Forum:Christmas Logo

G'day everyone. I know it's jumping the gun a bit, but while we're on the subject of logo variations, what does everyone think about my proposal for a logo for Christmas? I started working on this when LiR introduced his proposal for the Halloween logo (click link to see what I'm talking about), so I thought I could put in a proposal for a Christmas one. Ho ho ho...?

Anyway, comments below, please! Thanks. &#8213; The  Tim   Man  (Infinite Histories • Galactic Crucibles • The Sims Wiki • Hallows Maleficent • Why I'm here in the first place ) 09:29, October 3, 2014 (UTC)

Discussion
Ho Ho Ho! I like it. We should really give you the title of "Logo Designer"! --I am  k6ka  Talk to me!   See what I have done  10:57, October 3, 2014 (UTC)
 * Very nice design. However, the gray/white lettering on "Wiki" doesn't stand out very well against the current Mosaic header. We'd need to find a special Christmas-themed header, most likely, in order to make this work. Alternatively, perhaps you could apply a thin black outline/shadow around the word, to help it stand out? Another very nit-picky thing on what it overall an excellent logo... the snow accumulated below the logo maybe should be textured a little bit, so it doesn't just look like a blob of white at the bottom. I tried to do this myself using your png but I couldn't easily separate the snow from the white Wiki. Did you design your logo using the original logo file, or by working off our logo png? --  LostInRiverview talk ~ blog 17:03, October 3, 2014 (UTC)
 * I downloaded all the original logo project .xcf files from LostLabyrinth's website, and I worked on it from there. That's also how I created the TSP logo. &#8213; The  Tim   Man  (Infinite Histories • Galactic Crucibles • The Sims Wiki • Hallows Maleficent • Why I'm here in the first place ) 21:54, October 3, 2014 (UTC)
 * I absolutely support this. Ѧüя◎ґ (talk) 14:46, October 4, 2014 (UTC)
 * This is great! I support this as well.  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  07:01, October 5, 2014 (UTC)


 * Yeah, I like it, but how often will we change the theme of the wiki in 3-month span?  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  07:22, October 5, 2014 (UTC)
 * Most of the challenge is in coming up with a theme design. Actually implementing a design once it's created is pretty easy. Personally I think the logo looks fantastic, even without any additional theme changes. But, I would also support making a wider Christmas/holiday theme. I think some of the changes we've made for the (proposed) Halloween Theme could be made here as well, e.g. changing the main page headers, border colors, button and menu colors, and the color of the background. Bear in mind as well that we might be looking at different background or header images come Christmas, if this thread ever produces a clear result. --  LostInRiverview talk ~ blog 07:00, October 6, 2014 (UTC)


 * I wonder if we can re-implement the snow effect we used last year. I'm not too fancy with it since it slows down my browser, but I guess it's not a bad idea either.  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  11:20, October 6, 2014 (UTC)
 * There was a snow effect last year? I don't remember it. --  LostInRiverview talk ~ blog 17:54, October 6, 2014 (UTC)

I loved the snow effect. That would be a neat idea to bring back. Ѧüя◎ґ (talk) 03:06, October 10, 2014 (UTC)
 * There was. I didn't remember if it was implemented wiki-wide or if you have to enable it manually in your own .css though.  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  10:25, October 10, 2014 (UTC)

I changed the mosaic around a bit, adding christmas hats for everyone! :D What does everyone think about it? &#8213; The  Tim   Man  (Infinite Histories • Galactic Crucibles • The Sims Wiki • Hallows Maleficent • Why I'm here in the first place ) 23:32, October 15, 2014 (UTC)


 * As I've said on IRC:

[19:34:41] It's funny, but at the same time I'm not sure if that's the best [19:35:48] Adding Santa hats to the Sims on the current mosaic almost... looks like something done with MS Paint


 * Could we do something with The Sims 4? After all, it is the newest game in the series, even if many of the older players dislike it. --I am  k6ka  Talk to me!   See what I have done  23:46, October 15, 2014 (UTC)


 * I agree with k6ka. The Santa hats don't look good.  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  11:35, October 16, 2014 (UTC)


 * I don't think a TS4 Christmas mosaic would really work, since the game doesn't have any content related to Christmas...or winter for that matter. Perhaps we could have multiple mosaics, maybe for the purpose of reflecting the song "12 Days of Christmas" or simply a collection of images that are take turns being displayed every few days? &#8213; The  Tim   Man  (Infinite Histories • Galactic Crucibles • The Sims Wiki • Hallows Maleficent • Why I'm here in the first place ) 10:04, October 20, 2014 (UTC)
 * I think it's a creative idea, but from a practical standpoint it probably wouldn't work. Aside from the fact that we'd have to create multiple images, any change to the wiki navigation background image (aka the mosaic header) has to be done in MediaWiki:Wikia.css. It would fall on the admins to make the change manually every day or couple of days, when the image changes. -  LostInRiverview talk ~ blog 10:41, October 20, 2014 (UTC)
 * Very well. However, I do have an idea for an image:
 * In the foreground, a small round table. On it are a plate of cookies and a glass of milk (perhaps a glass of nectar can be used to represent milk, as nectar in TS3 looks similar to milk IMO). In the background, to the left of the table, is a christmas tree, complete with decorations. The lights of the house are off, save one - a wall light in the next room, in which there is a staircase at the back. The light spills into the first room through a doorway. Two heads silently poke through the doorway, watching patiently and intently. They are children - waiting for Father Christmas. &#8213; The  Tim   Man  (Infinite Histories • Galactic Crucibles • The Sims Wiki • Hallows Maleficent • Why I'm here in the first place ) 08:29, October 21, 2014 (UTC)


 * Well, for my own personal taste, I'd like to have the background as simple as possible. It could be plain or patterned, but not overcrowded. I'm not entirely into screenshots with too many features.  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  04:24, October 22, 2014 (UTC)

1 month later
Christmas Day comes closer and closer! I support the implementation of the logo and the mosaic that WikiBuilder designed. Ѧüя◎ґ (talk) 14:52, November 24, 2014 (UTC)


 * I support the logo, but not the mosaic. It looks unnatural and not really good.  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  07:01, November 25, 2014 (UTC)
 * I agree with Nikel; I really like the logo, but not so much the Santa hat-mosaic pattern. ~ Waikikamukow  ( Anyone wanna chat? ) 05:42, November 28, 2014 (UTC)
 * I agree with Nikel and Waikikamukow, I'm not a fan of the mosaic. When we did the Halloween theme, we didn't have the mosaic, it just showed the wiki background. I feel like that's our best option, unless we can find another image to use in its place.
 * Do we want to roll out a more extensive theme? I mean, for Halloween we had the logo, a recolored background, and new header colors. It would seem silly to go far for Halloween but not do the same for Christmas. That being said, what kind of theme changes would be best for a Christmas theme? Traditional Christmas colors are green, red, white and gold; three of those four colors are represented in the logo, so it would probably be best to keep them consistent in the theme as well. When I have a chance, I'll try out some styles on my test wiki and see how it looks. In the meantime, perhaps someone would be able to make a re-color of the current wiki background in either a shade of red or a darker shade of green? --  LostInRiverview talk • blog  •  contribs 06:50, November 28, 2014 (UTC)


 * A while back I recoloured the background to red. Here it is. &#8213; The  Tim   Man  (Infinite Histories • Galactic Crucibles • The Sims Wiki • Hallows Maleficent • Why I'm here in the first place ) 10:23, November 28, 2014 (UTC)
 * Is it possible to edit the color? I like the red, but the darker red for the plumbob silhouette doesn't seem fitting. I think it would look better if the plumbob silhouette uses lighter shade, like the standard background we currently have. Christmas should be cheery and joyful after all, so I think it looks better if it's light than dark.  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  12:20, November 28, 2014 (UTC)
 * Now? &#8213; The  Tim   Man  (Infinite Histories • Galactic Crucibles • The Sims Wiki • Hallows Maleficent • Why I'm here in the first place ) 12:34, November 28, 2014 (UTC)

It looks better! :) I'm not against the idea to customize our mosaic. If we can customize more (but not too overdone), I don't think it's bad. The thing is just that I'm not a fan of the Santa hat mosaic, that's all. I wish we could share more ideas!

Holiday is just around the corner. Do we have any plans when to apply this theme?  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  11:45, December 1, 2014 (UTC)


 * Well, IMO since it's already December I think it should be implemented ASAP :P &#8213; The  Tim   Man  (Infinite Histories • Galactic Crucibles • The Sims Wiki • Hallows Maleficent • Why I'm here in the first place ) 11:57, December 1, 2014 (UTC)


 * Perhaps December 5 is okay, if it isn't too soon?  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  12:10, December 1, 2014 (UTC)
 * what is it with me and edit conflicts tonight I might try to make an early version of this theme tomorrow and change some things like the header colours in the right siderail, however this shouldnt be too hard to do. I'd like to get this done as soon as possible, probably end of this week at the latest. And given I haven't posted in this thread yet, I'll go out and say that I support this for purposes of consensus, if needed.


 * Looking forward to it, Wogan!  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  12:26, December 1, 2014 (UTC)
 * Christmas theme mockup 1.pngChristmas theme mockup 2.png I've gone ahead and done not one but two different designs of the christmas theme, the reason for which will become clear in a second. Before I get into it I'll preface this by saying that these were done on my test wiki so there might be a few differences to what it will look like if it gets implemented here, i.e. we don't have the create a page button on the "Recent Wiki Activity" siderail, the header is different, etc. The bottom image is the most similar to our current theme however I also made another one, being the top image. The main reason for this is due to the mosaic's grey-ish coloring messing around with the silver in the logo which we made. Things such as the exact shade of the header, button colors, color of the "on the wiki" nav header thing can all be tweaked further if need be, I took a shortcut and used the theme designer to get a rough design made quicker. A couple of the flaws I noticed when making this:
 * Background: I tried to mimic the current background we have in regards to how far down the page the plumbobs go, however as I only had the image from above it did turn out a little bit blurred. If someone with access to photoshop or similar would be able to get me a higher resolution one I'd be grateful for it!
 * Siderail headers: Again stemming from my lack of photoshop, I had to use MS Paint to make some "quality" headers. The obvious issue here is the fact that the plumbobs are in the middle of the bar, something which I could probably fix by making a new image. However, I'm not even sure about using this bar, as I feel like its not vibrant enough and the red looks a bit too pale.
 * There's a couple of other things I'm not exactly sold on like the overdose of red - I wanted to try to put some green in there but I'm not sure where it would go without making the whole thing off balanced. What do you guys think?

Forgot to mention that if you want to get a better look you can go to my test wiki which is set up to look like the first image. If you want to get a better look at the second make a wikia.css page in your name and paste .WikiHeader { background: url(http://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/sims/images/a/a7/TS3Mosaicrepeating.png); background-repeat: repeat-x; background-size: auto 123px; } in it to get the header.


 * @ WH - I think your current design looks really good. --  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 04:34, December 3, 2014 (UTC)
 * I love it! Ѧüя◎ґ (talk) 05:42, December 3, 2014 (UTC)

Wogan, this is the high-resolution version of the background. Even at that resolution, there may be a break in the background if displayed on a larger monitor (screenshot here), so you'll want to make sure that you select the "fix" and "no split" options in theme designer. For visibility reasons I think we should get rid of the mosaic header; the word "wiki" barely stands out against that background. Also, maybe we could set the topnav menu to green, and change the modules using wikiheaderblue (such as the modules on the right bar) to a darker green, then change the modules using wikiheadergreen to red or gold? --  LostInRiverview talk • blog  •  contribs 13:23, December 3, 2014 (UTC)


 * It looks OK in general, but the word "wiki" does tend to get lost in the mosaic. Dharden (talk) 15:34, December 3, 2014 (UTC)


 * @ Dharden - I see what you mean. --  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 19:46, December 3, 2014 (UTC)

Gone ahead and made a better version of the theme. I've removed the mosaic header due to it conflicting with the wordmark, and I've managed to fit some gold/green in there. This would be a good time to say something about the new navbar since this would look much better if I could change the color but I can't. The category bar looking different is what I believe to be a result of wikia's change to the navbar and I'll try to fix that up soon, both on this theme and TSW's normal theme.


 * We don't need the mosaic, do we? If we can do without it, then it looks pretty nice, I must say! --I am  k6ka  Talk to me!   See what I have done  00:37, December 4, 2014 (UTC)


 * It looks better now than before. More colours and more variation. --  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 01:04, December 4, 2014 (UTC)


 * The green and red theme is fitting! When I saw the first screenshot, it was too much red and I almost screamed. I guess omitting the mosaic isn't bad if it fits the theme very well.  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  17:52, December 4, 2014 (UTC)
 * What colors would the main page headers be changed to? It looks like we're changing the blue headers to red, but what about the green headers? If we're keeping them green, we should maybe darken them or make them match the other green being used in the theme. --  LostInRiverview talk • blog  •  contribs 03:52, December 5, 2014 (UTC)
 * A lighter green theme may be a better fit. Ѧüя◎ґ (talk) 00:03, December 8, 2014 (UTC)
 * I was intending to use the same gradient I used for the header and the buttons (#009933 at the top, going towards #33ad5c at the bottom) for the mainpage stuff. I could also see a gold gradient working as well, however I feel like green would work better.

The discussion here seems to be focused on small details, whereas the overall logo and theme have gained approval from the group. I think it is probably best for us to just implement the new theme immediately and work out the small issues as we go along. The vast bulk of the theme has been consented to, so the rest can be left up to the discretion of whoever is implementing it (probably wogan since it's coming from his wiki). --  LostInRiverview talk • blog  •  contribs 02:09, December 11, 2014 (UTC)
 * That seems like the best solution. --  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 02:29, December 11, 2014 (UTC)
 * I agree. Christmas Day is only a couple days away! Ѧüя◎ґ (talk) 09:09, December 11, 2014 (UTC)
 * Gone ahead and implemented the basic theme. Working on some smaller stuff like the wikiactivity hotspots and editing some of the div classes as we speak, will try to get it all done by this evening.
 * [[file:Christmas mainpage.png|200px|thumb]][[file:Christmas wikiactivity.png|200px|thumb]] For the div classes and mainpage styles I'm not exactly sure and I'd like some thoughts on what to do. I've made a version using christmas colours but I'm not sure I exactly like it. As before, I've put a couple of mock-ups to the side, don't mind stuff like mainpage border colours because if this goes through I'll change them to something more fitting. Additionally, you can copy this into your wikia.css to get a better look at it. Thoughts?
 * I like what you've posted, I think it looks good. --  LostInRiverview talk • blog  •  contribs 03:45, December 12, 2014 (UTC)


 * Just wanted to say that my ISP blocked Imgur, so I cannot see headers on the leftside modules. It's just a personal problem; no big deal. But if you're going to replace more of these headers (like the forumheader on top of this thread), maybe you can just upload them here so the images are hosted by Wikia.  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  08:26, December 12, 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks for pointing that out. I'll refrain from using imgur for interface stuff. I've also gone ahead and replaced them with a file hosted on my test wiki, which should presumably work better.


 * Thanks, Wogan! :) Sorry for the hassle! It's my ISP to blame really. I wonder if I could change it in the near future...  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  08:58, December 12, 2014 (UTC)

Can't you use a proxy to get around the block? As long as you don't use it to edit the wiki, it seems fine. --I am  k6ka  Talk to me!   See what I have done  11:44, December 12, 2014 (UTC)


 * Relaying advice from Blue12porcupine: "Yep, the red is way too bright. You need to tone it down a bit." She commented that it looked a bit like "Valentines". I personally think it looks too much like a "girl game" wiki. A darker shade of red will probably do. --I am  k6ka  Talk to me!   See what I have done  21:38, December 12, 2014 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure how you would "tone down" red without making it pink. --  LostInRiverview talk • blog  •  contribs 23:37, December 12, 2014 (UTC)


 * @k6ka: I'd use a web proxy when I need it but it doesn't seem convenient to use it constantly.  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  12:22, December 14, 2014 (UTC)

Ending the theme
When should we remove the Christmas theme? --  LostInRiverview talk • blog  •  contribs 05:03, December 19, 2014 (UTC)


 * December 27, maybe? --I am  k6ka  Talk to me!   See what I have done  00:44, December 20, 2014 (UTC)


 * I was thinking about keeping it until the end of the month, but December 27 seems reasonable.  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  15:05, December 21, 2014 (UTC)


 * I suggested December 27 after looking at our Halloween design,and how the thrills of Halloween faded within a day, and the design seemed to have lost its appeal. As the holiday spirit seems to die quickly after the big day, it doesn't make sense to keep it up any longer than needed, but taking it down the day after seems a bit... wrong.


 * On an unrelated note, I did once leave Christmas decorations out for three years in a row. Seemed a bit weird when I woke up to it being Christmas every day in July. --I am  k6ka  Talk to me!   See what I have done  15:16, December 21, 2014 (UTC)


 * I don't really feel festive this holiday, and I also didn't celebrate Halloween. Actually, I don't even enjoy celebrating special days at all. When you said holiday spirits die quickly, I don't really sense it because... I don't even have that feeling from the beginning! If we keep the theme even until January, it's okay to me, albeit it will be thematically incorrect. :p  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  15:30, December 21, 2014 (UTC)


 * It seems everyone agrees that December 27th is the day in which festive theme ends. Ѧüя◎ґ (talk) 16:23, December 21, 2014 (UTC)

Conclusion
Christmas and the New Year have both passed, and I'm currently in the process of reverting the theme back to what it was. Therefore, we're done here (until next year!) Thanks for all your input.