Wednesday, December 14, 2005

KDE links

I would like to update the links page on KDE-Artists.org to include all the KDE related websites I can find (they don't have to be just art related). If you know of any good ones please reply to this posting or this one.


I have also been looking for some Krita tutorials to publish on the site. Are they hidden somewhere or is it time to make some?


Thanks!

Wednesday, October 19, 2005

Tango anyone?

So what does everyone think of the Tango Project? Is this something that the KDE community should contribute to? There has been a general discussion at KDE-Artists.org and we would love to hear more opinions. We have also created a board for Tango in the "Open Source" section (go to Tango anyone?).

We have been receiving some artwork requests from third party non D.E. specific applications. Take a look at Jpodder. This collaboration is completed and serves as a model for what is possible. We think this is great and hope to see a lot more third party applications seeking artwork as a result.

Friday, August 26, 2005

Default artwork polls! Vote now!

Our KDE-Artists have made some wonderful wallpapers that will look great in the next release of KDE. Stop by the Kollaboration forum and vote for your favorites. We will submit the highest rated wallpapers from poll #1 and #2 to the KDE-Artists mailing list so we can decide which one will be the new default for 3.5!

Click here to go the polls:

After the new default wallpaper has been chosen the KDE-Artists team will make a matching splash screen, KDM theme and more! Our goal is for a smooth professional unified look for 3.5.

Tuesday, August 16, 2005

Kontact sexification

Kontact is a very mature program now so it is time to make it feel slick, cool and professional. The Kontact devels have posted a bunch of artwork requests at KDE-Artist and started a contest for a new logo. So how can we make Kontact sexy?

Here is a quick link to the Kontact board on KDE-Artists: kde-artists.org/kontact




Since the aKademy to coming up soon I made up a few (okay more then a few) akademy themed t-shirts and polo shirts for my spreadshirt shop (for everyone who requested a US shop here is the link to that).

Sunday, August 07, 2005

KDE 3.5 default artwork

With KDE 3.5 just around the corner it seems like a good time to discuss the look and feel of the default artwork.

Should we experiment before 4.0 comes out and try some new colors or should we continue to refine our blue look?

Some people might be slow to adopt 4.0 so KDE 3.5 might be on peoples desktop for a while. I think it is important to make this release look really polished. It would be nice to have a unified look with our default wallpaper, splash screen and about pages.

We are discussing this here and today on the #kde-artists channel on irc.freenode.org. Please feel free to voice your option.

Monday, July 18, 2005

Vote for the best concept art!

Plasma has 9 new animated desktop button concepts!

Even though this weekend challenge has ended the need for Desktop Button concept art has not. So check out the entries. Vote for your favorites. Then fire up your favorite graphics program and contribute a few more!

Saturday, June 11, 2005

100!

It has only been one week since we debuted the KDE-Artist.org website. I just wanted to announce a milestone that we just hit. Our 100th member signed up today!

Other interesting stats:
The site has had 33,347 hits and 300 posts to the Kollaboration forum.
The Plasma board alone has have 138 posts.

Here is some great screenshots I found on the Kollaboration forum that shows a bunch ideas that our artists, developers and dreamers have been working together on:

Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Wednesday, June 08, 2005

screenshots = a 1000 words

I just added a two new boards on the Kollaboration forum at kde-artists.org:
KDE Website Screenshots and KDE-Docs Screenshots.

If you need any screenshots for your projects website or for your documentation please post your request.

The KDE-Docs Screenshots board might be particularly helpful to our Docs translators...

lauri: ok, say I take four new screenshots in konqueror's doc... two replacing old ones, and two new... we freeze for 3.5 at that point... askie here, and his team, pick up the docs to translate to dutch and askie has to retake those screenshots, as nearly exactly the same as possible, but *in dutch* and there, the requirements are a lot easier: exactly duplicate what you see in the english screenshot, but do it with the language set to dutch

lauri: some teams (swedish :) do them pretty much as we do in english - usually within a day of a new screenshot in the english doc, the swedish one is updated, some do it as they go through the doc translation, some do it all in one batch once they're done
so it might be useful in those latter two cases, to have some help for sure so maybe for the dutch team to be able to ask "hey, can someone install the dutch i18n pack, and then retake the screenshots in the konqueror and kicker docs"

askie: It depends mostly on the translator.

lauri: and there *are* situations where I totally can't do the english ones either

askie: Some take the shots while translating, some take 'em after the entire translations. We don't have enough people-time for updating them when they come in.

lauri: but being able to post them on a page, might not hurt (worst case, nobody does them, and I keep nagging, right?)

Monday, June 06, 2005

Need artwork?

KDE-Artists.org has a section where KDE developers can request new icons. All you have to do is register at the site and start a topic in the Application Projects board on our Kollaboration forum.

Image Hosted by ImageShack.us

Please include any ideas you have for the icon like symbolism, colors, etc. You could even attach a picture of your current icon and a link to your project's website. The more details you include the better. Then our artists can submit their icons to your thread and you can pick the one you like the best. Another benefit is that other kde-artists can give suggestions to make sure your new icon complies with our current Crystal standards and looks really cool!

Don't forget to check back often and particapate in your new "Kollaboration".

Friday, May 13, 2005

New resources urgently needed

I would like to formally propose that we start a new project. It would take the best ideas form KHotNewStuff and Adopt-a-Geek. You see there are a lot of KDE developers out there that are students, inbetween jobs or otherwise deprived of dating resources. Many of these folks overworked their underpowered social skills to help bring you an outstanding Open Source desktop. There are also appreciative users that are willing to donate their obsolete girlfriends to help the KDE project if they knew who needed what and where. In order to bring both parties together and thereby increase the productivity of these KDE developers, I suggest we start a project called KHotNewChicks. All we would need is a web page were we could list all these ex-girlfriends that would might make good matches for your favorite developer.


Check out the responses from this article if you don't think this is a urgent need;)

Wednesday, May 11, 2005

makes me happy

I found this picture I took of of the kids a few months ago and it just makes me happy.



I was giving the girls make-overs and they wanted me to pencil in their eyebrows. Then they wanted me to pencil in the babies eyebrows too.

She looks like Groucho Marx don't you think?

a few good quotes

"We must remember that one determined person can make a significant difference, and that a small group of determined people can change the course of history." - Sonia Johnson

IMO KDE is not just about this or that new feature or bug report. It isn't even about a hobby that I love. The work we do together gives people the tools to make their lives better. It gives _everyone_ the opportunity to use world class applications that are a pleasure to use.

"What moves men of genius, or rather what inspires their work, is not new ideas, but their obsession with the idea that what has already been said is still not enough." - Eugene Delacroix

Saturday, May 07, 2005

Stupid fun quizzes

I have been wanting to start blogging again, but I am too sick today to write anything smart. Well at least it is fun:)





Your Linguistic Profile:



75% General American English

20% Upper Midwestern

5% Midwestern

0% Dixie

0% Yankee


btw I am from the Pacific NW part of the US. I have heard that news reports come here to learn to talk boring plain American English. I guess that is why I got a 75% score for General American English.

I think people don't realize how the different each region of the US is. A few years back I was a sales rep for the eastern part of the US. I noticed that the people from Georgia needed to chat a little before they could get to business and the people from New York would get very impatient if I even asked them if they were having a nice day and they talk so fast I could have used a translator.

found another fun quiz....




You Are 35% Normal

(Occasionally Normal)






You sure do march to your own beat...

But you're so weird, people wonder if it's a beat at all

You think on a totally different wavelength

And it's often a chore to get people to understand you


This is a perfect way to spend a sick day:)

Monday, March 21, 2005

There is still time...

There is still time to enter the digiKam Superimpose Template Contest. The deadline is March 28th.

Making a Superimpose Template is easy.

1. Make a image any size you want.
2. The image should have at least one area that is completely transparent.
This way when you paste it on top of a photo in digiKam you can see some of
the photograph underheath it.

digiKam is a terrific program and can really use our artwork. Not to mention
that KDE could use more apps that are "fun to use for all of us"!
See http://dot.kde.org/1108131906/1108156751/

Here is a peek at a few of the entries we have received so far:

Friday, February 18, 2005

KDE-Look.org T-shirt Contest Winner!

The community has spoken and the winner of the First Annual KDE-Look T-Shirt Contest with 24 out of 81 votes is Nenad Grujicic with Green! Nenad has won the first Official KDE-Look T-shirt and an External 7 in 1 Memory Card Reader!!!!

Congratulations goes out to him and to all of you who entered in this contest.

Our new KDE-Look T-Shirt is on sale at Revelinux Gear with all the proceeds going to help out with the costs of running KDE-Look.



When we posted the vote to KDE-Forum.org they thought that they were experiencing a Denial Of Service attack because so many people viewed the forum at the same time! WE HAD 3,528 PAGE LOADS WITHIN 7 DAYS. They were a bit relieved and excited when they found out it was a KDE related quest.


KDE-Look... We overwhelm the world with beauty!

Just a reminder that the digiKam Superimpose Template Contest is in full swing. We are "looking" forward to seeing the artwork that this contest brings out!!!

For those of you interested in helping out on future contests please feel free to join KDE-contests mailing list.

Be on the" look out" for many more great contests and challenges coming your way soon!!!

Monday, February 14, 2005

digiKam and KDE-Look.org team up!

DIGIKAM AND KDE-LOOK.ORG ARE TEAMING UP TO HAVE A CONTEST FOR THE BEST NEW SUPERIMPOSE TEMPLATES TO BE INCLUDED IN DIGIKAM'S NEXT RELEASE!





digiKam's Image Editor now has a new plugin to use PNG template files
containing borders, frames, and composite images that can be added to or
superimposed on other images hence the name Superimpose Templates. The
currently selected image acts as a background and the templates can then be
selected and overlaid on the image. You will be able to see the image
underneath the transparent areas of the template. These templates can be
created using paint programs such as The Gimp or Inkscape.  


With this new Superimpose feature you can create some great images including photocards.
There is a screenshotof this plugin in action on theSuperimpose Templates section of digiKam's manual. Download the latest version of DigiKam and the plugin pack to experience this and many more of digiKam's awesome new features.



The last day to submitt your images to this contest is March 28th 2005.

Rock the vote

We are going to do our judging for the new KDE-Look t-shirt Contest a little different this time. The judges picked their favorite t-shirt designs and now we opened a poll (at kde-forum.org) for the whole KDE community to vote on the new KDE-Look t-shirt. 2 DAYS LEFT Feb 16 is the last day!!!!!!

Click the shirt to vote!

Wednesday, February 02, 2005

kde-contests

A lot has been happening lately. We have recently opened a mailing list called kde-contests and I have been given permission to resurrect the artist.kde.org website.

The mailing list will be used to coordinate all our future contests on kde-look. This list will provide a venue for artists and developers to interact on the guidelines and specifics of our contests.

I am inviting all you usability experts, artists and developers to subscribe. Developers that need artwork for their apps please join our list. Members of the usability list, we could really use your insights. Artists looking for a challenge or wanting to try your skills and improve the apps you love (and maybe pickup some killer prizes along the way) JOIN US.

Go to: https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/kde-contests to join the new kde-contest mailing list.

After we get the next contest under way I will be working on the artist.kde.org site. Anybody interested in helping on the website drop me an email at theobroma@revelinux.com. For more information about our vision for artist.kde.org see my last post on this blog.

And stay tuned for more awesome artwork coming from kde-look in the coming months!

Wednesday, January 26, 2005

Kollaboration

There are many of us artists at kde-look.org who desire to contribute to the KDE Project. We would like to work cooperatively with developers and existing artists who are building a beautiful, powerful and unified desktop environment. For our part I propose using a combination of kde-look contests coupled with a full featured collaborative web site.

Contests:
The contests we are having at kde-look.org just flat out work. We are attracting many talented artists a lot of whom have joined kde-look just to take part in the contests. Our last contest received 86 SVG wallpapers in a 3 week period. The artwork was amazing and the selection extremely diversified. A lot of the artists are looking for a starting point. The contests give them opportunities to make a valuable first impression. I have heard many people on the kde-artist mailing list say that we need more artists. I believe they have them in the artists at kde-look.org.

Full featured collaborative web site:
KDE-Look is a great place for the artists to contribute their contest entries and personal
artwork. As time goes on though we are going to need a place where these artists can go to for reference and more direction. Artists are very visual people. That is one of the reasons that KDE-Look works so well. The wiki, the kde-artist mailing list and the buglist are great for developers however artists need a more visual space where they can feel comfortable and work collectively.

A site like this would be a great space for developers to connect with our
artists (new and established) as well as great space to keep track of the current
state of various artwork projects. A collaborative web site could be a place for artists to submit ideas, talk to and learn from the masters, learn new "tips and tricks", find guidelines, find re-usable color palettes, find re-usable icon elements (add, delete, edit, locked, folder, page, etc) for the different icon themes, easily see which icons are missing, easily get involved with the "official development", talk about how things should look, vote for preferences, establish standards, help coordinate the look and feel of each release, develop art to go with different themes and styles, and a space developers could request specific artwork that they need such as icons for new programs or new versions of programs. The site should be a space used for “Kollaboration”:)

Specifically this web site would have the following modules news, reference, instructional, and a kollaborative modules for our kde artist and developers. We would use the forums to kollaborate on each individual project.

I would also like to start a mailing list called kde-contest. The reason for this is it is taking a lot more people to coordinate these contests as they are getting bigger. This could be an excellent starting place for many new and innovative contests to be held in the future.
We need a place...
1. for the developers to submit there contest requests.
2. to discuss the guidelines for the contests; as they can vary from contest to contest.
3. to coordinate the sponsors and prizes.
4. for the judges to discuss issues that arise during the judging process.
5. to discuss future contests.
I think this mailing list could also be a great place for others groups within KDE that are having contests to learn from our experience. We also be able to help them with finding judges and sponsors.

To summarize:
We propose to use kde-look contests to bring in fresh ideas and new artists. We are asking the KDE community for a visual space for developers and artists to Kollaborate. Specifically we would like to resurrect artist.kde.org for this propose. I am volunteering to set-up this web site and maintain it. We are also asking for permission to set up a mailing list called kde-contests.

Through this proposal we believe that we can help move KDE artwork and development forward while maintaining a unified community.

Janet Theobroma


Special thanks go out to Robert Wadley and the artists at kde-look for their thoughts and inspiration that helped shape this proposal.

Saturday, January 15, 2005

KDE-Look.org T-shirt Contest Prizes

The first place winner of the KDE-Look.org T-Shirt Contest will receive a 7-in-1 External/Internal USB Memory Card Reader AND the new KDE-Look t-shirt featuring their artwork!

7-in-1 PRODUCT SPECS:



7-In-1 USB 2.0 Card Reader/Writer
USB 2.0 interface
Up to 480 Mbps data transfer rate
USB powered
Hot-swappable
Plug and Play
Power LED indicator
Access LED indicator
Microsoft, Macintosh and Linux compatible
Media support: Secure Digital, SmartMedia Card, MultiMedia Card, Memory Stick, Memory Stick,CompactFlash Type I/II Cards, IBM Microdrive, xD card
Retail Package Includes: USB 2.0 8-in-1 card reader/writer, USB cable,Driver CD, User's Guide,