Batman. Bart Simpson. Godzilla. Invader Zim. Hello Kitty.
Beyond our business, our lingo, and our common desire to design rather than work for a living,
graphic designers are united by the common compulsion to customize our workspaces. Atop any creative pro's monitor will
be figurines, toys, koosh balls, brain-teasers, or Matchbox cars.
Inside the computer we get even more creative. Mac-based designers customize their colors and wallpaper, and, unless constrained by IT, have half a dozen APE modules running that make progress bars splash liquid all over their dialogs or give windows a case of the shakes that would impress any detox nurse.
Windows designers have even more control over their user interfaces, changing not only wallpaper but the color and shape of their window borders, their cursors, and some even dumping the Start bar in favor of custom-built menus or desktop widgets with Object Desktop.
One area in which we can all—Mac, Windows, and even UNIX users—express our creativity is in customizing the icons our computers use.
WinCustomize.com is the largest community for Windows UI customizers—Mac readers, don’t stop reading yet. And in this CorelDRAW tutorial series by veteran icon designer Mormegil, creating your own set of custom icons is easy. The one shown here is from part five of Mormegil’s “Icon-A-Day” series.
View all of today’s How-To’s Day tutorials.
View all How-To’s Day tutorials (includes Photoshop, InDesign, Painter, Illustrator, and more).
1. Yes! Finally persistance pays off. I stumbled upon Stardock.com 2 1/2 months ago after I purchased this computer (I think it will be inadequate after reading some of your stuff) and just went bananas. After many nights with no sleep to just figure out what the heck you creative geniuses have been talking about,I decided that I am going to put all my free time into graphic design. I am starting from the below the ground floor, well maybe not that bad since I have been able to figure out how to download and apply skins, use widgets, etc. I have fallen head over heels with this "new" artistic medium. I have been painting and doing photography for years. Took a whole bunch of fine art classes in college(lotta good that did me I'm a nurse). I am been told by many that I am artistically talented ( I think so too). But I grew bored!! and until graphics had a creative streak that just plain went to sleep.By day I am a full time Critical Care Nurse and work in an Open Heart Intensive Care unit. (can relate to seeing the "detox" shakes in patients) but to get off on a tangent here..it should be more like a seizure on Ativan. Anyway back to why I am up at 4 am again. I have alot of free time on my hands, I only work 3 days a week thanks to 12+ hour shifts. I have spent many, many hours reading "blogs" on Joe User.com and now this site. I saved up to purchase ObjectDecktop, since I have downloaded all the sharware (from Stardock and Wincustomize) and don't like the fact that I really can't do much with it except make my computer look really cool and be more functional.Hat's off to you guys..some of this stuff is just plain gorgeous and works like a dream!!! Anyway..I want to design! So seriously, other than going to the local university and signing up for classes, which I can't afford if I am to buy software, can you suggest a few things to help me out? First of all is my computer enough? I have WindowsXP with AMD AthlonXP 3000 and 2.10 GHz with 448MB RAM, DVD+RW burner, lots of ports and one expansion bay just waiting for something. I can hear laughter out there..this is all I could afford to buy. My point in question..what do I need to add as far as Graphic cards, design software etc to begin learning how to design? Hey I am way up here in Maine and you are all I have when it comes to questions like this (unless of course you want me to go to Staples to ask) cause that is about it up here. I sent in my order form for ObjectDesktop and can see from Morgemil's lessons on icon making that I am going to need more. Can you pretty please suggest whatI need to get started in addtion to ObjectDesktop. Well, back to reading all these articles and tutorials cause I dont know diddly. Hope you take me seriously and have the time to answer back. PS I will stay away from Avalon since I don't have a computer to spare. Thanks for your time..I will be back. Heck I'm only 44 got plenty of time to learn.
Denise Gardiner RN BSN and budding graphic designer
Posted at 6:10AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Denise Gardiner