Call for an official Mozilla Sunbird theme

[suslik]

Looking good!

My only comment is that the bird is too 'skinny'. I think the proportion of bird to calendar isn't quite right yet. This becomes particularly noticeable for the small bird only icons..

I would gladly second that. Right now the beak-end is dead center, and the chest is at 1/4 of radius. Imho chest at 2/3 of radius inn would be more favorable for the bird. Also, this way you dont have to think about the tail.

Concaved calendar - excellent idea - gives some depth, without loocing too much realistically 3d (like those ugly isometric monstrocities of icons from the days of yore).

[jeffhot]

I think MarkCarson's latest concept has some very good personality, in a way that suslik has described Firefox having. The bird seems to be looking over his plans for the month, perhaps to find a good time for a vacation.

Suggestion for either of mark's designs though: get rid of the outlines at some point. Neither Thunderbird or Firefox have any outlines, besides the envelope. Maybe you haven't arrived at that step yet, no biggie, but it may be difficult to do later. If the clarity of your design depends too much on outlines, you might not be able to just turn them off without tweaking the ehll out of gradients and colors and such. I know you're not even trying for a final design yet though, so I'm just mentioning it.

By the way, someone suggested that mine looked final. I'll take that as a compliment, but by no means do I feel that way about it. For one, I want to round-ify it some more. Perhaps make the wings themselves resmble the sun a bit. And that damn clock/calendar/whatever goes back there is a major problem. I'm torn between enlarging the head (to match the personalities of FF and TB's icons) and leaving it small. If I get time I'll come up with some studies for that. A bigger head will require a better drawn head too, though (=more time). Yada yada.

[markcarson]

Roger that Jeff, perhaps what some folks don't appreciate is that changes take time and effort. Its all a lot of work, even when the results look simple. In fact sometimes, the simpler the graphics the more time it took to get the proportions right so that a simple graphic "works".

Keep posting stuff Jeff, the more ideas we kick out there the more opportunities there are for finding something appropriate and interesting.

Regarding outlines, I create almost everything in Corel Draw as vector drawings, so outline width is something that can be controlled element by element. I've found that I have to thicken and darken the outlines for small icon sized graphics in order to get some definition. At larger (logo) sizes, the outlines can often be reduced to hairlines or removed entirely. Since I'm working with vectors, not rasters, this is easy to do when the time is right.

Aloha

[suslik]

Wanted to see how the only other color left - green - would work.

Once again, lazy Photoshop resize (Sharpen > Resize).



The big one (128x128) has 3 extra layers turned on ("headdress", "Clock Nodges" and "Inner Sun")

Surprizingly, scales fairly well.

Illustrator file (for poking around) is available upon request. (dotsa@hotmail.com with Subj. "sunbird")

Gentlemen, pick up your rotten tomatos...
Ready, Set, GO!

[jeffhot]

That looks great suslik! I mean, yeah: weird tail, but I still like it tons. It definitely "pops" more than any other version yet, and I like it better than your earlier versions since it shows the whole bird. The only deficiency I could point out is that it doesn't much match the FF or TB icons, but maybe that's a dumb goal anyhow. I certainly know that it's constrained my work, since almost everything I've done to it was to make it match up with the other icons better.

This one is my new current favorite.

[sirchode]

You've definitely got some skills, suslik, and I really like how the green turned out. I also like how you implemented the sun into the clock, very clever.

My initial impression, however, was that the clock was thrown at the bird by a teenager and it's as if a camera happened to catch the moment when the two connected and the bird dropped from the sky in a puff of feathers. My second impression was that the bird is -- for some reason -- trying to crawl over the clock and hasn't quite made it all the way yet.

I like how the feathers are realistic and distinguishable. There is also a lot of color variety, which is nice. Overall, great effort. Keep 'em coming!

[suslik]

Lol, you certainly have live imagination! I see where you're coming from. That's y i called it cannon(ball) too :)

Thx for encouragement, and more thx for poking your finger at problems - more important.

The logo was an oddball anyway. More like a test of dispersed parts:
- Green Clock
- One more posture
- Seeing if putting a sun on tail is any good
- Seeing what scales well and what not.

- It seems green in clock may work - I am relatively happy.
- Positioning a bird "around" and object makes it too small, which makes it difficult (for me) to approach the style of FF and TB. :( I make it more detailed than it has to be. Also, this posture and and anology to "bird got hit by a ..." is unavoidable. (WIth calendar it was "bird got hit by a newspaper" :) )
- Sun motives on tail (other body parts, wings? too much detail?) seems to work ok to me all way to 32x32. (comments?)
- Symmetry really helps to keep Logo recognizable almost down to 16x16

[chrisw73]

chrisw73
I hope I understand all of your suggestions (I'm not sure that I do) but in the spririt of your input I made another variation. Is this more what you had in mind?

Yes, you did! Sorry for not answering earlier, but I've been away for the weekend.

I'm not exactly sure what Firefox/Thunderbird colors are. Are we talking color saturation or something else? The color are a first shot at something less "gold" than the previous logo. Feedback?

These colors are warm and full-tone with strong gradients for the 3-D look. That's what I mean, when I talk of FF/TB-colors.

<img src="http://markcarson.com/images/SunBird-7-200x200.png"> 200x200

I still like this one best and I would love to see it completely worked out, but... (see below)

BTW - I agree with Lazlo Woodbine that a calendar would seem more appropriate than a clock. I appreciate that a clock is a recognizable item (even at small pixel sizes) and does convey the notion of time, but if you look at the data views in Sunbird, they are more calendar than clock centric. So, I'm happy to brainstorm on logos with clocks, but I have to keep wondering if a calender in some form might not be better.

... I agree, that using a calandar would carry the message more appropriate.

<img src="http://markcarson.com/images/SunBird-12-200x200.png"> 200x200

Yep, and this one rocks, too! A bird caring for it's or our appointments! Great!
Just one remark: The way you add show multiple calendar-gages: Genious, but I'd make the calendar thicker (top and bottom with the same strength.

Additionally: I think we finally found the way how the bird should look like: qute round eyes, sickelish beak and a round shape in general. That's it (IMHO)!

Greetings,
Chris

[suslik]

<img src="http://markcarson.com/images/SunBird-12-200x200.png"> 200x200

I like this approach a lot... Unusual thinking... It's as if you look at the situation from the top. I've been stuck in "side\front view" mentality.

[markcarson]

Based on feedback (larger body, wingtips, bigger calendar header, less whitespace, etc.) I made some modifications but the drawing is still preliminary (colored outlines only) but perhaps a bit more refined. Trying to get shapes and proportions better is all. Following is a full set of icon sizes with and without the calendar. Icons were not optimized for their size (not outline adjustment, etc.). Again, I like that without the calendar, the icon looks like a "C" for Calendar.

<img src="http://MarkCarson.com/images/Sunbird-12b-200x200.png"> <img src="http://MarkCarson.com/images/Sunbird-12b-200.png"> 200x200
<img src="http://MarkCarson.com/images/Sunbird-12b-48x48.png"> <img src="http://MarkCarson.com/images/Sunbird-12b-48.png"> 48x48
<img src="http://MarkCarson.com/images/Sunbird-12b-32x32.png"> <img src="http://MarkCarson.com/images/Sunbird-12b-32.png"> 32x32
<img src="http://MarkCarson.com/images/Sunbird-12b-24x24.png"> <img src="http://MarkCarson.com/images/Sunbird-12b-24.png"> 24x24
<img src="http://MarkCarson.com/images/Sunbird-12b-16x16.png"> <img src="http://MarkCarson.com/images/Sunbird-12b-16.png"> 16x16

Anymore suggestions anyone before I start the shading and detail work?

UPDATE 0800 GMT/12-JUL-2004: minor changes only

[markcarson]

Interim update:

<img src="http://markcarson.com/images/Sunbird-12c-200x200.png"> <img src="http://markcarson.com/images/Sunbird-12c-200.png"> 200x200
<img src="http://markcarson.com/images/Sunbird-12c-48x48.png"> <img src="http://markcarson.com/images/Sunbird-12c-48.png"> 48x48
<img src="http://markcarson.com/images/Sunbird-12c-32x32.png"> <img src="http://markcarson.com/images/Sunbird-12c-32.png"> 32x32
<img src="http://markcarson.com/images/Sunbird-12c-24x24.png"> <img src="http://markcarson.com/images/Sunbird-12c-24.png"> 24x24
<img src="http://markcarson.com/images/Sunbird-12c-16x16.png"> <img src="http://markcarson.com/images/Sunbird-12c-16.png"> 16x16

[suslik]

Anymore suggestions anyone before I start the shading and detail work?

1. On one with calendar: I would say the body piece is only pulling you down. Lose it.
2. On the "C-4-calendar" - run with it, though that white space will hunt you down in the end. You might need to fill in some space with "solar radiance" from tail or somth.
3. If you are trying to stay absolutely circular, i dont understand you.
4. I have seen you go for yellow and stick with it. When you get to 256 system color (or, god forbid 16 color for Win98-2000 taskbar/system tray compatibility), 16x16 you'll feel out of paint and out of breath. Smack a patch of reds/oranges - it'll give you freedom for depth. If you are concerned with looking too much like FF if you go orange, don't. Your composition is positioned different.

It seems you yourself like the one without the calendar more... That is an open-ended story... We'll see more iterations on that from you I'm sure... :)

Good luck.

[suslik]

I am sure some of us already know this. For others, this Mozilla logo policies will be of interest. (in short, browser is MPL\***\****, the logo isn't) (The clever one will design 2 similar, but different logos, one for official biilds, the other for CVS DIY crowd)

Also, in light of that, are we actually stepping on someone's toes, designing logos for Sunbird ourselves?

It would be good to hear from either of these ppl on this.

Mozilla Marketing volunteers
* Steven Garrity, Mozilla Visual Identity Team leader
* Dave Murray, Mozilla Donations Moderator
* Brian Jenkins, Mozilla Press, Licensing Moderator
* Percy Cabello, Mozilla Links founder
* Simon Males, Mozilla Partners Moderator

[markcarson]

Something a bit different...

<img src="http://markcarson.com/images/SunBird-12d-200x200.png">

Sun + Bird

Sunrise denotes a new day, hence the notion of time.

[Lazlo Woodbine]

Anymore suggestions anyone before I start the shading and detail work?

I think that rotating the image clockwise (about 30° or so) might look a little better. I definitely still prefer the calendar over the sun image, although it's an interesting idea. The bird without calendar just doesn't look right to me.