[ubuntu-art] Mark's Comments on Branding

[Matthew Nuzum]

On 6/29/06, Michiel Sikma <michiel at thingmajig.org> wrote:
> Op 29-jun-2006, om 16:14 heeft Matthew Nuzum het volgende geschre
> > For inspiration, I strongly suggest looking at what other OSs are
> > doing. Most computers come from the manufucaturer with the maker's
> > branding on the wall paper. Stop into your favorite computer store and
> > look at the wall papers on Toshibas, HPs, Sonys and the like and see
> > what they're doing. There are some great designs out there. Even if we
> > don't put the [U|ED|K]buntu logo on the graphic, I think we can come
> > up with something truly exciting to look at... something where people
> > won't want to put icons on the desktop because they don't want to
> > cover up the picture.

> I personally feel that the wallpapers that are included by default
> should be as neutral as possible. They should also not really try
> anything valiant in terms of graphic design and should generally be
> pure. All major operating systems currently do this right. As much as
> it might seem boring, I fully support the "random graphic drizzle"
> that one finds in default wallpapers.

>
> PS: most of the vendor-specific wallpapers consist of random stock
> art plus their logo. I don't usually find them very interesting.

First, forgive me if my first e-mail sounded too forceful, I just want
to say that I am giving my opinions and I'm 100% comfortable if the
art team goes a different route.

The reason why I suggest looking at what retail computers use is
because retail computers have to face one of the toughest sells...
they have to attract potential buyers to a particular computer from
across the room when there are 30 other computers also doing the same.

There is much more thought put into those desktop wall papers than
just, "what's a cool new way we can show off our logo?" Big companies
have art-teams, and industrial artists pouring over every little
detail about a computer's aesthetics in order to make people say, "I
want this one!" I have a great deal of respect for the R&D money those
bigger companies put into those designs. I think it's foolish to not
even consider what others are doing.

Also, I come from a web-desgin and web-usability background. I've been
working with artists for years and I have great respect for those who
way, "My studies show..." instead of "I like..." or "I prefer..." I've
sat in many meetings where executives make decisions about what they
think users will like and then watched as the design failed because
they didn't bother even asking the users.

Ubuntu is not for artists alone, and you need to appeal to engineers,
business people and a variety of other types in addition to those
experienced at producing art.

Slashdot will judge edgy based on the screenshot tour on osdir. Look
at the first four slides here and that is where we have to make 90% of
the users (not just artists) say, "wow, I've got to try this out!"
http://shots.osdir.com/slideshows/slideshow.php?release=659&slide=1

> As for other wallpapers included by default, I think that the best
> ones are pure photos. There are billions of great-quality free
> license photos online that may be used for this purpose.

The problem with pure photos is that its hard to make them stand out
as being distinctly *buntu. Also it's difficult to find a photo that
is bright enough to catch the eye and yet has dark regions for people
to place their icons. We'd need something that has darker colors on
the left and graduates to more vivid and contrasting colors on the
right, without having that pure gradient look of the gnome 1.x
desktops.

> Unfortunately, people are still going to put icons on their desktop,
> and like I've stated earlier, the shadow underneath the text
> underneath icons just isn't enough to make the text show up as
> readable on very light backgrounds, so we're still somewhat
> restricted to darker wallpapers.
>
> Michiel

Of course they are, but don't you think the wallpaper should be so
good looking that they will want to see it, rather than cover it up?
(no, I can't maximize firefox, I want to be able to see the wallpaper!
;-)

-- 
Matthew Nuzum
www.bearfruit.org
newz2000 on freenode