Thoughts about GIMP Logo Contest [long]
The day before yesterday at lunch time I took a look at the list of
submissions for our new logo and was *very* dissappointed. I went to
lunch to meet a nice girl with a very bad mood. I had to realize
that at least 70% of all current submissions fail simple rules for
logos - and our own rules. The remaining max. 30% didn't look like I
could vote for them, although there were one to three that are
acceptable.
. I wonder if it was a good idea to use the GIMP team for a logo
contest. I've gotton the impression that they are graphishms (sp?)
but no designer or constructors who would be needed to design a
logo.
I've gotton the impression that these people are experts in
graphics, drawings or paintings, they know how to "play" with
techniques, shades and colours but don't know anything about
logos.
No harm but these people are to design our logo? I must have
understood something wrong - or somebody else...
. I refuse to accept that it was a good idea to insist of using the
GIMP to create the logo. This makes it impossible or at least
difficult for people who have good ideas but lack skills on using
GIMP. However I accept that we insist on using GPL-free programs.
. I refuse to accept that it is a good idea to depend on scalability
of the logo but insist on using a bitmap-based program for its
creation. Bitmaps are not well scalable by definition, vector
oriented things are, like xfig-based or postscript ones for
example.
. I don't think that it was a good idea to insist on people
submitting two logo ideas (official and liberal use). Contrary to
that I would feel better if only one logo would need to be
submitted and we, the Debian group, would modify it to create an
official and a liberal version.
. I don't think that we don't need to manipulate the winning logo.
Thus I believe that a submission which only impresses an idea, that
is only a preview but needs to be manipulated by a person with
proper skills, would be fine as well.
. I don't think that depending on one particular free program to
create a logo for a free project is a good decision.
. It is unclear to me if we need to use the winner of this contest
for our new logo or if we can continue searching.
. Thus I have *BIG* difficulties accepting this logo contest.
Unfortunately I wasn't able to spend time on this thing prior to the
contest. I saw that Wichert was handling it and trusted him. Maybe
I shouldn't have done this but jumped into it before. I fear that
now it is too late and I should have done something before.
I have to admit that I have never paid attention to a GIMP logo
contest before. Graphics is something I *really* can't do but other
people are wonderful with. So I only accept that it exists and
that's it.
Since I was extremely dissappointed by the current submissions I sat
down, took half a dozen of hours of time which I couldn't afford,
spent them on drawings, circles, triangles, boxes, rectangles, kites,
graphs etc. pp. to provide some logos on my own. I'm everything but
a graphic guy. So this is a scary situation that we came so far that
even *I* am trying to design possible logos for our project.
Anyway, I even was able to come up with a few ideas which look
possible for me. Even two people thought that two of them are good,
maybe they are, I don't know, at least they *are* logos. I even was
able to transfer them into binary, by using the power combination of
xfig and xpaint.
Now the problem is that I can't submit them, since I haven't used
GIMP. This looks very stupid to me. Even worse I don't seem to be
able to create them with the GIMP. I already tried that.
Additionally GIMP is not a program that was invented to play with
geometrical material but with image processing. This is somewhat
rediculous since only images are very detailed, use much colours and
stuff. A logo isn't detailed nor uses much colours. So why
depending on the GIMP.
Depending on the GIMP excludes people who - like me - came up with
some useful (at least I hope that they are) ideas but aren't able to
turn them into binary data by using a non-vector based program.
Now I am in a big dilemma. First, none (or only very few) of the
current submissions meet my own guidelines so I can't feel happy with
them. Second my own ideas weren't done by using GIMP, only by two
other free programs.
For me the question now is what to do?
Shall I spend some 40 hours to learn how to use GIMP and how to
redesign my ideas? This would be about 14 evenings on which I
wouldn't be able to do real work like other regular Debian-related
work I should do, write free software, propagate free software,
organize meetings, talks and such.
Shall I submit my ideas regardless of the fact that they weren't made
by GIMP and that the GIMP people might reject it for that very
reason.
Shall I find people with proper skills who are willing to rework my
previews and do everything entirely with GIMP. Well, I already
tried this today and spent 2.5 hours only to find out that GIMP is
the worst program to do this. We haven't converted a single preview.
Or shall I simply resign and thing the world is evil?
Regards,
Joey
--
We all know Linux is great... it does infinite loops in 5 seconds.
- Linus Torvalds
Please always Cc to me when replying to me on the lists.
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