Carry On Doctor icons (Part One)

[thisbluespirit]

A sort of epic post of insanity, really. I just thought that Carry On Doctor would be fun to practice icon-making with... two or so weeks later, and 188 icons down the line, here's a post. Um. Yes. It's not my favourite of the series by a long chalk, but definitely iconic in all senses of the word.

For the DW majority here: icons of Peter Butterworth (the Monk), Bernard Bresslaw (what an Ice Warrior looks like underneath), Joan Sims (Katryca), Julian Holloway (Survival) and Peter Gilmore (Frontios). Also Peter Jones (the voice of the Hitchhiker's Guide). But mainly the usual suspects.

I still have an issue with the basic quality of the images (causes: Me? Software? One or the other, since any image has the same problem, regardless.) However, I think I managed some prettiness.



If anyone does want any, go ahead. Any comments are much appreciated. As is obvious, I'm all new to icon-making.

Comments

[pedanther]

I still have an issue with the basic quality of the images

Does "basic quality" mean that the image is disappointing from the moment you capture it from the movie? Or that it turns out basically disappointing at some later point?

[thisbluespirit]

I've come to the conclusion that it's the moment I try to do anything with it, although it's a bit hard to be certain. I've played around with some different things, but part of it could still be the screen caps themselves (it makes no difference whether it's film, old, or something new like Spooks).

[pedanther]

Do you save the image much along the way, and if so, what as?

One of the stock recommendations for image manipulation is that while you're working on the image, you should save it in a non-lossy file format (I'm not sure what your options are with the program you use) and only save the final result as a jpeg, because jpeg is a lossy format so every time you save a jpeg file the image quality gets a little bit worse.

[thisbluespirit]

I try not to, but i did wonder about that, because once I save it in the computer programme it's a Serif file (goodness only knows what that does) and will only save in another file as an export. So then I export it as a jpeg and crop it in my basic software (which is better at that, and also doesn't lose the quality so much.) I'll have to have a play with that. What sort of file types should I be looking for? (If I don't have them, I'll just experiment, but I knew that jpeg was potentially problematic, but not which file type is better.)

Thanks. :-)

[pedanther]

The proprietory format of many image editing programs is lossless, for obvious reasons (Photoshop PSD, for instance); but of course that's no use if you don't have the program. I haven't found anything yet that will tell me if Serif format is.

Off the top of my head, TIF and 24-bit PNG are good lossless file formats. (8-bit PNG is a lot like GIF: can perfectly reproduce a simple picture with fewer than 256 colours, but has trouble with photographs.) (Which reminds me that for your icons that are just text on a non-photographic background, you might consider doing them as GIFs; they're likely to come out neater that way than as JPG.)

If you do find that you're stuck with JPG, there should be an image quality option when you export, with a slider usually from 0 to 100. If you push it up to 100, you minimise the loss of quality (with the trade-off that the file size is larger).

What software are you using to crop the image?

[thisbluespirit]

Thanks. That is very helpful - I'll see what happens next time I get the urge to make obscure and slightly rubbish icons... (Heh.)

And I'm using MGM Photosuite III to crop the image - it came with my digital camera, but it seems much better at doing that precisely and with less loss of quality than Serif. Odd, but hey...

:-)

[peculiargroove.livejournal.com]

YAY for Carry On icons! You NEVER see Carry on icons so these made my day! Snagged a few, will credit when used - thank you! =D

[thisbluespirit]

Aw, thanks. Your comments have also made my day, since you rarely find people who WANT Carry On icons, either. Or not mine... :lol:

:-D Thanks for the feedback.