Post 1 of 2 today: Icons for my favorite Watcher

[feliciacraft.livejournal.com]

Hello everyone! Today's my posting day. Yay! Thanks to the mods for keeping the tea party going at Summer of Giles! And thanks for everyone for making this such a blast!

This time around I'm thinking in colors instead of words, so instead of fanfic, I'm pleased to offer a set of Gilesy icons. This is my very first time creating icons for LJ (I've just created a PhotoBucket for this purpose and read about uploading icons), so please let me know if anything's amiss. Also, I'd love to get honest feedback, including anonymously, if that'd make you feel more comfortable.

All icons are snaggable; please credit because that would just make my day to know someone out there is using an icon I created! :)


1-4.


5-8.


9-12.


Extras:
10-variant              A pair of Buffy icons cut from a larger piece


6-variant                4-variant


1-variant                12-variant

Comments

[double_dutchess]

Great job! My personal favourite is #3 -- Giles and his true love :-) I also really like #7 and 10-variant. And the image you picked for #8 -- love Ethan's expression!

I'm not really one for subtle shades myself, but in a few of your icons I feel the colouring and contrasts are a bit on the harsh side (in particular for #1, 4, 9). But I guess that's largely a matter of personal taste. In #8 I think it actually fits very well.

[feliciacraft.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I love musical Giles, and pairing him with Ethan. :)

Rookie mistake: I spent the majority of my time on the icon set working in high-res. Some of the images had way too much "content" to effectively down-sample to 100x100 pixels, and everything looked too sharp and too crowded in the end. I do love the high-contrast, saturated look (like Fujichrome Velvia slide film), but you're right -- some of them are a bit much.

I've since added a few variants, but idk -- my whole focus on the news ones was on "a lighter, gentler touch" that I think any "vision" I had got lost in the process, if that makes any sense. Clearly there's much to learn! :)

Thanks again for your comment! :)

[double_dutchess]

I actually really like your 'soft' variant of #1. But it's definitely true that it's the vision that has to come first. If you get out of touch with that, then you're not likely to be happy with the result, no matter how technically perfect it might be.

[feliciacraft.livejournal.com]

I think another thing I neglected was that with writing, I always needed multiple drafts and revisions. With these icons, I was tweaking up until I posted them, where everything was too new, too immediate for a more cool-headed self-evaluation. Looking at the above icons today, I think I should've done a number of them differently. :)

[double_dutchess]

I do that all the time too, and then often I have to come back to change or repost things (even re-upload new versions of vids, that's the worst). I really should know by now it's a mistake, but I still can't resist!

(edited typo)