Challenges and Things

[laisserais]

Hello Everyone! I have been bugging goodbyebird to let me run some challenges and things in this comm and she is being gracious and letting me.

Since I am too cheap to have a paid account, there is no poll, BUT! I am looking for feedback from y'all. What kind of icon battles/challenges would be interesting to you? Some ideas I've had so far:

*Show us your psds
--This one is totally going to happen, and I'm announcing the details probably tomorrow. It will be a free-for-all where you can post as many psds as you'd like, either a link to your own journal/other journal or in the comm. And everyone can read and comment and ask questions about your techniques. 

*Technical Challenge
--You sign up and get tagged to make one icon using a particular technique. Sort of like a round robin, you watch the comm to see when you've been tagged, and then have 24 hours to do your icon.

*Team Battle
--You sign up and work with another artist, with each one taking a turn at making a layer, and then you post your completed icon (or icon set) on your assigned day.

*Ask the Maker Spotlight
--I'd like to do something where we have guest icon makers come and discuss their process.

--> Question: Most of us use some version of Photoshop, I think. Who uses something else? GIMP? Other? A program that cannot produce a layered object?

Please let me know in comments if you are interested in these sorts of challenges, and/or if there are other ideas you'd like to see. This is YOUR community! We are one of the most-frequented icon communities on dreamwidth, and I want to hear from you! Everyone gets a vote, even if you're just watching this comm; even if you don't make icons.

Comments

[timetobegin]

I have photoshop CS6, and i'd be most into the show us the psds (i don't save mine, so i'd have to make new icons though) and tecnical challenges.

team battle sounds cool, but i'm too lazy/slow to do it

[naushika]

I don't use PS so I can't participate in show us the psds unfortch. :( I use Corel Paintshop Pro X4. It has a layered format file like psds but I doubt they would be openable in PS and I know psds don't really work when I try to open them in PSP.

I love the technical challenge idea though. I probably wouldn't do a team battle (I'm not very punctual/reliable with those sorts of things so I don't want to leave anyone hanging). Ask the maker could be fun, I like finding out people's tips and tricks.

I've been thinking lately about how I miss iconpraise since I've pretty much left lj behind, but I don't think there's a big enough icon community on dw yet to make a similar comm. But we could do like a monthly praise post, where people point out some icons they've seen lately they really liked. Or something. Basically I just want to oogle pretties.

[qem_chibati]

I'm interested in the technical challenge,

(I er have such an unpolished icon technique that I'd feel too awkward with the others)

If you need someone to post a poll for you I'm happy to do so, otherwise people tend to use external services I think poll maker is one I've seen used: http://www.poll-maker.com/

[goodbyebird]

Oh yay long list of ideas here!

I save PSDs for about a quarter of my icons, so that wouldn't be an issue for me, so long as my ps computer actually manages to connect to the Internet again grrr. Are we thinking people can make requests from other makers? Like, if they've made an icon they especially like, and if the maker hasn't saved a psd maybe they remember some of the process and can demonstrate that? idk.

And as for different softwares, I think that's good to cover more, since most tuts are photoshop based.

I think Team Battle is something better suited for those who already chat amongst themselves, since it's a bit to coordinate. But if we keep doing it, maybe they'll pick it up too ;)

And at some point we'll have an Icon Request Fest again for sure! (sorry if any f this is wonky, I just woke up hehe)