On the Suject of Headers and Banners

[chibihalo]

A topic in another icon related community got me to thinking about headers and banners. People in that discussion claim that headers and banners are so hard to do that it takes them hours to complete just one. This leads me to believe that everyone else who makes headers are always creating image blends for their journal and user info headers. I wonder when the standard of header and banner making became that they had to be image blends. I myself make banners and headers for journals, userinfo sections, and forum use and yet I have yet to use an image blend on a large graphic. I maintained in my contribution to the conversation that good headers and banners can be made with the same techniques used for icons just applied to a larger scale. Larger versions of brushes, textures, and patterns can be applied along with the same coloring techniques can be used without the need for complex blends each and every time a person creates headers and banners. What I wonder is when it became blends only for larger graphics? If a banner or header lacks a blended image is it instantly not a good graphic when it contains beautiful coloring, patterns, textures, and brushes? Can an icon tutorial really be applied to a larger graphic or is it frowned upon to not use a banner tutorial for banners?

I get the feeling that there are some people in the iconing world who work with large graphics that believe icon techniques cannot be applied to banners and headers because they must contain image blends. I also get the feeling that these same people feel a large graphic without an image blend isn't a good graphic. Is this true or just my misinterpretation of what's being said in other discussion? Where do you stand on the ease of making larger graphics