Topic awaiting preservation: **November 07 Sig Contest** - Text - Discussion

Any questions or thoughts pertaining to the "**November 07 Sig Contest** competition go here.

Sig Contest

(Edited by Tao on 11-07-2007 09:04)

Here are some examples of the kind of thing I'm looking for.



(Edited by Tao on 11-07-2007 09:05)

Testing Sig

Good subject, Tao. Just wanted to let you know that I am working on a sig for this month, it just might take me a while to get it done. I'm trying my hand at pixel art, which is something I don't have too much experience with.

I've not dabbled in "pixel art" at all myself either, I'll be really interested to see what you come up with Suho.
Good stuff Blacknight, don't forget to officially enter it into the competition by posting it in the other thread as well, easy thing to do.

Hmm... I think I might have gone a bit overboard with this one. I started with an idea, and it just kept growing. Rather than rein things in, I just went with it, and this is what I came up with:



I just wanted to test it out and see what it looked like in the Asylum.

(For it's pixel size, it's ridiculously heavy (100k). You don't want to know how many frames are in there.)

[Edit: I suppose it would help to have the right URL in there... ]

[Edit 2: I'm still trying to figure out how I feel about it. After staring at the blasted thing for so long at such high magnification, there is definitely a sense of satisfaction at seeing it completed. Whether I like it or not is another story. Maybe I've just been staring at it for too long.]

(Edited by Suho1004 on 11-13-2007 08:23)

(Edited by Suho1004 on 11-13-2007 08:27)

^^ Holy tamale... "a bit overboard" he says

Suho: First of all, that's great work! Gotta love all that detail, and it just -works-.

Also, there's a relatively easy way to make it a lot smaller. With the background completely transparent, Imageready can't do much to keep the size down.

There's a sort of compression method IR uses for animations: first frame is a keyframe, and the other frames just contain the pixels that change since the previous frame. The rest of the image filled with transparent pixels. (Which is key, because large areas of transparent pixels compress very nicely.)

However, since your background is transparent, IR can't use that method. To solve this, you could fill it with the asylum's average background color (2B0404). Your sig is mostly square, and only the right end is actually 'connected' to the asylum background, where the slight color difference may show. If you'd insert a separating line just like on the left, you'd be in the clear.

tl;dr: It shows that you have the dedication to make something very cool.

mahjqa: Thanks! The compliment means a lot coming from such a talented artist.

As for the IR compression thing, yeah, I noticed that. When I had the average background layer on (I kept it on while I was creating the image just to get a feel for what it was going to look like) and no transparency, it was about 62k. But as soon as I turned on transparency, it went bonkers! I was wondering why there was such a change (basically, it got 50% larger).

I'll see about reworking it a little to make it completely square and separated from the asylum background. That sounds like a good solution.

quote:

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Suho1004 said:

Hmm... I think I might have gone a bit overboard with this one.

---

We wouldn't recognize you otherwise

Great sig though - I wouldn't even worry about the size, honestly. However, boxing it in opens any number of possibilities for background colors and would be a good all around solution.

Great stuff Suho, the detailed work you must have put in has paid off dividends, well done.

OK, here's a boxed-in version... the first is the average asylum background and the second is just straight black. The colors obviously pop more on straight black, but I wanted to see how it looked here.



And now a little space to cleanse the mental palate...

*whistling in the dark... whistling in the dark...*

Ahem:



[Edit: Hmm. You can tell that the background in the first one is different from the post background if you look closely, but it doesn't seem to jump out at you right away (at least it doesn't seem to jump out at me). Still, I'm wondering if I should just go with a visibly different background. The straight black does look kind of nice. I'll have to think about this.]

[Edit2: Oh, yeah, and going with a non-transparent background cut down on the size by over a third. Amazing.]

[Edit3: Interestingly enough, my original design had another box along the right side and was thus completely closed off. But somewhere along the way I got the idea of putting in the vacuum chute, and the right side opened up. So I've returned to my roots with this one. OK, enough edits.]

(Edited by Suho1004 on 11-14-2007 05:28)

(Edited by Suho1004 on 11-14-2007 05:29)

(Edited by Suho1004 on 11-14-2007 05:34)

Well, almost didn't post this after seeing the incredible effort Suho did... But for what it's worth...

Jung: I'm glad you posted it. It made me laugh.

took a second, Jung, but made me chuckle. Very nice...

I was wondering if you were going to be around this month Jung. Good to see you about and great to see one of your sigs up too.
It took me a couple of cycles to get it, but then I laughed when I did and that's always a good thing, great stuff.

So, no opinions on the background in my sig?

Coming back to it now, almost a week later, I am more drawn to the straight black. The Asylum median seems to clash a bit, even though it is entirely boxed off. It's like how if you wear two items of clothing that are similar colors but slightly different, it can look worse than two items of clothing that are of drastically different colors. So I think I'm going with the black.

There's still a few days left, though, so I'll wait around and see if anyone has an opinion. On my sig, that is. I know you all have opinions on one thing or another.

I think I've got an opinion or two laying 'round somewhere..... I'll look for them later. I do like the dark background on your sig, Suho! That's good stuff!

I'm quite rusty but threw something together:



(Edited by Lacuna on 11-25-2007 00:00)

wow.... lil rustier than i thought....



ok... I used the average bg color. Back to PS for me hahah

BTW, good to see yall!

(Edited by Lacuna on 11-25-2007 00:03)

Classy! Although I think the background is going to be tough to get right. I've found that, unless it's just used as a matte for transparency, the average background is still different enough to be readily noticeable.

And in that vein, I think I'll definitely be going with the black background in my sig.

Sorry I've not been next to a computer long enough to make any comments.
I think you went with the right version of your sig Suho, that black background gives it a little more punch.
Lacuna, great to see you in the forums again. It feels a little weird firing up Photoshop again when you've left it alone for a while I know, I'm still finding my way around after a long hiatus too. I like the rich velvet pattern on the oval as well as the decorated text, good stuff.

Looks like I'm going to be away for a couple of days. I should be able to get the use of an internet connection if I'm not back by the end of the month.
Failing that I may be a day or two late with "the announcement".