Re: [Gaim-cabal] Artists

[Ethan B. <ebl...@cs...>]

Sorry this is coming so late, I was at Gaim Developers' Conference
2006 and didn't have access to email.  Sean didn't tell me we were
supposed to discuss this at the conference.

Sean Egan spake unto us the following wisdom:
> I've been talking with primarily two artists for the new artwork. Most
> recently, I've been talking with Stephen Horlander who did the Firefox
> default theme. He made this mockup:
> http://gaim.sourceforge.net/sean/status_icon_ideas.jpg
>=20
> He's been a bit flakey to work with, so I'm considering going back to
> Andreas Nilsson, who does most of the Tango icons. He made this
> mock-up:
> http://gaim.sourceforge.net/sean/gaim-status-test.png

Honestly, I don't like either of these _at all_.  The purple wavy dude
is OK, but everything else about both of these does nothing for me.
None of the little colored dots tell me anything in the first logo
(What is a red dot?  Is red offline?  Blocked? Away?  I assume green
is available?), and the phone icon isn't perceptible superior to the
one we have now.  In the second set of icons, what are triangle,
square, and circle?  Are circles good?

Abstraction in interfaces can be a beautiful thing, but we're looking
pretty far afield for these particular abstractions.

I suggest we ask some artists to come up with some designs with an
emphasis on conveying meaning, as well as on being pretty to look at.

Ethan

--=20
The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws [that have no remedy
for evils].  They disarm only those who are neither inclined nor
determined to commit crimes.
		-- Cesare Beccaria, "On Crimes and Punishments", 1764