Amarok Icon

[Bart Cerneels]

On Fri, Feb 24, 2012 at 06:46, Ken Vermette <vermette at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Thu, Feb 23, 2012 at 10:44 AM, Bart Cerneels <bart.cerneels at kde.org> wrote:
>> On Thu, Feb 23, 2012 at 08:14, Myriam Schweingruber <myriam at kde.org> wrote:
>>> On Wed, Feb 22, 2012 at 18:18, Ken Vermette <vermette at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> I know you guys aren't looking for an icon to replace the existing
>>>> crystal-style icon, but I've prepared an oxygen style icon because the
>>>> existing Amarok icon doesn't match the general style of the Oxygen icon set.
>>>
>>> Are you aware that that icon is actually part of the logo and
>>> trademark of Amarok? It was never intended to be changed in any icon
>>> set.
>>>
>>> While your logo looks very nice I still think it is not suitable for
>>> Amarok as it suggest that Amarok is a CD player which is only a small
>>> subset of the Amarok functions.
>>>
>>> Regards, Myriam
>>> --
>>> Proud member of the Amarok and KDE Community
>>> Protect your freedom and join the Fellowship of FSFE:
>>> http://www.fsfe.org
>>> Please don't send me proprietary file formats,
>>> use ISO standard ODF instead (ISO/IEC 26300)
>>> _______________________________________________
>>
>> I like it though, even if it does not fit with the current trademark.
>>
>> Ken: you obviously know your way around a graphics editor. How do you
>> feel about doing some other artwork that we are currently missing.
>> For instance: we have background images for the browsers (media
>> sources panel) but not for the (if empty) context view nor playlist.
>> Such images would be really welcome to break the "ocean of grey"
>> effect when there is no content.
>> We sort of have a house style for those, but if perhaps you can make
>> the other images fit the oxygen style as well.
>>
>> Bart
>
> @Myriam: All I was asking was if someone was willing to compile a copy
> for personal use, I can never get things to build properly so I was
> just curious if someone already set up for it would be willing. That
> being said, while I'm aware of the concept of branding I didn't
> realise it would be that bad an idea to offer an icon to an
> open-source project. I could change the CD to the moon, but from your
> message I doubt any attempts to work on a new icon would be welcome.

That is quite some effort just for changing an icon. I think it might
just be easier to replace the icon on the file system. Would be
overwritten with each new install though.

>
> @Bart: I'd be happy to help out where I can, but I can't guarantee a
> super-speedy schedule on when you'll get my commits. I can definitely
> get some sort of playlist background-art in for you; I'm not really
> sure what you'd want for the context view though, and once art is on
> either side I'm not sure if it would make it overcrowded. Anywho,
> looking at the background art, is it in grey-scale?
>
> Throwing in my two cents if I may; In general options there's the
> option to have either background art or no background art. If I made a
> second series of very simple unobtrusive background images, could the
> "show Background Images" option be changed to a dropdown with...
>
> Background Images: ["Detailed" "Simple" "None"]
> (Maybe using just folder names in some location so people could add their own?)
>
> I've just found that when text gets overlaid on top of the background
> images it tends to get very messy looking with detailed icons below;
> and disabling the background images leaves you with that familiar
> "ocean of grey". I'm mentioning this because a simplified 2D set of
> icons will probably still break that monotony, but not fight any text
> that gets laid on top of it. Just an idea, I can throw the art in if
> someone programs the dropdown/art changer. :)
>
>  - Ken

We really try hard to avoid many configuration options. We'll just
stick with the current on/off, which in an ideal situation would not
be needed at all.

I was planning of introducing a global CSS file for amarok. That could
include the background images along with colors, etc.