque rings will please you? A color contrast in the rings is also possible, but I don't want to go away from the real ring structure and keep Saturn's iconic look.

one big wide ring of Saturn. But beautiful.

This statement is too fuzzy to get your point. Can you please show me a screenshot so I can see what you don't like? I don't really know what to improve on this icon still.

[Alexell]

Screenshot_1.jpg (5.6 KiB) Viewed 8441 times

The edges of the rings are uneven. Such as they were without a black frame. Rings a few, also have uneven gaps between them. The size 32x32 it looks not nice and does not suited the role of Celestia icon.

Added after 1 minute 28 seconds:
ulfg, you can send your "C" icons (which you have shown) on a transparent background in PNG format?

[FarGetaNik]

The edges of the rings are uneven. Such as they were without a black frame. Rings a few, also have uneven gaps between them. The size 32x32 it looks not nice and does not suited the role of Celestia icon.

You do know that (supposing you posted in original resolution) your image shows the icon at a size of 48 px, not 32? My computer also shows me the 48 px image per default. Are smaller sizes even used? And as I said, it is a matter of interpolation how the pictograms look at such small size, either they become smooth (and possibly blurry) or noisy and pixelated. I use the default interpolation in Gimp, which is kubic. If you wish, I might use a different one, but I doubt we will get better results. There is no way such a small image can look good.

But anyways, I redesigned the icon again, the rings are now opaque and more colorful. I tested it on a colorful background and for my taste is shows enough contrast. I used 2 different methods for downscaling this time, maybe this might solve some of your issues. The left one (Celestia-C5) is made by downscaling each layer from the 1024 px image, the right one (Celestia-C5b) is made by downscaling each layer from the previous one:

Celestia-C5-b.png (41.58 KiB) Viewed 8425 times

Celestia-C5.zip

(211.03 KiB) Downloaded 273 times

[Fenerit]

FYI, C5 icon (the left one) looks better than C5b at 16x16px on Xp 32.

And as I said, it is a matter of interpolation how the pictograms look at such small size, either they become smooth (and possibly blurry) or noisy and pixelated. I use the default interpolation in Gimp, which is kubic. If you wish, I might use a different one, but I doubt we will get better results. There is no way such a small image can look good.

But anyways, I redesigned the icon again, the rings are now opaque and more colorful. I tested it on a colorful background and for my taste is shows enough contrast.

Could you post the 1024 layer of the left one? I've some ideas about how to get rid of aliases at small sizes. Then you can check it out also on Vista and up, having I a freeware icon converter program which make the job.

[FarGetaNik]

Could you post the 1024 layer of the left one? I've some ideas about how to get rid of aliases at small sizes. Then you can check it out also on Vista and up, having I a freeware icon converter program which make the job.

I created both fro the same 1024 px image, the difference should only occur at 128 px or smaller. Here it is:

Added after 2 minutes 41 seconds:

FYI, C5 icon (the left one) looks better than C5b at 16x16px on Xp 32.

To me, C5 looks more smoothly, but I figured that was what Alexell might be complaining about. C5b is sharper at small sizes, but at poor pixel densities it might look blocky.

[Fenerit]

Sorry, I'm unable to do better; the aliases still persist even by blurring the borders alot. It seems the ring to be too much circular in shape. Do try to skew it a bit.

[FarGetaNik]

It seems the ring to be too much circular in shape. Do try to skew it a bit.

Uhm what? The rings are to circular do you propose to use something like my first try with a prolate "C"? I don't think this will get any better. Maybe someone with actual skills or profession in graphic design might do better. Or we'd need to create a vector-graphic, but good luck with that

[Alexell]

I agree with Fenerit. C5 icon looks better.
32x32 and 48x48:

Screenshot_1.jpg (5.9 KiB) Viewed 8393 times

Screenshot_2.jpg (6.69 KiB) Viewed 8393 times

But while I'm not sure that we can stay on the choice this particular icon for the program.

[FarGetaNik]

I agree with Fenerit. C5 icon looks better.

Then the procedure I was using up until now wasn't that bad after all.

But while I'm not sure that we can stay on the choice this particular icon for the program.

Well I guess we will have the same problem with any icon when scaling it down.

[Alexell]

FarGetaNik, The icons that I presented in the first message, with a decrease in look normal.

[FarGetaNik]

FarGetaNik, The icons that I presented in the first message, with a decrease in look normal.

And how did you scale them down? I refuse to believe it's just because of the transpaency pattern. There are plenty of icons out there with a symbol built by transparency which actually look good.

[Alexell]

FarGetaNik, I'm not saying that the problem of transparency. The problem in the structure of the rings. They look at reduction is not as good as we would like.
I'm at work. Originals of my icon, I will show tomorrow, and you can see them at a reduced size.

[FarGetaNik]

Hm there has to be a way to modify the ring structures so it looks better. There are several icons featuring circular structures and transparency that still look good:

circular-icons.png (141.19 KiB) Viewed 8379 times

The best examples for this would be Audacity and CCleaner, both featuring curcular arcs, and snipping tool features a semi-transparent area. I see that my Celestia icon seems to be of lower quality somehow, but these other icons prove that it should be possible to make it look better. And it certainly is way better than the default icon.

I'd like to see your icons at various size and how they compare. Maybe this will give some hints.

[Fenerit]

There are several ways to get icons looks nice; some are to apply shadowing upon the image layer, either external or internal brighter outlines to achieve glossy and blurrish shades, another is to make the icon within a 3D modeler, in which the shaders (also toon shaders) and lights (also several spot lights) are applied directly in seat of 3D mesh's rendering. The resulting image is of course of custom size and custom background, strongly antialiased and even already transparent.

EDIT LATER
my workaround to remove aliases...

C5_aa.zip

(108.86 KiB) Downloaded 260 times