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Adamki2000 · Mar 20, 2005, 02:40 PM

Hi everyone! As a longtime GUI fan and theme user, I've noticed that there seems to be a real lack of truly colorful themes out there. Most are mainly white, black, grey or some variant thereof. Why are there no truly good colorful themes? Granted, there are some really good themes out there that are mainly blue or do incorportae color elements into the menus and buttons but as far as the menubar itself or the windows, I just seem to see less color than I'd like in most themes. Am I the only one that wishes for more colorful themes?

I don't have the skills really to do a mockup of what I'm talking about but to give you an idea, I was thinking that, for example, someone could create a theme based on Pixar's "The Incredibles" that could be fantastic with colors. For instance, the menubar and wndows could be a shade of red (like a warm red) and the menus could be a yellowish shade (or maybe black or a milky white color) with maybe a thin red border around them. Buttons in the Finder windows and applications could be yellow or white too. Anyway, that's just my basic idea right there for that kind of theme. But there could be lots of other themes that incorporate other colors too.

If the main reason that most themers don't use colors too much is because it tends to clash with the desktop pics or because choosing colors that don't clash together too badly is hard, then I know there are simple ways around both. I'd gladly have a plain desktop wallpaper image that was white or that was some other color that would complement the theme if it meant it would make a colorful theme look good. Choosing the colors isn't too hard for anyone with an artistic mindset. Just choose colors that look good together, limit the color variety within a given theme to 2 (maybe 3 at most) and make it look soft and gentle in nature rather than blaring out at you with absurdly bright colors or bad color choices.

If anyone has any recommendations for colorful themes, please feel free to post about them here and (even better), if anyone wants to try to develop a new colorful theme, that'd be extremely awesome! I would like to hear comments and thoughts from everyone! Thanks! :-)

Randman · Mar 20, 2005, 02:49 PM

There are plenty of colorful themes out there. Usability is the No 1 factor for using colors such as soft blues and greys.

I mean, do you really want to work on a theme that looks like

cruciarius · Mar 20, 2005, 03:16 PM

i've somewhat started a theme with a few color variants (blue, red and purple), but my problem with themeing is...i'm not that good. so far, all i have is a menubar and i don't have the skills to make the windows, buttons, ect. i'd love to finish it, but it's not in my skill range, yet.

some old screenshots:
red
blue

i don't have a screenshot of the purple, yet. like i said above, the menubar is all thats really done. the drop down menus are too, but they could use some work. i haven't worked on it in a while, because, when i did, i'd work on it almost all day long and end up back where i started.

i've asked if anyone wanted to work on the theme before, but nobody seemed interested. most people seem to be going thru the white/grey theme faze.

vip · Mar 20, 2005, 04:07 PM

i think soapsky is the best colorful theme

along with somatic ... other than that, i havent really seen any ... eXec ... but its black

Randman · Mar 20, 2005, 04:41 PM

All are colorful and most veer to the reddish part of the spectrum.

cruciarius · Mar 20, 2005, 04:46 PM

randman, links to those would be nice.

Randman · Mar 20, 2005, 04:53 PM

Here's one place to locate them.

cruciarius · Mar 20, 2005, 05:17 PM

ah, thanks, Mr. 4000 posts.

i just hate that site, cause it has a popup, even though i have popups blocked.

fisherKing · Mar 20, 2005, 06:50 PM

those pics are (mostly) a good argument for LESS colors...

if i'm sober (and i am right now), i want my mac to be friendly but not overbearing,
something i got at a computer store (as opposed to toys'r'us...)

FB Eye · Mar 20, 2005, 07:19 PM

Giggle is actually fun to use to a while, and quite colorful (no, I'm not joking here). But I dare you to use his other themes for more than 2 minutes!!!

Macsom

Hal Itosis · Mar 21, 2005, 04:13 PM

Originally posted by FB Eye:
Giggle is actually fun to use

Agreed. But, the radio buttons for Giggle2 (and the checkboxes to some degree),
are almost useless. Themes should make it easier for us to see all widgets... not
require us to squint and laboriously study a window, just to determine conditions.
The current status should be readily apparent. I really wish the author of Giggle2
would fix that.

Adamki2000 · Mar 21, 2005, 05:04 PM

Yeah, some of the themes posted above definitely have lots of color but my general gripe with most of them is that they're too dark or that IMO, they just don't look good. A tan-colored theme for example could look good if done using the proper shade of tan, but the one several posts up looks really bad as a theme I think. I just am looking for a simple 2 or 3-tone fairly brightly colored theme with good choice of colors and is something rather simple and not overyly elaborate or intricate. Use of too many colors (such as in that Christmas or Giggle theme) detract from ease of use and are too complicated for most users' eyes. When I see colorful themes, I see lots of greens, blues, tans and purples but not many reds, yellows or oranges. Preferably, I'd like to see more reds and yellows, or a combo of the two, which is why I suggested a theme based on "The Incredibles."

Some mods on certain themes would look awesome also I think. I once suggested to max Rudberg of maxthemes.com that he ought to make a variant of his "Aluminum Alloy" theme that would include "Ruby" and "Solar" variants, which I still think would just rock completely. Anyway, hope that clears up my main points of my original post and fosters more discussion! :-)

eyevaan · Mar 21, 2005, 05:46 PM

IMHO... while I can't disagree with the 2-3 color tone observation . . . many colors is hard to juggle in the GUI - reability becomes tough very quickly.

M a k k i X [yellow at its absolute best!] by Izawa
Cel Shaded Green from the vaults of this forum
FlagShip 2.5.1 from TopsyDesigns.com (a little glossy but well done.)
Royal Inpirat by Makki [yeah I know its a port but it is done so nicely!]
SoapSky by XiAP Developer Group (the most color without falling apart.)

I am intrigued by "the Incredibles" idea... Why don't you grab Max's Templates from ThemePark and start the mock-up. Post the thoughts and perhaps you get a collaboration going.

bentoon · Mar 23, 2005, 12:27 AM

Just came out in all colors

http://carbon.ambitiouslemon.com/themes.html

webcookie · Mar 23, 2005, 04:04 PM

Originally posted by bentoon:
Just came out in all colors

http://carbon.ambitiouslemon.com/themes.html

FatalE is an amazing theme that has just the right amount of colour. And it comes in every colour you could ever want, including pink!