What Makes a Good Skin/Icon/Cursor/Theme?
Wednesday, July 26, 2006 by Zoomba | Discussion: OS Customization
Of course, there are some things that almost everyone recognizes as high quality. Skins like eminence and Jaluran seem to be enjoying pretty wide-spread acceptance by the community, at least judging by the number of downloads and comments. But what is it about these two skins, which are very different in general style, that everyone likes so much? Personal tastes aside, what makes a skin, an icon, a theme etc. "good"?
Currently, I'm running eminence by rjsmith2007 for my blind, and Mormegil's Apogee icon suite. Hippy's Magic 8 Ball often graces my desktop and I have ObjectDock Plus running with the standard skin (because I can't find a good one for it). All of the enhancements I actually run on my system tend to be of the clean/minimalist style. Soft, clean edges, nothing extra/unnecessary generally. That's the style I like. But then again, I love MikeB314's Old Republic skin, which is generally a lot busier than I usually like.
What is it about these different skins? Is it their clean and well drawn graphics? Is it the interesting placement of borders? Is it the color schemes that do it?
What do YOU think are the essential elements to any skin, icon, theme etc? What separates the OK from the great? What are the things you always look for in the content you download?
Reply #2 Wednesday, July 26, 2006 9:49 AM
New job has me so stressed out that I broke out with shingles. Yay, this is totally worth it...../sarcasm
I hope its better with you now that you are out of this god forsaken place.
Reply #3 Wednesday, July 26, 2006 9:49 AM
The number of icons in a package is something I look at also. The more, the better.
I have been using Eminence by Zero since it came out and absolutely love it. I also use aerial by danilloOC. They are just clean, original skins and I switch between the 2 constantly. I use numerous icon packages, most of them are Paul Boyer's.
Reply #4 Wednesday, July 26, 2006 11:28 AM
My current line up is: Kali WB theme, ClearXP icons and Pro Tools cursor.
Reply #5 Wednesday, July 26, 2006 11:40 AM
What I look for is clean, well made graphics that are not 'messy' looking. Also, that whatever skin I am using (for whatever) is completely skinned, I find it really annonying to use a very nice skin and then a piece is not skinned or missing something.
Currently I'm using a WIP so guess I can't really say much more than that.
Reply #7 Wednesday, July 26, 2006 2:23 PM
Reply #8 Wednesday, July 26, 2006 3:14 PM
In an icon package I look for instant file type recognition. If I can't figure out what the heck that icon's program is at a glance I probably won't keep it around long. Hanging Folders by Asect is a great example of instantly recognizable icons.
For WB, clean lines, white spaces and good contrasts. If the backgrounds on text spreadsheet and email files are weird colors with hard to read font colors it will wear out fast. I love good animations, just not giant annoying ones. I'm using ChaNinja style right now and I love it. My business desktop gets seen a lot by co-workers and I prefer a professional look. (My home desktop can get a bit more wild and creative.)
I know several co-workers who've bought Windowblinds after seeing my desktop at work.
Reply #9 Thursday, July 27, 2006 5:08 AM
Originality and useability come afterwards; if a skin is too dark, too light, etc., I can always go in and change it. If the core look of the skin is just plain ugly though, there's no fixing it.
after all, I can draw up a 5-minute skin in ms paint, then move the window buttons to a different location and call it original, and the skin would be complete crap.
Reply #10 Thursday, July 27, 2006 7:41 AM
There is also the point that I have never found the "one" perfect skin for any app (blind, wa, miranda, ...), but this might be due my own perfectionism when I create skins, so you won't seen much of my own in public as I never can see a skin of mine finished
Reply #11 Sunday, July 30, 2006 2:59 AM
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Reply #1 Wednesday, July 26, 2006 9:30 AM
One word....
Originality...