Custom Splash Screens

[Big Frank]

i think you may have stepped into a little problem here
those pretty little pens are actually sitting on mr scribblewotshisname
when he wakes up hes going to be might mad
time for a sharp exit...

[Gare]

Here's a generic version of the splashscreen, no options button, no version number.

Where I wanted to go if in the world of Fantasy this design was ever chosen (!) would be to alternate the front pen to reflect the program; four pens, four programs to the best of my knowledge.

I'm not 100% happy with taking the version number out because the text doesn't stack perfectly, so I've included in the Zip file the art only if you want to design your own logo for a splashscreen. I burned out the lower right so your registration number should show up as expected, and I did these guys as PNGs to not lose quality as JPEG file format can do if you save once or more times.

And I could care less about reading the PANTONE litany, but I guess a gradient from grey to black at right could be a workaround.



My Best,

Gary

[wizard509]

Larry. I think I still owe you a custom Victorian frame, don't I?-g

No I finally managed to log on to XaraXone and got them.

if yours came out as the splashscreen for Version 10, then I think I would feel extremely challenged.

Me too Rik.

[Gare]

From when I found out that you can make your own, then I think I've done that in version 7, 8 and 9.

But, if yours came out as the splashscreen for Version 10, then I think I would feel extremely challenged.

Larry, Rik—

My intention was borne out of an artistic need to make the very first thing a new or previous user sees is class, excitement, attention to detail, something that provokes the rightful expectation you’re going to have fun using this program! Painter, before Corel Corp. acquired it, used to have really beautiful splash screens, with an alpha channel that supported odd-shaped elements on top of the desktop as it loaded.

I didn’t post this to challenge anyone, really. I did something called “doing my best”, which I wish was an approach and an attitude that I could kindle more often.

I see absolutely no reason not to seize an opportunity to perform some advertising with the screen as Xara loads. That, or just don’t use a splash screen, but please don’t settle for “bland”, something guaranteed to be understood by the Lowest Common Denominator across language platforms. Here in the USA, we’ve had our share of “anti-intellectual pundits” telling our people to vote for religious values, not to believe science, to vote for the party and not the person, and just plain dumb stuff that is meant to appeal to…well, dumb people, I guess. They get to vote, too!

However, please, Dear Xara, don’t promote mediocrity with a splash screen. I’ve read support for my desire for something handsome on load time, and I’ve read more than one “chill out, it’s just a splash screen” here. Yeah, there might be more important things to consider in the future of Xara, however, I’m waiting for Xara to load right now, the splash screen is a turn-off, and it took me less than an hour to try to improve upon it. “Dismissiveness” strikes me as a call for mediocrity, “oh, why do you care?” Isn’t it enough that more than one fellow member thinks attention to detail in an art program is important?

It reminds me of the stunningly stillborn response by the White House several years ago to a positively groundbreaking cultural event. In late 2008, Condoleezza Rice downplayed the New York Philharmonic playing in Pyongyang, by saying, “At the end of the day, it’s just a concert.”, even though just about every other musician and politician was quoted as saying it was a “very big deal” for cultural and political reasons.

Yeah. And at the end of the day, a Mercedes is just a car, and Dom Perignon is just a beverage?

Hey, then go to WalMart for your 50th anniversary celebration and buy some Great Value™ champagne!


I understand that to be “cool” on tg, it’s very easy to take an opposing view, even though the view has little substance.

I think we can always do better.

—Gary

[pauland]

I understand that to be “cool” on tg, it’s very easy to take an opposing view, even though the view has little substance.

Gary, you are welcome to take the opposing view - we love you for it.

[Gare]

Turnabout is fair play, eh, Paul?

Actually, if you post first, isn't yours the original view, and the second poster is the opposing one? Or are both views opposing ones?

(imagine a row of smileys here)

My tirade was directed at no one specifically, and for that reason (and not to be anti-social/rude/ a jerk) I'm not lecturing to anyone specifically, and although I doubt "we love you for it", I do appreciate and mention it when a member has extended themselves far above the "I like it"-click to post another empty post thing.

You and I had a disagreement over what I meant to state as someone's lazy thinking a while back, and my remark was interpreted as calling an individual lazy.

I'm very unsettled by mediocrity masquerading as—and being heralded as "good", or even "adequate"—these days when it's easier than ever to express one's creativity. It's absolutely mind-boggling what calculations a software program can do for you, once you've fed it the instructions you desire. And yet I see people desiring the thinking process to be simpler, pretend it looks like more while doing even less, and we as a consequence, see a hum-drum photo made marginally more interesting by clicking Apply with a photo filter. We've never come so close to Auto-Art and Auto-Thinking as in the Digital Age, Paul.

Here's the blandest, least inspired collection of dreck I've seen in a long while, falsely labeled as "Inspiring Logos for your Delight" here at WebDesignLedger Talk about emtpy calories! This aggregation inspired me to immediately click other links in my browser, and that's all.

My Best,

Gary

[pauland]

blandest, least inspired collection of dreck I've seen in a long while

Yeah, but what do you really think?

Some seem pretty bland, but others..

I still like to have room for alternative views, even when they aren't to my taste.

Your forthrightness lifts the forum from the bland, that's for sure.

[Gare]

The Conservatives in our country use this methodology for determining what is the Truth and what is Good and Right, Paul:

You buy as much media as your Big Business buddies give you the money to buy.

Then if you say the same thing—regardless of what it is—over and over again, and loudly enough, it becomes the Standard, the Truth, as it were.

Or weren't.

I think both the "who is to say?" Vague-ism, and the "I'm an authority on this" Pompous-ism are extreme positions to take on anything.

I think I return a volley with an equal and opposite volley far too often on this forum, I'm not being moderate (as in "Moderator") and I will not beg the excuse that it's out of Passion, because that's rationalizing, another step toward Indifference and Capitulation over Clarity.

My excuse is that it's because I'm not a good Moderator!

There. I feel much better having said that now.

-g

[Big Frank]

My excuse is that it's because I'm not a good Moderator!

hip hip hooray

[pauland]

Time to hit the Rum, I think.

..well almost. Too much thinking going on.