Art Tips For Programmers?

An anonymous reader writes "Recently I've found myself in a bit of a bind with artwork. My programming contracts have been rather small, barely enough to pay myself let alone an artist. The art needs aren't intensive, mostly icons or sprites depending on the project. Despite owning a few key apps (Photoshop, LightWave, Maya) my art production output is rather poor. Are there any other developers who have learned to be self-sufficient? Are there any resources available to educate me on the finer points of making graphics that look professional?" One resource for the less-artistic among us is the collection of free SVG clip art at freedesktop.org, though it won't give advice for creating new art. What are some others?

Comments

one place to look

[Chip7]

On place to look for art and helpfull artists is Deviantart

College students

[agentkhaki]

A great untapped resource: college students. If you know folks in college, or there is a local college with a decent art program, contact their career advisor (or anyone at the art school) and let them know that you've got work that needs to be done.

Generally, you'll find one or two students who have the budding (or more developed) skills and know-how, and who will be more than grateful for the opportunity to earn a little extra cash or, more importantly, who will work for free in exchange for being able to use a "real world" project or two in their portfolio.

Not only are you "giving back" to the community, but you get what you need for cheap/free.

Two words of caution though. First, don't be a condescending ass. A lot of non-artistic, business-types tend to think of art students as starving-scum-of-the-earth, and they end up coming across as assholes who don't get the best they could. Second, realize that college students aren't always 100% reliable (were you?), and budget for that time-wise).

Re:buy an icon collection

[Squareball]

Try KdeLook.org A lot of the icon sets are GPL.

Some survival tips from a fellow non-expert.

[adolfojp]

These are some of the things that I've learned from my mistakes and from experience. I was in your situation about two years ago. Enjoy!

• 1. Stock photos. A good picture is worth a 1000 design elements. Start scavenging for stock photos NOW. A good place to start is here: http://sxc.hu/.
• 2. Avoid excessive effects and filters when not needed. Nothing ruins a good design like trying to emboss everything or making it 3D.
• 3. Keep it clean and simple. Think Apple.
• 4. Learn from the experts. Visit places like http://www.deviantart.com/ You can even post designs and get peer reviews. Also, http://http//www.alistapart.com will help.
• 5. Use and abuse CSS. The separation of design elements from everything else will help immensely. You will be amazed by this site: http://www.csszengarden.com/ Change the themes and be amazed by the power of CSS!!!
• 6. Buy graphic design books, preferably those with collections of commercial art made by different designers. Get inspired ;-)
• 7. Get a digital camera and take lots and lots of pictures of the world around you. Current examples of designs and logos and ads will help.

I hope that helps!

Cheers,
Adolfo

Microsoft to the rescue!

[TheSHAD0W]

This is a wonderful style guide to building icons meant for Windows XP, and the techniques are good for icons of all sorts. You can figure out how to build good looking icons out of simple design elements.