Icon Progression 2016
Here's my progression post for 2016, where I show a selection of icons I made every month, and try to comment on my progress more or less coherently. :)
I have linked the different posts in those comments, but you can also click on the month names for that month's calendar with links to all my posts.
January
I made 6 icon posts in January, that's got to be some kind of record. I participated in a 90s battle, and the icons I made for jsfunction's character project are still some of my best icons (sharpening notwithstanding). I put a lot of effort into those, since the other makers who took part in the battle are so very good. I also made some request icons. Sadly, imho it shows that I don't know the respective fandoms. The icons look kinda uninspired. I still miss technique20in20, which was always very challenging. That set had some of my first manually colored icons. The last was a Star Wars post for 10in30, which looking back now didn't really have any good icons.
February
The first time I participated in 20muses, and it was so much fun, and damn that set still looks like an explosion of 20 different techniques. Blocking! Text! Hair painting! About half of the icons still hold up a year later, the rest are victims of my tendency to overcrowd icons and not make the subject stand out enough. I got the hang of contrast and text work, but there are still some vital techniques missing, like vibrance and the interaction between contrast and sharpness. But I was very inspired and that shows. The icon maker community was still very busy and exciting at that time. I remember it fondly.
Other than that, I posted a multifandom icon roundup from which I can barely find two icons that I still like, and another set for technique20in20.
March
March wasn't a very busy month challenge-wise, only two challenges. One Elyas M'Barek set for character_draw (I used to like that comm a lot, but it feels like it hasn't had a character randomize challenge since), and a Lucifer set for 10in30. I sucked so much at muted close crop, and I think I mostly still do. I tried very light pastel coloring that month, and I don't think it worked all that well. The very vibrant painty technique ones are better. I'm happy with that last Lucifer icon, and I've used that look several times since.
April
My first two entries for theiconthrone this month marked the start of a long and happy relationship with that comm. It's one of few sets I have ever made that look cohesive. The usual problems with sharpness and vibrance/contrast persist. In the Ichabod Crane set for character20n20, I tried some more of that light pastel style, and I like them a bit better than before, although the close crops still look boring. The purple Americans icon was a lucky find, and I am still happy I stumbled on that technique. Other people liked that style, too, apparently, and later asked me about it.
Then there were a lot of challenge icons. I think that month was the first time ever I participated in a lims (lims_movie with the movie Deadpool). I had previously shied away from them because the critique is pretty harsh. I had to admit at some point that I wouldn't be getting critique for my icons any other way, though, so I tried it after all. And, lo and behold, it paid off immediately. second_love gave me valuable information about saturation - namely that the vibrant parts of icons draw the eye, and that it's not usually advisable to make the subject less vibrant than the background. That had never occurred to me before and helped my progress as an iconmaker a lot. Of course everyone also complained about oversharpening, and while that was easy to understand, it took me much longer to figure out how to fix it. *g*
Oh yeah, and I learned how to put text on shapes, as evidenced by the Community icon!
May
May was the month of the turbo_rumble. Always a very good chance to get good critique. It worked this time, too. Man, did I get ripped a new one for my first icon. :D The only bad thing was that I didn't get around to remaking my turbo rumble icons this year. :(
The 20muses icon set was very inspiring and had some results I still like now. Especially that "High Maintenance" icon I identify with and love using.
June
Icon drop with tons of challenge icons that show a lot of different styles. They are still mostly oversharpened, but otherwise pretty nice. *g* The third icon is special in that a Librarians fan twitter used it as its profile image for a while. Yay!
This year was also the first time I participated in Ask the Maker, and I got three wonderful questions and learned how to write up icon tutorials. (I learned handy things about Semagic, too.)
July
Lots of challenge icons. I'm getting better at that coloring thing, but looking at those icons, most of them look too dark. I have started working on the oversharpening issue, but the result is all over the place. Lots of icons are still too sharp, others are too blurry. I got to the finals of a lims (lims_btvs) for the first time - but admittedly the competition wasn't all that hard. That Scream painting icon is still one of my favorites of the whole year. I finally finished my 2015 remake icons from January. The results are better than the originals, but I can't say I like many of them anymore.
August
Three icon posts this month: all for theiconthrone: Ocean + Inspired By + Progressions, and there are some icon drops added from other comms, too.
I especially still like everything I did for paintedpixels ( theme: Impressionism), but I haven't managed to really get the style down since. There's a lot of experimenting going on in this month, which will stay a topic for the rest of the year. Sharpening is getting better, but I'm not paying enough attention to it all the time, especially not on text. I'm still masking in the finished 100x100 size, which is easy and saves a lot of time in the process, but makes the subject outline worse. A lot of them have terrible crop choices, too, and some of those compositions just seem off. *shudder*
September
Tbh, the one challenge set I posted in September contained icons I'd already made ages ago but never posted. I obviously can't count those in the progression. The other set I posted that month, though, that one is very representative of my skills at the time. I did a lot of plain blocky background colors, because everyone likes those. Everyone but me. ;) But I think they were a necessary step in my experimentation. And at least they made me realize that I need to pay more attention to the direction of the light in the subject. This is the first month I started adding a light gradient to every icon to account for it.
I still really like that set a lot. Of course, there was also the second turbo-rumble round that ended in September, and I posted all challenge icons I made in August and September here. In that set, there are still a lot of icons that don't contrast well. I don't think I have gotten that correct even now. Still so much to learn... :D
October
I did some request icons with a yellow color palette, which is always nice, and they had a lot of text. I finally consquently started smoothing it, and they look okay. Compositions are still mostly upper half of the body with plain background (=boring). I had fun with some easy self-made animations that month.
Somewhere around here, I started masking the original cap and only downsizing afterwards. This really helps to get a clean outline of the subject, improving the result in terms of perceived sharpness, but easily adds five minutes to the icon making process. All the hard lessons involve me spending more time on an icon. *sigh* :)
This is also the month I started trying to emulate scarred_loretta's lighting, and I am so bad at it. Especially because it clashes with my at the time favorite flat style. It'll take me some time to keep those two stylistic elements firmly apart. :)
November
My health started deteriorating towards the end of the year, and it shows in the lack of new techniques. I feel like I didn't make any progress at all, and those icons look exactly like the icons from previous months. I barely got up the energy to participate in every theiconthrone challenge. Actually, I think I missed a few of those, too. Most icons that month were really boring, but I admit I adore the last one - it's one of my favorite quotes ever. Here are the post links: Time icons, Librarians icons, and My Life in icons.
December
The home stretch for theiconthrone, but I had not enough inspiration or muse left for all of them, due to being under the weather. I don't like the first post, and, again, it contains quite a few icons I had made in previous months but not posted. The second post contains some good examples of the flat coloring style I developed over the year, while the black & white post focuses more on the bright lighting (that now looks a bit better at least). I made another request post with winter icons and books & tea, where nothing special happened technique-wise, but the icons turned out nice and the recipient seemed to really like them.
Closing Thoughts
I - again - made over 1000 icons in 2016, which is a lot more than I'd expected. I'd thought 2015 was a one-off thing. Ha. :)
I met some really nice people in the icon maker community last year, and I am very happy to have found some personal connections in addition to the "usual" icon interaction! You guys rock!
In terms of technique, I got the masking and sharpening better under control, but it's still not where I want it. I didn't experiment enough at the end of the year, but I'm hoping this will get more again soon - I love experimenting and getting unexpected results.
I'm looking forward to new challenges this year, and hope a lot of other icon makers will join the fun!
x-posted to dw (comments:
)
I have linked the different posts in those comments, but you can also click on the month names for that month's calendar with links to all my posts.
January
I made 6 icon posts in January, that's got to be some kind of record. I participated in a 90s battle, and the icons I made for jsfunction's character project are still some of my best icons (sharpening notwithstanding). I put a lot of effort into those, since the other makers who took part in the battle are so very good. I also made some request icons. Sadly, imho it shows that I don't know the respective fandoms. The icons look kinda uninspired. I still miss technique20in20, which was always very challenging. That set had some of my first manually colored icons. The last was a Star Wars post for 10in30, which looking back now didn't really have any good icons.
February
The first time I participated in 20muses, and it was so much fun, and damn that set still looks like an explosion of 20 different techniques. Blocking! Text! Hair painting! About half of the icons still hold up a year later, the rest are victims of my tendency to overcrowd icons and not make the subject stand out enough. I got the hang of contrast and text work, but there are still some vital techniques missing, like vibrance and the interaction between contrast and sharpness. But I was very inspired and that shows. The icon maker community was still very busy and exciting at that time. I remember it fondly.
Other than that, I posted a multifandom icon roundup from which I can barely find two icons that I still like, and another set for technique20in20.
March
March wasn't a very busy month challenge-wise, only two challenges. One Elyas M'Barek set for character_draw (I used to like that comm a lot, but it feels like it hasn't had a character randomize challenge since), and a Lucifer set for 10in30. I sucked so much at muted close crop, and I think I mostly still do. I tried very light pastel coloring that month, and I don't think it worked all that well. The very vibrant painty technique ones are better. I'm happy with that last Lucifer icon, and I've used that look several times since.
April
My first two entries for theiconthrone this month marked the start of a long and happy relationship with that comm. It's one of few sets I have ever made that look cohesive. The usual problems with sharpness and vibrance/contrast persist. In the Ichabod Crane set for character20n20, I tried some more of that light pastel style, and I like them a bit better than before, although the close crops still look boring. The purple Americans icon was a lucky find, and I am still happy I stumbled on that technique. Other people liked that style, too, apparently, and later asked me about it.
Then there were a lot of challenge icons. I think that month was the first time ever I participated in a lims (lims_movie with the movie Deadpool). I had previously shied away from them because the critique is pretty harsh. I had to admit at some point that I wouldn't be getting critique for my icons any other way, though, so I tried it after all. And, lo and behold, it paid off immediately. second_love gave me valuable information about saturation - namely that the vibrant parts of icons draw the eye, and that it's not usually advisable to make the subject less vibrant than the background. That had never occurred to me before and helped my progress as an iconmaker a lot. Of course everyone also complained about oversharpening, and while that was easy to understand, it took me much longer to figure out how to fix it. *g*
Oh yeah, and I learned how to put text on shapes, as evidenced by the Community icon!
May
May was the month of the turbo_rumble. Always a very good chance to get good critique. It worked this time, too. Man, did I get ripped a new one for my first icon. :D The only bad thing was that I didn't get around to remaking my turbo rumble icons this year. :(
The 20muses icon set was very inspiring and had some results I still like now. Especially that "High Maintenance" icon I identify with and love using.
June
Icon drop with tons of challenge icons that show a lot of different styles. They are still mostly oversharpened, but otherwise pretty nice. *g* The third icon is special in that a Librarians fan twitter used it as its profile image for a while. Yay!
This year was also the first time I participated in Ask the Maker, and I got three wonderful questions and learned how to write up icon tutorials. (I learned handy things about Semagic, too.)
July
Lots of challenge icons. I'm getting better at that coloring thing, but looking at those icons, most of them look too dark. I have started working on the oversharpening issue, but the result is all over the place. Lots of icons are still too sharp, others are too blurry. I got to the finals of a lims (lims_btvs) for the first time - but admittedly the competition wasn't all that hard. That Scream painting icon is still one of my favorites of the whole year. I finally finished my 2015 remake icons from January. The results are better than the originals, but I can't say I like many of them anymore.
August
Three icon posts this month: all for theiconthrone: Ocean + Inspired By + Progressions, and there are some icon drops added from other comms, too.
I especially still like everything I did for paintedpixels ( theme: Impressionism), but I haven't managed to really get the style down since. There's a lot of experimenting going on in this month, which will stay a topic for the rest of the year. Sharpening is getting better, but I'm not paying enough attention to it all the time, especially not on text. I'm still masking in the finished 100x100 size, which is easy and saves a lot of time in the process, but makes the subject outline worse. A lot of them have terrible crop choices, too, and some of those compositions just seem off. *shudder*
September
Tbh, the one challenge set I posted in September contained icons I'd already made ages ago but never posted. I obviously can't count those in the progression. The other set I posted that month, though, that one is very representative of my skills at the time. I did a lot of plain blocky background colors, because everyone likes those. Everyone but me. ;) But I think they were a necessary step in my experimentation. And at least they made me realize that I need to pay more attention to the direction of the light in the subject. This is the first month I started adding a light gradient to every icon to account for it.
I still really like that set a lot. Of course, there was also the second turbo-rumble round that ended in September, and I posted all challenge icons I made in August and September here. In that set, there are still a lot of icons that don't contrast well. I don't think I have gotten that correct even now. Still so much to learn... :D
October
I did some request icons with a yellow color palette, which is always nice, and they had a lot of text. I finally consquently started smoothing it, and they look okay. Compositions are still mostly upper half of the body with plain background (=boring). I had fun with some easy self-made animations that month.
Somewhere around here, I started masking the original cap and only downsizing afterwards. This really helps to get a clean outline of the subject, improving the result in terms of perceived sharpness, but easily adds five minutes to the icon making process. All the hard lessons involve me spending more time on an icon. *sigh* :)
This is also the month I started trying to emulate scarred_loretta's lighting, and I am so bad at it. Especially because it clashes with my at the time favorite flat style. It'll take me some time to keep those two stylistic elements firmly apart. :)
November
My health started deteriorating towards the end of the year, and it shows in the lack of new techniques. I feel like I didn't make any progress at all, and those icons look exactly like the icons from previous months. I barely got up the energy to participate in every theiconthrone challenge. Actually, I think I missed a few of those, too. Most icons that month were really boring, but I admit I adore the last one - it's one of my favorite quotes ever. Here are the post links: Time icons, Librarians icons, and My Life in icons.
December
The home stretch for theiconthrone, but I had not enough inspiration or muse left for all of them, due to being under the weather. I don't like the first post, and, again, it contains quite a few icons I had made in previous months but not posted. The second post contains some good examples of the flat coloring style I developed over the year, while the black & white post focuses more on the bright lighting (that now looks a bit better at least). I made another request post with winter icons and books & tea, where nothing special happened technique-wise, but the icons turned out nice and the recipient seemed to really like them.
Closing Thoughts
I - again - made over 1000 icons in 2016, which is a lot more than I'd expected. I'd thought 2015 was a one-off thing. Ha. :)
I met some really nice people in the icon maker community last year, and I am very happy to have found some personal connections in addition to the "usual" icon interaction! You guys rock!
In terms of technique, I got the masking and sharpening better under control, but it's still not where I want it. I didn't experiment enough at the end of the year, but I'm hoping this will get more again soon - I love experimenting and getting unexpected results.
I'm looking forward to new challenges this year, and hope a lot of other icon makers will join the fun!
x-posted to dw (comments:
)