Where have all the decent skinners and skins gone?

Sunday, July 9, 2006 by Matches_Malone | Discussion: WinCustomize Talk

First I would like to say this. I'm proud to be a paid subscriber to Stardock and virtually all of it's products even bought some as gifts too family members.
While scrolling the windowblinds section I've seen some ridiculous skins even some by those whose been skinning for awhile. Like i.e. 'Happy Fish c'mon. I think wincustomize is losing it's flair when it comes to high-defintion not too mention quality skins. And us loyal customers has to go elsewhere to find some good skins, like Flux by josephs, before that skin was uploaded here it was on of course on other sites first even though he stated that for his art award.
What happened Tiggz, Mike Brandt, and a host of others, the real skinners who dedicate their entire being, and lots of man hours, not to say those who make general skins don't but not like the professionals that puts true dedication to put forth a high-quality skin and not just downloading skinstudio and putting some bars together.
Please weed out those ridiculous skins, put wincustomize back on the map. I think it should be a skin-law the weeds out the good from the bad skins.

Bad-skin: defined as, too many bugs and have to keep uploading the skin
Good-skin: defined as, not as many bugs and upload twice for update
High-quality-skin: defined as, no bugs every part of the skin is skinned w/periodic updates to add more new tweaks if users ask.

-End of report
First Previous Page 6 of 7 Next Last
starkers
Reply #101 Wednesday, July 12, 2006 6:03 AM
Thanks Starkers for the compliment.


You're more than welcome, ramesese, I like what I saw of your Batgirl suit....had I not been suitably impressed, I'd have said nothing. In fact, I'm quite interested in seeing the completed article, as I'm sure others are, so hopefully you'll post some more pics when it's finished.

I'm also hoping the couple of hours sleep I got earlier will help to reduce the confusion and help me avoid looking like a proper goose again. Soooo...how did it feel to have a temporary gender reassignment?

Buttermaker
Reply #102 Wednesday, July 12, 2006 10:12 AM
I agree that my comment was uncalled for, but I was upset that a person is not allowed to speak his/her mind about the quality of the skins, without people threatening each other or calling each other names. There were a couple of posters that made very rude comments to me and I was acting from that. I too said some comments at the end that I shouldn't have and when I went to go edit them later on, I got a message saying I don't have permission to edit it, that's why it was left on.
Fuzzy Logic
Reply #103 Wednesday, July 12, 2006 11:21 AM

People are allowed to speak their minds, which is why this thread is still here. However, you cannot expect those being put down to not respond. You said:

For one thing, I have no time to waste on that. Also, I am paying to use this and to be able to download skins, but there is limited skins to download
You paid for the use of the software. The skins here are made by people for free, for their own pleasure. You have no right to to use any of these skins except by the kindness and generosity of those who make them.

Be thankful skinners even bother to upload. With the kind of criticism and abuse they receive from the ungrateful minority, it's a wonder we have any skinners left at all.

Skinhit
Reply #104 Wednesday, July 12, 2006 11:41 AM
"Be thankful skinners even bother to upload. With the kind of criticism and abuse they receive from the ungrateful minority, it's a wonder we have any skinners left at all."
amen fuzzy!
Buttermaker
Reply #105 Wednesday, July 12, 2006 1:34 PM
There is one thing that I had to get off my chest... even though what I said was wrong, that still is no excuse for what Skinhit and Zubaz said. Not liking and commenting about a post is one thing, but threatening to kill someone because of it is another. I was extremely offended by what those two idiots had to say, that's why I reacted the way I did. No offence to anyone else on this board.

lynch
verb

lynches, lynched, lynching
1. Said of a group of people: to decide mutually without holding a legal trial that someone is guilty of some crime or misdemeanour, and subsequently to put them to death, usually by hanging.

Thesaurus: hang, string up, kill, murder
CerebroJD
Reply #106 Wednesday, July 12, 2006 1:42 PM
Bmaker... Again, please try to be more diplomatic in what you are saying, or dont say it at all.  The other members of the community will not take kindly to the lack of respect you are showing towards any individual who challenge you.  Your statements thus far have indicated that you are far more concerned about demonstrating your 'rights' here on this website than the actual topic at hand.

Just to be clear, the 'right' to speak here is in fact a privledge.  It can be taken away if bad behavior continues, so I would take care to not provoke other users any more.
ZubaZ
Reply #107 Wednesday, July 12, 2006 2:02 PM
Not liking and commenting about a post is one thing, but threatening to kill someone because of it is another. I was extremely offended by what those two idiots had to say, that's why I reacted the way I did. No offence to anyone else on this board.


Sorry you took offense to my teasing another member of WC. Jafo is constantly reminding me that humor is relative and if one hasn't been around this forum long it can be hard to tell who's trying to be funny.


Posted via WinCustomize Browser/Stardock Central
Matches_Malone
Reply #108 Wednesday, July 12, 2006 5:17 PM
Skinhit, I got over my temporary gender assignment, I got a little scared, then I woke up this morning and found everything intact, so I'm pretty much good now :}

Okay, on too today's business
The Batgirl-Begins prototype chest-piece is complete. Mind you, this is whole total reproach to on-going existing character, in which why I dubbed the character this name. My version on what it should be, for promotional reasons.

Matches_Malone
Reply #109 Wednesday, July 12, 2006 5:28 PM
Fresh off the presses

Here is another I'm working on as well [not complete as of yet], this prototype is dedicated to NightTrain, for all his efforts skinning on the infamous WinCustomize, hope you enjoy buddy!
This is titled Nightwing-Begins.
Skinhit
Reply #110 Wednesday, July 12, 2006 5:33 PM
BMaker...i think you took our lynching a little too literal. Its called a sense of humor
-scion-
Reply #111 Thursday, July 13, 2006 12:27 AM
"There is one thing that I had to get off my chest... even though what I said was wrong, that still is no excuse for what Skinhit and Zubaz said. Not liking and commenting about a post is one thing, but threatening to kill someone because of it is another. I was extremely offended by what those two idiots had to say, that's why I reacted the way I did. No offence to anyone else on this board."

funny...my niece is 6 years old...when she gets in trouble she pulls this same thing. grasp at strings to try to get herself out of it or to make you feel sorry for her.

bmaker...i've seen the comments you've left on skins...you trash them without provocation and are absolutely brutal to them for no reason other than your own gratification...and if you think i'm wrong i can provide the whole world with proof.

ask internetworld7 how "speaking his mind" worked out for him both here at wincustomize and deviantart:

his comments: http://forum.deviantart.com/galleries/skins/655163/
the result at deviantart: http://internetworld7.deviantart.com/
starkers
Reply #112 Thursday, July 13, 2006 2:18 AM
ramesese, seems to me a lot of work goes into your creations....sooooo, have you ever considered turning it into a career?

Seriously, though, I like what you're doing and think the Batgirl suit is really something. However, if you could have someone model the complete suit to show it in a 'real life' situation, I feel that would really clinch it to show its form, style and potential. Look out Hollywood....here comes ramesese.

Fairyy~
Reply #113 Thursday, July 13, 2006 6:27 AM
ask internetworld7 how "speaking his mind" worked out for him both here at wincustomize and deviantart:


Thats the one thing I dislike about DA - this type of name calling. I guess it makes some people feel good to talk down to others that way.

On a brighter note - ramesese - your artwork is looking quite nice.
Buttermaker
Reply #114 Thursday, July 13, 2006 7:35 AM
Scion... I think it would be best if we dropped the whole subject now, k?
DA pushed it way over the edge... you CAN NOT compare my comments to any of those that were on there. Even I think that it was taken way too far. Peace.


-scion-
Reply #115 Thursday, July 13, 2006 9:24 AM
agreed bmaker...subject is droped...peace indeed.
Matches_Malone
Reply #116 Thursday, July 13, 2006 2:13 PM
Thanks Starkers and Fairyy, Yes indeed I have made a career out of it. I went pro about 7 years ago, 15 years total.
Daiwa
Reply #117 Thursday, July 13, 2006 4:27 PM
It has been said before, but is worth repeating.  Skinning for WB3 was so much simpler than with WB4 & especially with WB5.  There is just so much time & effort involved in doing a skin that takes full advantage of all WB can do now.  When I first started using WB, talented skinners like essorant could put out a full-featured skin once or twice a week, using only Notepad and Paint.  How many skins did Adni18 put out?  4000?  (Kidding.)

I don't claim any skinning talent, but I do claim some skinning knowledge and I can tell you a skin is a major investment of time & effort.  It took me a year of working part-time just to update a WB3 skin suite I'd done to add WB4 features and improve the "fit & finish" to the point I felt it was ready to be uploaded again.  It would probably take me another year to add all the WB5 features & make sure it all "worked" - the complexity of skinning just increases as features are added.

Having people criticize the quality & quantity of skins doesn't bother me.  But it tells me they've not really spent any time going through the library of phenomenal skins already available.  Admittedly, most of my all-time favorite skins were made for WB3 or WB4 and have not been updated to skin all the GUI elements of XP, but a number of them have been.  The ones that haven't could be updated by the user & presto, a great WB5 skin is yours for little effort - no need to start from scratch.

I'd much rather see people express their appreciation for the effort skinners have put forth to provide skins gratis.
Stylah
Reply #118 Tuesday, March 6, 2007 5:35 AM
well i see you have the nack for bringing people down everyone has to start somewhere even you thinking that your all perfect. The model posted above, would you be able to do that before you even started your "modeling" carerer, i dont think because i could'nt that is a piece of art just like anyone else give them time and they may be some good skins appearing on wincustomize.
vStyler
Reply #119 Tuesday, March 6, 2007 1:39 PM
Here is an example of the work I do, and remember you saw it here first! My female version of Batman Begins this is '. Batgirl Begins -Note: this is no human figure wearing this.



Theres just something disturbing about that, I dunno.. looks..weird. Then again, I dont know anything about sculpting.

Anyway, I agree with one point you have made, I think some stronger criticism would help some skinners. I know it took years of blunt "that looks like crap" commenting on Neowin.com and other sites for me to actually start seeing that they were actually right some times. So now, I feel im a much more accomplished skinner because of it.

Im not saying insulting someone is a good way of doing it as it is not, there are tactful ways of telling someone they need to improve in some areas.

I do also miss the likes of Tiggz and a few others but as in life people come and go and theres certainly plenty of talent still left on WC and new skinners start everyday.
starkers
Reply #120 Tuesday, March 6, 2007 3:17 PM

I do also miss the likes of Tiggz and a few others but as in life people come and go and theres certainly plenty of talent still left on WC and new skinners start everyday.


Yep, 'tis sad for those who remain when skinners and valued community members move on, but fortunately there's a wealth of talented skinners still here and the quality of their skins is exceptional.....

I'm not artistically inclined - meaning I have no talent for it - but I know what I like, and there's an over abundance of it throughout the WC galleries.

Three cheers for our skinners, in triplicate...hip, hip hooray x 3.

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