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Operating System Specific Discussions => Amiga OS => Amiga OS -- Development => Topic started by: Zorro on June 10, 2003, 12:04:40 PM
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I like the new os4 screenshots...
the grey and metal brushed look is ok, the font engine is almost perfect, almost all the gadgets are good and the gradients are very nice.
But... you should expect it ! :-) A little lovely question ! :-D :-D
I would know if the icons, the gadgets and the other elements that aren't anti-aliased in the shots will be
smoothed so to reach a real consistent overall look ?
Hyperion ? Graphic designers ? Anyone ?
@ all
What do you like or not like from the actual shots ?
Alessandro
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I guess a valid discussion point here is "should icons be anti-aliased?". The primary purpose of an icon is to stand out as a usable part of the interface, not a work of art, IMO. Of course it should look good though.
I quite like all the screenshots for OS4. The default theme is good enough for a default theme, that's all that's really needed.
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It's not only about anti-aliasing. RGBA icons enable partial/full transparency of the image.
As an example: the MOS icon has a shadow, while the busy pointer has a white glow. Both is a simple RGBA image.
With RGBA icons the GlowIcons may have REAL glow :-)
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If I remember right I have recalled to have read somewhere that the icon technology of AmigaOS, in its actual state, don't let to do big improvements... :-(
(max 256 color ?)
@ mikeymike:
I guess a valid discussion point here is "should icons be anti-aliased?".
Well, I think so, at least if we want obtain a true consistent look... certain elements of the GUI are smoothed and others not. I like the glowicons but hope that they can be anti-aliased also if the look will be the same of today.
Alessandro
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With RGBA icons the GlowIcons may have REAL glow
I will cross my 37 fingers then... ;-)
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Sound like going for the WinXP Colortype look, ,which is no bad thing . ;)
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by Mad-Matt on 2003/6/10 13:48:19
Sound like going for the WinXP Colortype look, ,which is no bad thing . ;)
Aargh ! AmigaXP !!!
Nooooooooooooooo !!!!! ;-)
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Zorro wrote:
If I remember right I have recalled to have read somewhere that the icon technology of AmigaOS, in its actual state, don't let to do big improvements... :-(
(max 256 color ?)
Just as MOS replaced this system one day OS4.X will replace it too. Having a 256 color pen system in 2003 ain't that cool.
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AmigaXP !!!
Thats not even funny as a thought, now go get some strong soap and wash your mouth out, repeat until sickness kicks in
:-)
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but who wants icons to look any better than they do now i like how they look in os 3.9 and os4 screenshots why use any extra resources to make them a work of art even the icons on my pc are fine and there only use is to run a program so making them look better to me is not worth it.??? :-)
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I would know if the icons, the gadgets and the other elements that aren't anti-aliased in the shots will be
smoothed so to reach a real consistent overall look ?
There isn't much point in "antialiasing icons", since they are bitmap images as apposed to vector images. If the icon system supported alpha-channel, the icons could be properly antialiased by the artist.
I don't see any reason why border gadgets, and other system vector images can't be antialiased, though.
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I agree with what people have said about transparency though, that is useful/nice.
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As a joke someone posted a workbench 1.3 screen in one of the OS4 screenshots news items.
If I get OS4 and someone makes that skin, I'd probably use it just for comic effect :-)
That tells you something about how much I care about the look of it. I tend to agree that functionality is what I'm after. GUI effects like transparency are nice, but I'll spend most of my time browsing the web or coding. Focusing on what I'm doing rather than how I'm doing it.
I think the look of the OS will evolve as people start to develope software for it and more is known about what it can do and the direction people wish to take it in. What I've seen so far looks like an excellent starting point.
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I agree the icons are an issue for me after seeing the screenshots. Its not that they aren't AA or anything, its the fact that its a new version of the OS with icons from the last 68K version.
However I have a feeling that Hyperion have things undercontrol and hopefully these won't be the default icons. :-?
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@ zudobug
That tells you something about how much I care about the look of it. I tend to agree that functionality is what I'm after. GUI effects like transparency are nice, but I'll spend most of my time browsing the web or coding. Focusing on what I'm doing rather than how I'm doing it.
I am not a GUI candy lover but if you can smooth the fonts and some gadgets, why can't you complete the job with all other elements of the GUI ?
At least to reach a omogeneus look... this is my point.
Anyway all of us take functionality at first place... or we had left the amiga world many years ago... :-)
Alpha channel, save us all !!!
;-)
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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
... but we'd like a little path running down the middle.
A path! A path!
I like the laurels particularly.
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i hate the screenshots
too gimmicky, like windows XP, if you know what i mean
if it were a bit more serious and professional, i would like it more
they should provide a version of intuition.library and boopsi gadgets for people who only want a simple UI - for speed
i could copy these simpler libraries over and then all the customization crap would be disabled but it would be faster overall
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Which city is worlds most livable?
I know vancouver, Canada, is one of the most livable places :-D
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Darth_X wrote:
Which city is worlds most livable?
I know vancouver, Canada, is one of the most livable places :-D
Melbourne! and thats official! :-D
it has been voted the best by some magazine(several times) and a number of other people :-D
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@iamaboringperson
Dont want the gradients? Turn them off. Dont want the font smoothing? Turn it off. See a patern emerging here? :-)
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gnarly wrote:
@iamaboringperson
Dont want the gradients? Turn them off. Dont want the font smoothing? Turn it off. See a patern emerging here? :-)
im completly aware of that ;-)
but there is still a fair bit of program code to go through for those options - i may be a bit picky, but it would be nice to have the option of alternative faster libraries
i want my GUI software to draw lines, accept input, and splatter text all over the screen ;-)
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Zudobug! OS1.3 doesn't look That bad, I mean hey, blue and orange, what could be better, and Whiteborders! Oo-la-la 4 colors here!
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Zorro wrote:
I like the new os4 screenshots...
the grey and metal brushed look is ok, the font engine is almost perfect, almost all the gadgets are good and the gradients are very nice.
But... you should expect it ! :-) A little lovely question ! :-D :-D
I would know if the icons, the gadgets and the other elements that aren't anti-aliased in the shots will be
smoothed so to reach a real consistent overall look ?
Hyperion ? Graphic designers ? Anyone ?
@ all
What do you like or not like from the actual shots ?
Alessandro
Well, id say things shouldnt have to be anti-aliased, they should just be that way when they are created. Ie icons should be created smooth, and any other things also. I dont think you should degrade system performance just to make things a little prettier, when if they were creted prettier in the first place, you wouldnt have to worry about it.
Same for gadgets, they can be cretaed to look smooth from the word go. So can round windows, just use round smooth graphix... etc...
The reason we have it for text is that, its hard to do it for text i'd thing. You have to have each character as a vector image, but vector images have only been big the last couple of years. Infact, i dont know if we even had them pre 95?
Oh, that brings another thing to mind. Does AmigaOS have support for vector graphix? Cause vectorised icons would be sweet, as well as gadgets and windows.. that way you could resize everything, but nothing woudl come out blocky :) andyway, thats another discussion...
I think anti-alisasing should be kept to text. Its up to gadget creators and icon created to creat smooth graphix, not an anti-aliassing engine to tidy up their own work.
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AFAIK all the system gadgets are vector images. get some gui creation tool and have fun drawing HUUUUGE checkboxes or any other GUI attribute if you don't believe me.
Amiga E i think had one, so do many other tools.
so vectors ARE PART of the AmigaOS GUI system, probably since it's conception.. if not then definately since 2.0.
and erm no. you can't anti-alias all the icons 'when they are created' if you want a decent looking icon... they would anti-alias relative to the background.. so if the icon artist anti-aliased them for a white background and you are using say a dark blue one, it wouldn't look right would it? it would have a gray or whiteish border.
vectors have been around since the dawn of time... probably. they weren't 'discovered' in 95. i forget the name now, but i have used many a vector drawing package. Wordworth for christ sake had vector support. i wouldn't be surprised if there's some datatype on aminet.
and what are you on about vectors only big in the past few years, especially fonts???!?! what about TrueType, IntelliFont, etc. etc.
Workbench 3.0 had it. So did Windows 95 or 3.1 or just about anything in circulation since the early 90s.
Again, it wasn't conceived then.. that's when it came into mainstream use!
and while we're after top performance, why not stick it on 4 colour orange and blue ala 1.3 or just use the CLI.
any modern computer (AmigaOne included) won't even blink an eyelid if we had to anti-alias everything.
GFX card accelaration would probably do it all anyway. And considering you can run Quake 3 at something like 150FPS with all the extras, do you think some anti-aliased text or icons are really going to make your system unresponsive???
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Iamaboringperson: i want my GUI software to draw lines, accept input, and splatter text all over the screen
Ah, a practical GUI designer! I respect that. Unfortunately, we are a dying breed. Try using THIS mess of a GUI:
TDK Mediacenter (http://theskinsfactory.com/skinsfactory/?page=fvportfolio&id=60)
Tiny fonts, bland colors, oddly shaped and placed buttons... essentially, every mistake in the book! If this is the future of GUI design, I will soon be critically ill. Of course, this kind of tripe gets good reviews by the eye-candy geeks.
Personally, I don't care how a GUI looks so long as all the buttons are in the right place, and everything is clearly labeled. I've never liked the soft, dark look of the OS4 preliminary screenshots. I think they're a mess and poorly organized. A good GUI makes a very good impression of the technology underneath. Pretty backdrops and shadow effects do not.
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I add to myself and say, consistancy is something thats up to the user (appart from the one standard theme). The use much choose what icons, gadgets, pens and whatever else to use to get a consitant look.
Ohh, andi dont think that text compared to icons compared to gadgets has anythign to do with consistancy :)
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SnowBord wrote:
and erm no. you can't anti-alias all the icons 'when they are created' if you want a decent looking icon...
You can if the icon system supports an alpha channel.
they would anti-alias relative to the background.. so if the icon artist anti-aliased them for a white background and you are using say a dark blue one, it wouldn't look right would it?
Thats why you need an alpha channel; instead of anti-aliasing to a specific background, you specify levels of transparency. This is the only way to properly anti-alias bitmap images, since algorythmically antialiasing bitmap images just tends to "blur" the image, instead of making it appear clearer.
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hmm, looks a bit like a Mac OS X and Win XP bastard love child...
so long as borders around windows and gadgets arent hardcoded to be OFF or "3D effect" as i like my single color ones in visualprefs (essentially make highlight and shadow color the same) :-)
and i LURVE being able to draw my own gadget bitmaps too!
but what i REALLY want to know is: have the icons been upgraded to have multiple icon sizes in one icon file so that one day we can view files just like in windows's "detail" view with a mini icon next to the filename!? yummy! and a MUST for doing serious computing (when big chunky icons just get in the way!
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so an alpha channel won't take up computational power at all, will it?
they'll just make themselves transparent.
it's a different approach, that's all. an alpha channel means more storage space per icon. a different overhead.
granted though, it IS a way to go, but just an option.
if you would like partial transparency, then great, use alpha transparency. if that's not an issue, i'd say it's a waste of storage space considering processing still has to be done.
and besides, anti-aliasing would only 'blur' the edges, not the whole image, which is hardly a problem. a semi-transparent edge will lose some of the icon's definbition, and 'blur' within the image, not outside it.
so alpha channel's purpose is transparency, not smoothing icon borders. otherwise, the icon is 'eaten away'.
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Waccoon wrote:
Iamaboringperson: i want my GUI software to draw lines, accept input, and splatter text all over the screen
Ah, a practical GUI designer! I respect that. Unfortunately, we are a dying breed. Try using THIS mess of a GUI:
TDK Mediacenter (http://theskinsfactory.com/skinsfactory/?page=fvportfolio&id=60)
Tiny fonts, bland colors, oddly shaped and placed buttons... essentially, every mistake in the book! If this is the future of GUI design, I will soon be critically ill. Of course, this kind of tripe gets good reviews by the eye-candy geeks.
Personally, I don't care how a GUI looks so long as all the buttons are in the right place, and everything is clearly labeled. I've never liked the soft, dark look of the OS4 preliminary screenshots. I think they're a mess and poorly organized. A good GUI makes a very good impression of the technology underneath. Pretty backdrops and shadow effects do not.
:-o eeeck! buy a brand new super dooper fast computer, only to have it slowed waay down with this nonsense