Icon Remakes 2020
Remakes
This might be the fastest I've ever managed all my remakes - and I got twice as many to remake as last year. Huh. The disadvantage is that I can't do it together with the bestof_icons voting roundup this time, because my icons haven't even gone up for voting yet. (I expect to be in the last two posts, it'll take a while.)
Teaser:
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ella_rose88 chose these:
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I am quite happy with this choice, because I didn't much like the overwhelming grunge texture. So I made it a little cleaner, and added text. It's still a bit grungy, because I like the texture of his skin and beard, and oversharpening those brings something interesting to the icon, I think.
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This one otoh was one of my favorite icons I made in all of November, and I had a really hard time remaking it. I don't really like the results, either, even though they're very yellow. But the original cap has him holding a microphone, and there's just no way to use this cap except in a close crop (and editing out the mic) like I did in the original. And in the far crop, his face isn't very well visible either, so I added it to the background - but the icon still looks pretty random anyway. Ah, well. (At least they're yellow?)
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I also had a hard time with this one, because I liked the vibrant coloring, and I spent a lot of time manipping her arm into shape so you can tell their arms apart. I admit it's too pink in places, especially on her hand and his ear. Maybe I should have just taken the old icon and fixed the coloring a bit? But I remade it, and solved the "arm problem" by simply choosing a much closer crop. I like the remake, fwiw, but I still like the original better, red tint and all.
littlemissnovel chose these:
Aaah, all three were tough.
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The original Ye Zun cap had his hand barely visible and it took a lot of manipping to get that to look like it looks now. It ended up a little too blurry, but those dark energy swirls just look like that, and they are the focus of the icon. I don't really see any other way. So: I had no idea how to remake that. I resorted to cropping it all out and adding an angry texture. :D I like the result, in fact. His facial expression is clearly visible now, and it turned into a nice "mood" icon.
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I love that icon. I love his face in it, I love the way I managed to make it red but not too red, and I adore his coat. It took quite a lot of fiddling and manual painting to make the stripes stand out like that. I tried to bring out the stripes in the remake as well, and I actually like the result, too. It does show off that beautiful coat, his facial expression (again) is better visible, and since it looks so strained, I chose an appropriately sad lyrics snippet to go with it. Overall: unexpected success!
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Another one that I am very fond of, and that I knew from the start I couldn't improve. I tried a simple remake, trying to bring out a bit more depth through contrast, but I really didn't know what to do with it, so I gave up. I am happy with the way I manipped out his phone, and the red of his sweater really works well with the higher contrast of his face. Not bad overall, and his expression is interesting enough to carry the icon without text, so that went better than I'd thought, too.
mirroreuler chose these:
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Another icon that really only works in this crop - and I loved the whimsical hearts in it. It's an overly romantic cap, and the icon always makes me laugh. The remake didn't want to come together at all - I discarded the frame version. Then I tried again with a closer crop, and a just as whimsical vibrant glow, and I do like that attempt much better. It retains some of the satirical slant of the original, while putting Bai Yu's lips front and center. Yup, that works! :D
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Very good choice, that one. It's too blurry for a close crop, and looks smudged and LQ overall. It was my pleasure to remake it. Although I'm not sure this is the best I could do, I like the new one. It might be a bit too white, which makes it hard to see the bandage on his head, and the text fought me tooth and nail, too. I ended up adding three X's to balance out its top-heaviness. I like the textless version better, even though it seems kind of empty and doesn't carry enough punch for a textless icon. Ah, well. It's still an improvement over the original! (But I know I can do better. I guess I should try again.)
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This was an icon from the tv tropes set, and a lot of work. I had to manip them together, and I really like the blood effect and the different fonts. I tried getting the same effect on the remake without having to manip by using two caps and slapping them on different levels. I decided on a retro coloring to bring out the blocky levels even more, and I actually think this turned out really well!
Last but not least, nightbulbs chose this one:
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That was a good choice, too. I had made it for the theme "visible texture", so I didn't mind how overwhelming the texture is in it - and the artsy style kind of hides the low quality of the cap. I tried my very best to hide that flaw with this remake,and I actually very much like the result. I am always fond of a painted look. I like how the blue color scheme came out, looking like an ocean - it fits really well, since the cap is of a water game (hence also the wet hair). Plus, it successfully hides the low picture quality. I really like how this one came out. (Right next to the other one, his face looks too orange, but I like it on its own - the complementary effect with the water was worth it.)
That was it! It was a very cool activity, like it always is. I surprised myself by managing to improve on icons I didn't think were bad in the first place, and I learned quite a lot about why some icons work and some don't. Since those were already ten icons, I didn't choose any additional ones from my usericons to remake.
As usual: all comments welcome, and my resource post is here.
Previous icon posts:
x-posted from dw (comments:
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