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Amiga Collections: Topik
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Topik - Disk 29 - Icons (1990-07-12)(Topik Public Domain)(PD)[f Topik][WB].zip
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Topik - Disk 29 - Icons (1990-07-12)(Topik Public Domain)(PD)[f Topik][WB].adf
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TheArtOfIcons
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TheArtOfIcons
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1990-04-18
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9KB
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154 lines
The Art of Icons
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tutorial by Robert Lang.
Thankfully the Amiga was designed with a lot of personalisation in mind.
The addition of preferences allows you to set your own colours,
external device settings, and even modify the familiar pointer which is
linked by software to the movement of the mouse. An extra degree of
personalisation was added when the icons were introduced. Sadly, however,
this is an area that is seldom used to its extent, and the explanation is
probably ignorance more than complication.
With the addition of programs such as Anim8bench on Megadisc 9, the icon
world has been enhanced even further. Such enhancement is only available
because the designers of the Amiga didn't lay down restrictions, but instead
set defaults. Therefore further expansion may enhance the personal world of
the Amiga even more, but until then we should all get down to becoming
experts on what we've got. In this article I hope to give you a detailed
description of how to make icons for the Amiga, and point out that the
technique is the same for 4 to 8 colours, its just that you have a few more
colours in the latter mode. I also advise that you get a letter off to
Megadisc and get your hands on the Theme Disc I made which is called the
"Icon WorkDisk". This disk is not a disk chokker-blok of every utility ever
made to work with icons, but instead is an environment set up with just
enough to creat icons of the best potential.
Onto the article, and obviously we begin by drawing our front picture. I
advise the use of any of the Deluxe Paint versions here, but any graphics
program which works in IFF standards is fine. You should be working in the
resolution marked "Medium" on Dpaint, which is 640x200 pixels. Select 4 or
8 colours as desired, and probably the best thing to do is to set the
colours as close as possible to the workbench for which you are designing
the icons. On my Theme Disk, I have set the colours to normal workbench
colours, and saved it as a picture so that the picture can be clicked on,
hence loading DPaint with the preset colours. If we label the colours on
the DPaint as follows:
----- ----- Where colour 1 is the colour which appears as the
| 1 | | 5 | background in workbench (i.e. normally Blue), colour 3
----- ----- is the colour which is used for such things as the
| 2 | | 6 | front/back gadget in the top right hand corner of
----- ----- windows (i.e. normally Black), colour 2 is the colour
| 3 | | 7 | which is used for such things as the text and window
----- ----- border (i.e. normally white), and lastly the 4th
| 4 | | 8 | colour is the colour used for the cursor in Ed (i.e.
----- ----- (i.e. normally orange). These colours are the only
ones which apply in 4 colour editing, but in 8 colour editing the other four
colours appear. Using Anim8Bench, colour 5 Flashes, while 6,7, and 8 all
cycle around. If Anim8Bench is not on, then the colours on the right
correspond to the ones exactly to the left (5 shows as 1, 6 as 2, etc.), and
hence wonderful effects can be achieved by hiding pictures until Anim8Bench
is activated. For instance, a square in colour 3 with the word "ROBERT"
written on it in colour 7 will show as just a square in colour 3 in normal
workbench. When Anim8Bench is activated, the word "ROBERT" will be seen as
flashing within the square of colour 3. My Megadisc 10 icon uses a lot of
this "hiding".
So once you've drawn a picture, you need to draw an alternate image if you
want one. I heavily advise the usage of alternate images, as such icons are
indeed more popular, and rightly so. To do this, the best technique in
Dpaint is to draw it on the alternate screen. This screen is accessed by
pressing j (being careful that the CAPS LOCK is not on!) to toggle between
the two screens. The artist can then place the front and the back of the
icon (I refer to the "back" as the view when the icon is selected...) by
pushing j. This gives him or her and idea of what the icon will look like
when in use.
Once the two pictures are drawn, and satisfactorially finished, then it is
time for the hard part, but in fact the shortest part. The conversion of
the picture into a usable icon is obviously the critical step and without
a doubt the step which separates the sheep from the goats. There are many
methods of doing this, I will obviously tell you mine which is evidently
effective, as proven by icons on previous Megadiscs.
I begin by drawing a box around the two icons, in the same place for
each icon, so as to guide me with regards to the size of the icon. Wierd
effects can be achieved by making the front and back different sizes, and a
lot of the time these effects are undesirable. This box does not end up
part of the icon at all, so it can be in any colour.
Now, I "zoom" into the top left hand corner of the guide box I just drew, and
select the "Makebrush" gadget on Dpaint. Now I go over to the pixel just
INSIDE the guide box and press and hold the left mouse button. I then use
the cursor keys to move down to the bottom right corner of the guide box and
release the left mouse button when over the pixel just inside the guide box.
This has therefore effectively made a brush out of the icon, and it can be
saved using BRUSH and then SAVE on the menu bar. I use a .fb after the name
to indicate that it is a "front" brush. The same can be done for the
alternate image, this time using a .bb after the name for a "back" brush. I
also place brushes, icons and pictures in separate drawers.
Notice how the guide box was used to ensure the two icons were the same
size. You are effectively taking the box on pixel inside the guide box.
You could of course use two, three, four, etc pixels inside the box, just as
long as you know so that the two icons are the same. If you are doing
serious editing, it may also be wise to save each screen you are editing on,
but that is purely your own choice.
Now you exit Dpaint and the fun really begins. You need some utility which
converts brushes to icons, but beware that some may chop off the extra bit
planes needed to have 8 colours. I have put zapicon on my Theme Disk,
because it is this program that I use. To convert a brush called MD10.fb,
you would simply enter the CLI and type:
zapicon MD10.fb MD10.fi
The icon would be saved as MD10.fi! (I use .fi and .bi to indicate front and
back icons!) If you are making a single image icon only, then your job is
nearly finished, but if you are making a two image icon then you must
convert the other brush as well, using the same command, so its not that
much more difficult is it??
Now you need to merge the two images into one icon, and again some programs
may cut off the extra bit planes so be careful. Iconmerge is the most
popular in this area because it works for 8 colours and can be run from the
CLI or Workbench. From the CLI, just type iconmerge, and answer the relevant
questions afterwards. From Workbench, just click on the icon and answer the
questions. You will be asked for the first (unselected) icon name, the
second (selected) icon name, and then a name to output the merged icon to.
Remember to add full path names for each filename.
So now you've got a pretty icon that when you click it changes to another
"selected" type icon. (Incidently, if you've saved an icon, but can't find
it in an already open window, then that is because its not really there.
When you close the window and re-open it, you will hopefully find it. Also,
some programs do not add .info to the end of the icon name. You can rename
a file to contain this or save it with the appendage, because without it
Workbench doesn't recognize it as an icon file!)
The next step is to decide what sort of icon it is. This was my headache
department when first playing with 8 colour icons, because all the programs
I had used to set the type (Icontype etc..) ripped of the 8 colour.
Icontype did work fine for everything but Drawers. A phone call to Tim
Strachan revealed he had the same problem, and a phone call to Queensland
revealed the solution : Iconimage!! I now use Iconimage to do all icons,
because it is by far the simplest method. All it does is simply replace the
"picture" data in an icon file. Therefore you can save a file with the old
notepad, then tell iconimage to put the icon you designed in place of the
notepad icon and it will do just that. Iconimage is invokable from the CLI
and workbench, which makes it also that little bit easier.
For example, suppose you saved a icon for a drawer that you just did as
"MYICON", and you wish it to represent the "System" drawer. You would simply
feed "System" name to iconimage as the old icon, and "MYICON" as the new
icon. Providing all has been successful (pathnames...), then when you open
the window you will have your icon staring you in the face representing the
"System" drawer. The icon artwork is thus complete.
Well, I hope that you have learnt something from this article, and indeed
hope that you will be able to utilize my workdisk. I have a good deal of
fun working with icons, and I'm sure that you will also once you get the
hang of it, but remember to play with backups of your software just to be
safe!! Have Fun!!!