Artists Wanted! (for drawing some mini icons)

[WillLem]

Hi all,

I've decided to go ahead and utilise Java's menu item icons to make the menu bar a bit more fun to look at.

However, my pixel art skills are nowhere near as good as some of the work I've seen done by people on this Forum, and any lemmings time I get at the moment is pretty much all going on Forum moderation and programming, so I'd really appreciate the help on this one.

There are 11 icons altogether. I'm open to ideas as to what exactly the icons should be, but here are some ideas to get the ball rolling:

IconAbout - a book or a pair of glasses
IconCodes - a pair of sunglasses or a Sherlock Holmes hat
IconEntrance - this should definitely be an entrance hatch
IconExit - this should definitely be an exit
IconHotkeys - an inverted T-shape with arrows (arrow keys layout)
IconMouse - a mouse
IconOptions - a cog
IconPlayers - Cluedo tokens
IconReplay - a clapper board
IconRestart - a reload arrow
IconStyles - a folder with an arrow pointing into it (this is for "Update Styles")

I've made some very basic versions of the above, please feel free to edit them or completely recreate them.

Size-wise, they should be no larger than about 24(h)x32(w), but if you can make really great looking 32x32 icons, that's fine. The menu items automatically resize according to the icons anyway.

So yeah, if you fancy giving this a go, please download the .zip and see what you can come up with!

[zanzindorf]

This looks like a fun challenge! I'd like to take a crack at it, though time might be spotty this weekend. I whipped something up in Blender/Krita for the replay icon.

Here's one with a dead-on camera angle.


Here's one with a slightly angled view, to hit the 32x24 aspect ratio a bit better.


It's a 3D model, so the lighting and camera angle can be whatever we like.


Which one do you like better?

I don't know what you had in mind for art style, but I have AnimationFactory.com on the brain atm, so I'm leaning towards simple, cartoony 3D renders?

[WillLem]

Which one do you like better?

Thanks for making these! I probably prefer the straight up 32x32 one, but both could work.

I don't know what you had in mind for art style ... I'm leaning towards simple, cartoony 3D renders?

Yes, ideal. By all means have some fun with it and see what you come up with. I'd say 32x32 is probably a good size to aim for if you're working with large 3D renders.

[zanzindorf]

Here's an attempt at the code icon:

This one kinda needs an outline for dark UI. Cramming sunglasses into 32x32 is very hard lol
This one's angled nicely, but might be too small.
This one's a front view with some binary.

Do we like the binary code? I can add or remove it to either render.




Also did a few more renders of the replay arrow.

This is the one from my last post.
For this one, I changed the lighting a bit to brighten everything.
Completely new model, is a bit more flat.

I'll likely have more time tomorrow. I may work on one of the more complicated ones, like IconEntrance or IconExit.

[WillLem]

Great work, zanzindorf

Here's an attempt at the code icon:
...
Do we like the binary code? I can add or remove it to either render.

I definitely prefer the front-view glasses. The binary is also a nice touch.

For this one, I changed the lighting a bit to brighten everything.

I can't decide which I prefer of these. The darker one seems a bit more 3D, has more depth to it, which is good. The lighter one is more "visible", but might not contrast as well against the standard menu background.

I'll get some previews of these icons up later today.

[Proxima]

Got to put my vote in for the side-view glasses; they look great!