Avatars for The New Flickr
A set of avatars (buddy icons) for The New Flickr.
I love Flickr!
Flickr: The social network that has shaped today's world of photography.
The social network that became the best place for image lovers online.
A precious source for photos and visuals.
The home of museums and institutes that offered the world the best image archive on the internet.
I have been a Pro. I have been a member of Flickr since 2005, and I even used the site as my website for some time.
So when Yahoo!, which owns Flickr, asked me to create a part of the new, revised edition of Flickr, I was more than excited. We previously collaborated on the London 2012 Yahoo! coverage, so I knew they were a pleasure to work with.
The Brief
Flickr has decided to replace the default avatar used for new accounts. The old avatar (aka “Howdy”) is retiring and will be replaced with more vibrant options. As part of the upgrade, Flickr will display avatars at larger sizes throughout the product.
The new avatars had to reflect several key aspects of the Flickr products and community:
• Flickr is photo/photography-centric
• Colorful - include the use of our brand colors
• Individual/personal
Technical Aspect
Flickr avatars will continue to be shown as square images. They must work across a range of sizes, including those listed here: 48x48 px, 96x96 px (retina), 150x150 px, 300x300 px (retina).
Orientation & Background
"We love this!" the Yahoo! group told me about our last work for the Olympics. They wanted to find a way to keep the same visual language but scale it down to the size of an avatar.
I previously called this kind of illustration "Neo-Futurism" and sometimes "Neo-Cubism". The great school of Futurist "Aeropittura" and the later movements of M.A.C. (Movimento Arte Concreta) and other mid-century artistic idioms have influenced me. Credit is always due to my teachers, Nino Di Salvarore, Carlo Nangeroni, and Augusto Garau, for having introduced me to Gestalt psychology and to the love of pure form and color. Garau's studies on "Continuum Cromaticum" and Rudolf Arnheim's ideas on color harmony inform the color palettes and juxtapositions.
How It's Done
The most common question I receive is "how you do it?". I always include a line mentioning all software used in my work. But many people believe that there is some hidden magic software wand that has created these shapes. Sorry guys! No magic wand of any kind. Just many hours of work trying to choose the best forms. And, of course, many years of study in Gestalt, Design, and Color theory.
The Making Of:
Version 1
Here you can find the work in progress for creating the new Flickr avatars.
My first idea was to include a human element in the avatars. The photographer's hand, or even just some fingers, could make the icons more personal. Everyone was very happy with the result, but it was too complicated, especially in the small sizes of 48 x 48 pixels.
Colors:
The first version was created using a very limited palette. The two Flickr colors (Red and Blue) plus the Yahoo! purple. Shades of these three colors have been added in order to give a more realistic look to the set of avatars. We have abbandoned this direction quickly as it was creating a less bold and more romantic look. We kept the three colors for the background and added a much wider palette.
We experimented with different color backgrounds. We tried black, a darker purple, and a lighter blue or red.
We then tried a light grey to put the emphasis on the camera forms.
We all agreed that the Yahoo! purple was probably the best color for the background. The Flickr Red and Blue could then find their place inside the camera forms, most of the times in the center of the icon, for example the lens.
The Avatars on the new Flickr website
Software - Hardware:
Made with Synthetik Studio Artist, Adobe Creative Suite, Apple technology, and good music.
Credits and thank yous:
Credit must go to the great industrial designers of these beautiful machines, old and new. Many thanks to many photographers, mostly through Shutterstock, who helped me with their shots.
A big thank you to everyone at Yahoo!/Flickr, especially Philip King and Shaun Forouzandeh.
A warm thank you to Marissa Meyer!
All the best to The New Flickr!
You are almost certainly the best online photo management and sharing application in the world!
