RealWorld Graphics

Icons and images

We provide services in the area of creation of synthetic application graphics including Windows XP compatible icons, cursors, splash screens and animations.

Application user interface has been a hot topic in both scientific and commercial sector since the beginning of computer era. According to conducted studies, correct use of graphics in user interface has notable positive effects. First, humans recognize images faster and with less errors than they recognize written text. The congnitive load is lowered when recognizing images, making the whole process less exhausting, reducing fatigue. Second, users conscioussly or intuitively associate the quality of user interface with the quality of functions behind it. Last but not least an up-to-date GUI increases the trust of users and marks the authors as flexible enough to follow trends and keep the application alive in long term.

The positive effects of graphics in user interface are only applicable if used appropriately. Excessive use of colors, unnecessary details in images or wrong metaphor may actually decrese usability. The purpose of graphics is to help the users work faster and more efficiently, not to distract them. We consider this point the most important when creating our icons.

Examples

Deliveries

We deliver icons by default as Windows .ico files and cursors as .cur or .ani files. On reqest we will deliver images also as Windows Bitmaps (.bmp) or Portable Network Graphics (.png).

We will archive 3D models and high-resolution 2D art for five years from the end of last project and re-use them to maintain consistent style in future projects.

Copyright

For all custom made icons, you are granted the rights to use them in any number of your projects, modify them and re-sell them.

Quality control

Icon design is a challenging artistic discipline. To select the correct methaphor, the artist must be able to think in context of the whole application and understand its user interface and scenarios. The artist must be aware of the technical limitations of current hardware and software, so that he can make the icon easily distinguishible from its neighbors while maintaining uniform style of all icons. These are the areas where our designers put most of their effort into.

It is a common problem of icons, that the conceptual art and larger images look great, but the small (and usually most important) 16x16 pixel image does not. In other cases, the icon looks good on its own, but becomes unexpressive when placed next to other icons into a toolbar. We are aware of these problems and actively fight them. By using 3D models together with flexible rendering environment, we can produce multiple versions of one icon with differnt colors, lighting, perspective, or relative sizes of its parts. This allows us to quickly finetune each icon and the whole icon set delivering perfect images in all resolutions.

The technical aspect of icon creation is backed up by our own tool (see Products section), written to minimize repetitive tasks and guarantee full compatibity with latest Windows standard.

Pricing

Our pricing is based on the effort needed to create an icon. We distinguish two types of icons. Unique icons are not similar to any other ordered icons and will cost you € 28. Variation icons share parts with another already completed icon and their cost is reduced by 50%. Some icons require different images for the small and big version. In this case, we charge 50% more for this particular icon.

Based on completed projects, the estimated cost per icon is about € 22 if images are delivered in all resolutions and € 20 if only single resolution images are required.

Please contact us if you wish to order cutom image or animation. Prices vary depending on size and content.