Induanes Client Skin

[Induane]

I\'ve been working on some stuff for our guild, includeing a skin.  It is much like the default or Elves skin, but designed to match the theme of our guild.  

Here are some samples - suggestions and critisism are welcome.

This one is from before I redid the toolbar buttons.



Here is one from after the toolbar rewrite.



and here are some close ups of some of the buttons:





Suggestions critique, and of course praise are all welcome

Thanks!

[ArcaneFalcon]

Apples?!?  Since when are there apples?  Hmph, maybe I should play more than once a month...

Not bad.  Lynx might drop by and tell you you shouldn\'t use PS art (like in the inventory window) but I think it should be alright.  The only thing I\'m not really a fan of is your background texture.  It looks very...photoshop cloud-rendery.  Also, you should edit some of the xml to change things like the title bar to fit your theme better (brown doesn\'t match orange/yellow too well).  Another thing you could do is use the use dodge/burn on the actual symbol layers on your toolbar buttons to make them look less mspaint-like.

I know how much work it is to completely redo a ui, so kudos on making it this far.

:emerald:

[Robinmagus]

Really nice Induane! But..the buttons..I read that your trying to keep it to simple shapes, but it\'s kinda hard to tell what they\'re for..but hey, those are pretty good given that dem suggested em

[Gentar]

where are people getting those sheilds?!!?!?!?!? the one in the inventory picture?!?!?!  is sheildcrafting working, because i saw the forge and that other thing in ojaveda???

oh yeah, the skins ok too, although i wouldnt use it....sorry. i think that it seriously lacks though in the sense of fantasy/medieval design.

[Robinmagus]

Actually, I think those designs depict the battle of ragnarok, which is what induanes guild is all about.

And the sheild you get in the arena, PM me for details.

[Induane]

I\'ll definately agree that some of the buttons are hard to tell what they are for.  If anyone has any idea on what I could do for it feel free to let me know.  I really was at a loss there.  

I didn\'t know I could edit the xml files to change those colors - I\'ll check it out shortly and see if I can figure out how to hack them up.  I hope it doesn\'t use html color codes because I pretty much don\'t understand them one bit - its all trial and error for me.  

As for the background texture - I struggled with it for a while, and eventually took work that wasn\'t mine - but it was an open-source image.  I have the author credited in a license file in the new zip file.  I just took the file streched it around and moved them around to my liking.  They will probabily stay until I can find something better.   I have each file saved with its layers as well as exported to png so replacing them is trivial if I can find something better.  It was designed with The Gimp not photoshop -  

As for using planeshift art, the intent is for it all to be origional eventually.  They are credited in the new zip file as well.  They are there because I havn\'t had time to implement redo\'s.  I wanted to keep the skin fully functional while in progress.

Any other ideas please - keep it comming

[ArcaneFalcon]

Induane: It just so happens the xml files use rgb, not hex, so you\'re in luck.  Even if they did use hex, I\'m pretty sure the color picker in GIMP displays the current color in both rgb and hex.

As for your backgrounds, just get a couple textures (http://www.imageafter.com if you need some) and a layer or two of colors and designs and overlay them using blending modes (multiply and overlay are my two favorites in photoshop, not sure how that translates into GIMP).  It will inevitably turn out better than what you have now.  All that I ask is that you stay away from filters as much as possible (a few are useful, like gaussian blur, but most are worthless).

:emerald:

[Induane]

Well here is one with new bars.  I don\'t know if it looks better or not.



Arcane - What are blending modes.  I\'m sort of a self learned trial and error taught image editor dude man person so I\'m not sure what that means.  I can overlay I think using two layers and various layers and opacity.

[Cherppow]

Hello!

Good job Induane, looks very nice already. I think the window titlebars fit much better to the overall style now. Hmm, I think with blending modes ArcaneFalcon just refers to the way how two layers are mixed. In Gimp you can adjust this in the layers tab:



If I\'m allowed to give tips, here\'s what I would try:

- Decrease the contrast of the bg image. Right now the brightest areas of the bg may make some texts hard to read. Bright bg also draws the attention of the user, distracting him/her from the actual use of the window. Background should remain in the background.

- Make the center of the window titlebar darker. Now you have the both ends of the titlebar darker, and the center is bright. However, it is the center that holds the text again, so the bright background may make the text difficult to read. I would try changing the gradient direction, so that the edges are bright and center is dark. Or simply try making the center less bright than what it is now. The latter would also make the titlebar look more solid and unified.

- The toolbar buttons are very nice, but I think they too could use some unification. Right now some of the icons are very thin, while others are somewhat thicker. I\'d try to make the thin ones match the thick ones.

That\'s all I can think of. All in all, good work, I\'ll be sure to follow how you develop it.

[Induane]

Ahh I get ya - thats not so bad to do, and I think I can try some of that.  Tonight I shall see what I can do - but now I\'m off to negociate on a new Volvo so - back soon I hope

[Induane]

I\'ve done a bit more work - not changing the texture just yet - I\'m focusing on redoing every aspect of the gui.  Here are some moderate improvements - the brown buttons are reamde, as is the close button at the top right of windows.



and  then

[Induane]

The latest version of our guilds skin is now available for download!

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD

All that mucking about with bad free hosts is gone - its hosted on our own server now.  As long as the ftp upload went fine which it seems to have, then all should be good.  Just drop the file in the /planeshit/art/skins directory and fire up pssetup and click on skins.  Select Ragnarok and you\'re on your way!

Please feel free to try it out.  Though it is geared towards our guild, some others might like it as well.  I havn\'t done anything with the abackground textures yet as time has been limited, but that is comming. Thanks for all the critism which helped make this better!

Regards,

[Induane]

I\'m working on touching up the skin now, - and I am presented with a decision - in screwing with it I remade one and couldn\'t decide if it was better or not.  Perhaps some feedback from the smarts here could help me with my indecisiveness.

Old


New:

[Neryam]

I dunno.. I\'d keep the frames but the bg is better in the new one.  )  Great work with the skin

[Induane]

You don\'t think the bump mapping is too much? I think it looks cool too but was worried it would be visually distracting.  Not sure still, hehe.