How do you Solve a Problem like Emoticons?

Though I jokingly did just submit a Spam Island thread about this same concept, I would like to visit an issue (or non-issue) of ZEJ as of a while now - the emoticons.

A couple years back now, I asked @Jonno if he wouldn't mind whipping up some emoticons for ZEJ. He graciously accepted the burden of the task, and made an entire batch of our little pixelized friends that you can now see as you go to make a post, just to the left of your posting window (or as you post your timestamped chatlogs, and they replace :3 and :5 , perhaps much to the chagrin of our users). They're a pretty snazzy bunch, but they are starting to feel a little bit... dated. After all, they were made about two years ago.

After a little while, @Cid did offer to give us some replacement emoticons, and there was a bit of a debacle there (my continued apologies for blowing that issue up to more than it needed to be). But he did raise a pretty solid point; the emoticons should probably see a facelift in the near future.

Now, structurally, I really like these little guys. While the shading may not be the best, they are all of a (relatively) uniform style, and aesthetically they fit nicely in rows of text. They don't stretch out a line to a large extent like the ugly MyBB default ones do, either. However, the main things that should be addressed are obviously:

1. Clarity. The emoticons that we have right now are, for the most part, pretty good with the way they express themselves... but some of them lack a lot of readability, or just flat-out don't look right. This should probably be fixed for a potential emoticon overhaul - they are structurally good, but sometimes the details of the face are lost to the colour. Also, @"Nebulon Ranger" reeeeeally doesn't like how the XD emoticon looks. At all!

2. Variety. Yeah, we have the absolute basics right now, as it stands, with what Jonno gave to us for use in the original set, but I think that we could stand to expand on what we have now. There are some common emoticons that we don't have, and even then, we could use some funnier-looking ones for the sake of diversity. Heck, maybe even the expressions of some well-known ZEJ members could grace our square-looking friends? Overall, we do need to expand our repertoire of expressive capabilities. Look at the iPhone, for instance. Emoticons on emoticons on emoticons.

3. Style/Uniformity. When we're working on this new emoticon package, I think it is important to note that we should stick to a fundamental size limit/style. The square fellows are aesthetically very nice-looking. Should we keep them? Should we make them a little bigger? What should we do about colour? Should we bring them all in line with each other?

All in all, this thread should probably be used to discuss what to do about our emoticons, and how we should best go about dealing with them in the future. If you have any suggestions for cool emoticons (images, text, whatever), or would like to step up to the plate for this rework, please give us a shout!

 

emoticon discussion pls

 

So would you guys suggest nixing emoticons altogether? As much as I'd love a new custom set whipped up by the wonderful @"ShadoeMayari", I don't think it's quite fair to her to put all that work onto her plate.

I do like the emoticons. I just think they could use a layer of polish (i.e. a makeover) to look nicer. Perhaps that'll be the subject of the next pixel challenge... make an emoticon. :5

 

holy moly i totally forgot that i was supposed to post in here

I'm really liking the looks of those emoticons, actually! I feel like you really captured the charm of the emoticons that we have currently, and rolled with it. If you don't mind finishing the set (the heart, the blushing face, the normal smiling face) and making a few more to add to what we've already got, then that would be really wicked as well. Some more diversity would be stellar.

What I'm happiest about is that you've managed to make our :5 and XD faces look less... ridiculous, to say the very least! The one emoticon that I would change up would be the :x emoticon, which we typically use to denote snide/sarcastic comments (as opposed to what I am assuming it currently stands at, being innocence).

If you ever have some spare time on your hands, please continue this! I would love to see a big array of emoticons in this style. :>

 

I think these are pretty rockin'. Does anyone else have any opinions? Should we replace our current set of emoticons with the ones that Bass has created here? Is there anyone out there who wants to take a crack at improving them further? I would like to hear opinions that aren't just my own!

 

If nobody has any further comments, qualms, or improvements to make on the emoticons at this time, how's about we get this show on the road, eh? @"Nebulon Ranger", do you think you could set these up and upload them to the server?

 

Man, Bass, you're awesome. Thanks so much for being so prompt with this stuff! :>