Civ 3 Dock Icon

[ChiefSparkY]

Hello you fine Mac Civ fans!
Just a quickie - I'm rather sick of the icon in my dock for Civ3, I've never been fond of it, looks rather out of place. Knowing how we Mac users like prettifying things, I was wondering what other people use for a replacement?

Cheers!
Gavin

 

[Chieftess]

You might be able to find graphics in the Creation & Customization graphics subforum.

 

[AlanH]

I'm still using the standard one, but I know what you mean. It's just a big square with very little detail compared withe the other dock items. I'll maybe try to create something different now you've mentioned it.

 

[ChiefSparkY]

I'd be very interested to see what you'd come up with!

 

[ejday]

I am intrigued... What, exactly, do you folk think would make a good dock icon? Something like the trademark tower, like in Civ3Edit? Maybe a spearman? What would you folks want to see?

 

[AlanH]

I was just trying to increase the transparency of the sky behind the existing tower as a starter, but got distracted .. sorry!

 

[ejday]

I was just trying to increase the transparency of the sky behind the existing tower as a starter, but got distracted .. sorry!

Being distracted is one of the great joys of life, Alan!
***
If it's just the transparency thing, I could cook that up by tonight – maybe throw a little drop shadow under it, too. I'm pretty sure I still have the raw materials from the Civ3Edit icon (which was basically the game icon with some words thrown over it).

 

[JoAT]

I am intrigued... What, exactly, do you folk think would make a good dock icon? Something like the trademark tower, like in Civ3Edit? Maybe a spearman? What would you folks want to see?

I'm still a fan of the old Civ 2: Gold icon which was a pyramid with the world behind it. (That icon resides in my dock next to the Civ 3 icon.) Maybe paying homage to that icon with a pic of a real pyramid with a real pic of the earth behind it. That would be cool...

JoAT

 

[ejday]

I'm still a fan of the old Civ 2: Gold icon which was a pyramid with the world behind it. (That icon resides in my dock next to the Civ 3 icon.) Maybe paying homage to that icon with a pic of a real pyramid with a real pic of the earth behind it. That would be cool...
JoAT

I have the vaguest memory of this but I can not, for the life of me, find my old Civ2 stuff. If you could post the icon somewhere (or point me to one), I'd love to see it (and maybe tinker with it).

 

[JoAT]

Took me a while to find it, but I did finally score it.

(The white outside of the "world" is transparent in the icon.)

JoAT

 

[AlanH]

How about ? can it be reduced to icon-size?

 

[ejday]

Took me a while to find it, but I did finally score it.
(The white outside of the "world" is transparent in the icon.)

JoAT

Shouldn't be a problem. I'll tinker with it and see what happens...

 

[ejday]

How about ... can it be reduced to icon-size?

Reduced? Heck, OSX icons are 128 pixels square and that classic smiley-of-frustration is only a 100 pixels wide. I'll center it and add a drop shadow...

 

[ainwood]

The Mac version has a tower as the icon? Can someone post it please?

 

[ejday]

Okay, I tinkered a bit. They look fairly decent on a desktop, especially with what OS X can do with gradient opacity in icons -- but converting it to a gif to display here doesn't do it any favors. For a more accurate preview, pretend the shadows don't suck...

For the first, JoAT's suggestion, I decided to keep it close to home for the pyramid - that's the Civ3 art used for the city display screen. The world pic behind it is a famous NASA shot. Altogether, it looks like this:


For Alan's suggestion, I tried it three different ways. The first was a 1-to-1 translation. The smiley is only about 100 pixels wide, so I centered it, gave it a drop shadow and called it even. Looked a little small, though, so for giggles, I enlarged it a bit before giving it a drop shadow. Better, but it can still get a little lost, so I waved the magic mouse and put the smiley over some in-game terrain. IMO, the splash of color makes the icon stand out a bit better. YMMV. Remember, the shadows in the example don't it justice (and the grass has nice gradient, too).

Enjoy...

 

[ejday]

The Mac version has a tower as the icon? Can someone post it please?

Doesn't the PC version have the tower as the icon? If not, what is it? Ours is the same tower that you see on the cover of the box (the same tower in the intro movie). If you don't have it, I'm sure we could post it.

 

[ainwood]

Doesn't the PC version have the tower as the icon? If not, what is it? Ours is the same tower that you see on the cover of the box (the same tower in the intro movie). If you don't have it, I'm sure we could post it.

No - the PC version is decidedly boring. Sort of a bluish-green distorted world with Civ III written over the top.

We actually had it as the download icon for the Civ3 version of the GOTM, until "someone" decided that it would be confusing Now I think I know why! I'll post it later (if I remember)

Edit: There is a desktop picture in this post which has the Civ3 icons on it. The (Vanilla) Civ3 one is third-down in the second column. Incidentally, the conquests one is 5th down in the third column.

 

[ejday]

No - the PC version is decidedly boring. Sort of a bluish-green distorted world with Civ III written over the top.

Hm... I see what you mean. I'm sure we could help out.
Now - correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the largest icon 48x48? Then 32, 24 (somewhat optional) and 16, right? Forgive me, I use XP Something-or-other at work but I've never had the opportunity to explore the nature of .ico files. I remember hearing somewhere that Windows was now displaying even larger icons (maybe towards the 128x128 size or so). Is that true?
If you can give the technical scoop, that would help encourage the local artists...

Edit:
Okay, I tried poking at it to see if it moved. There was some twitching...
Since I'm building this on a Mac, and I've never done windows icons, I can't make any guarantees. Heck, the 128-size might've made it in there but I can't be sure (that's the 128x128 tower below). It should work, but there's a possibility that only the 48, 32 and 16 got in. I know the 24 went scurrying off before I could nab it and there was this explosion and a sucking sound, so the 128 might've escaped too. Either way, check it out:

...If it doesn't, tell me and I'll see if I can figure out what I screwed up.

 

[ainwood]

Thanks - that looks quite good! I think PC icons are limited to 48 x 48 - and they need to be in .ico format, but I have iconforge at work, so I'll import it tomorrow.

 

[JoAT]

Very nicely done ejday! can't wait to see how it looks once I get to my Mac at home.

BTW, in OS X, do you still just paste the icon into the 'Get info' screen to change it?

JoAT