Oh, I really love all your Doctor Who icons! They're absolutely awesome! Like everything you do <3
I was a little bit dissapointed of my winner icon. I really don't think it was my best, don't even close (but that's because everyone has different preferences). Overall a lot of my nominated icons weren't my favourites, so I assume that I like icons that nobody likes and the opposite. And I think my biggest problem is just that - people always liked my mediocre level icons, so I don't know how that will impact my future style, do I keep making icons I like or icons that others like? I know that icon making must be for personal pleasure, but it's always nice to know that people like the icons you make (or at least a part of them) :)

Aw, thank you!
Oh I'm surprised you didn't like your winner, I think your winner icon was amazing. I think I was the one to nominate it - I'm sorry that I nominated something you didn't want to win, that's definitely not what I wanted. I just really don't think that it's a 'mediocre' icon in any way, I think coloring as deep and vibrant as that is very difficult to make and makes the icon stand out in a big voting post. But I totally get that it's disheartening if the audience doesn't like our personal favorites, it happens to me a lot with individual sets, but that only makes me want to practise the things I want to be liked for even more - but then again, like you say, everyone has different preferences and that's not really something that we can affect.

I for one had a lot of trouble picking just 5 of your icons to the voting and even more trouble voting for just 10, so if your favorites didn't make it there it doesn't mean that people didn't like them! :>

Thank you so much, your comments always make me feel better!
It's not that I didn't like it at all, but I spend less than 5 minutes on that icon and thought it didn't deserve to be among others, that I spend hours on :D But I guess the other icons of mine wouldn't mind that :D
Anyway, I hope the next year will be different (if I'm still around) and I'll try to make icons, which will be liked by me and by others. I still can't find my own style, I think that vibrant coloring is not enough for me, but we'll see :)
And I think that there's no way people don't like your personal favourites, cuz I personally love every icon of yours - your amazing texture use and text work with that beautiful vibrant, but at the same time muted coloring (I can't even describe it :D)

WHAT are you kidding or did you really did that in 5 minutes :O wow, I never would have guessed! But if that's the case then I definitely understand you not being happy with the win, of course it's natural to want all the hard work to be worth it. This is why it would be good to see the caps in votings like that, to be able to tell which icons have taken more effort than others; I would have definitely taken that into account!

Ohhh I definitely didn't mean to say that you should only make vibrant icons and nothing else, I think you have lots of different strengths so I'd encourage playing around with all of them - vibrant colors, lighting, contrast, blending, blocking, text, textures, everything!! :> or whatever you're inspired by, even if it's completely different from what you think anyone else likes; you never know. I think your icons are absolutely gorgeous, so, don't worry too much about this poll :>

LOL no seriously this happens to me quite a lot, hoping one icon to get positive attention and being 'wtf' when another much less carefully made one gets more compliments. But at the same time I don't want anyone to feel like they like the 'wrong' icons from me; anyone liking any icon at all is already sooo much better than nobody liking anything, so, the last thing I want to do is make people feel like there are restrictions on which of my icons they are allowed to like, or that I'm ungrateful, cause that's not true either. This is such a complicated thing, it's good to get to discuss it :)

Maybe not exactly 5, but it was pretty close. I remember I used a lot of Variations (which always helps me with the vibrant coloring, because I always get the colors I need and of course Vibrance, Levels and Contrast to get to that point. But it was pretty much nothing unusual.

Yeah, I know, but when I look at my icons and the only thing I see is vibrant colors :D I tried to play with text last year and most of the time I was quite happy with the text icons (others were completely failures of course) and I plan to stick with that, but lately I struggle very much with the text, maybe I need some new fonts, because this year I barely made text icons. Textures on the other hand are really tough for me and I really have to work on that :)

Your icons were so great last year! I looked forward to your posts the most, you always have brilliant ideas.

I'm gonna steal your idea and post my top 10 as well, if you don't mind! :P

I'm happy with the icon that won (because, pretty colors! lol) but it wasn't my best at all that I've done last year imo. So..it's interesting and something to think about. I guess I need to work on stepping up my game more this year!

Oh wow, thanks, that is such a flattering thing to hear - I hope I can keep it up this year, and I definitely loved your posts too, I think you probably did the most impressive progress last year, so I'm definitely looking forward to your icons this year too :>

Ofc I don't mind! (obviously this would have been a top 10 too, top 11 is not a thing D:, but there was a tie)

I looove the colors of your winning icon but at the same time I'm a little surprised that one of your grungy/textured masterpieces didn't win cause that's the style I think you really perfected last year! Then again i've noticed that often in votings color is what first catches the eye (and only after that composition, texture work, cropping etc), especially if there are lots of icons to pick from, so I guess that might be the reason. Gorgeous icon anyway :>

Thank you!

Yep, ita colors definitely stand out when choosing in the voting. :]

Honestly, I knew the Ruby transformation icon was going to win your lot. That round at T-R was such a mess on my end, and the only thing that keeps me from wanting to bury my head in the sand over it is the fact that such gorgeous icons came out of it, and your Ruby icon is, well, iconic. And I am thrilled that you are happy with your results especially 'cause all the icons here are so wonderfully composed and colored and, well, everything. ♥

Oh. Man. Now that you mention it...none of my top ten really reflect what I consider my personal style. Awkward. :-/

Lol, I knew it would win too, but I still remember making it for t-r and thinking 'this is such a ridiculously literal and cliche icon for this prompt, with that overused wolf texture and all!', so seeing how much people liked it was really a surprise. I remember no messiness at all from that round though, I think you were as awesome as always (I'm really sad that I couldn't participate on the anon/alias round, it was a brilliant idea with gorgeous results. Crossing my fingers that I'll be able to do the next round!)

Ohhh really? But there's text magic, lighting magic and deep gorgeous colors and contrast and lots of other wonderful techniques I personally associate with your icons in your top10! Not in all of them sure but all of these things are present in the top 10 (if I counted right...). And I totally absolutely love your winning icon, it was one of those icons that are really easy to remember after seeing them, really unique and gorgeous. I totally voted for it with 9 other beauties, but now that I think about it maybe something more lighting-heavy would have been a more representative winner. But, with the text magic and all I still think fits the vibe I get from your work as whole :)

Your icons really stood out last year with the retro coloring and creative composition! When I look at the result post, it makes me very happy to see when the icons I voted for won lol

I'm really surprised about my result. Really not one of my personal favorites and I made it in February...one of my absolute favorites from 2013 didn't even get any votes.

Oh thank you so much!!
I'm actually a little surprised about your result too, but it's utterly gorgeous anyway! I really love the smokiness of it and think that might be why it won (plus the fact that it got nominated early - icons at the top of the icon wall just get more votes than the ones in the middle or bottom). Still, there were tons of other gorgeous icons to pick from so it's unfortunate that a February icon won for you, especially cause I think you made a ton of incredible progress last year and I really loved your newest posts especially, so yeah I would have totally picked something from those :)

icons at the top of the icon wall just get more votes than the ones in the middle or bottom
I noticed that! I always tried to look through all icons when I voted. Sometimes the amount of nominated icons was kinda overwhelming though, I can't really blame anyone.

Aww, thank you :)

That is SUCH a fantastic selection up there. :D And pretty diverse too.

And lol, I will admit that I'm completely ??? about my winning icon. Gotta steal this and investigate for my top ten or so too, let's see where that leads me. XD.

Aw, thank you so much!
Your winner was awesome though, the text and colors were stunning! but ofc there was plenty of awesome to choose from. Yay, do that, I'm always interested in hearing everyone' thoughts about the results :>

Thank you! XD Done and posted, with a mini icon progression thingy added as well, lol.

Those icons are gorgeous! In terms of my winning icon...well, I was kind of surprised that my Padme icon won. It's pretty, but it's not really the best icon I did in 2013.

Thank you!! I loved your Padme icon, I don't remember if it was in the icons i voted for, but I can see why it would win (with the really good lighting, coloring and contrast). Also I've noticed that if there's one thing that always works for almost everyone, it's negative space, so there's that too :)

You're very welcome. And thanks! :D And yeah, negative space really does work a lot, it really does. :)

I did a poll with myself and I totally got it right which one would win of yours. Some of my personal favs are there too (1, 3,4, 5,7).
Look at your pool, I see what you are talking about, your style is all over them and I think it was really cool.


I got it right which one would be mine too. I hate pink and I did it for technique20in20, but I was grateful people voted for one of my last icon posts of the year.
Personal style isn't something I found yet, but I was mostly ok with what people chose. It wasn't a surprise, but some of my favs didn't make it and some really obscure/really ugly icons made it and I was??

Like shameless666 said, it's super weird to find the middle term: do what you like/think is good or move over and try to make different icons, thinking to broad your spectrum so that people like them.

Hee, thank you so much! :D I wasn't too surprised either about the winner from me, more surprised about the rest oif the top 10 (but in a good way).

Yes, having a recent icon win is definitely awesome! From me the winner was from July so it's at least not from January or something but still there's the implication that i got worse, so, I would have loved to get a new winner like you did. (then again I get why an older icon won, cause I had a huge iconing slump through the rest of the months and didn't even post most of my made icons properly so maybe that's the explanation x) )

I don't see any ugly icons in your poll though, I think you're being too hard on them! As for your last question, there are always benefits in analyzing why people might have voted for the icons they voted for, but in the end you can only guess (some votes are based on personal taste and some on execution quality, and you can't be sure if an icon wins for color, composition, texture use, brightness or something else) so it's best not to let it affect your style too much. I think all of your work is awesome as it is tbh :) i'll just pretend I didn't see you diss pink, lol! I looove pink, obviously :p

These are all so great, and they represent your style too, which is awesome :D I'll always be in love with #9 ♥

You know what I think about my winning one, haha. Good to see from the comments here that I'm not the only one who's a bit unhappy with my winning icon. My top ten is also weird, and not many icons from the end of the year got nominated, so I share your meh feeling about that. But your last posts were amazing so I'll say again that you definitely didn't get worse!

Oh thank you!! 9 was one of the earliest icon here, haha, but that was the time when i had just discovered a few new coloring techniques which I still use, so, good to know they work for you :> (I'm alb bothered by the bright purple shadows especially on her face, and that the whites of her eyes are actually pink, which is kinda creepy, but maybe that's just nitpicking x) )

tbh I only had one icon post from the end of the year, the rest of my icons were just randoms posted at watchnicon and capchallenge so I totally get that people wouldn't know to search those places when hunting for nominations :D also obviously in summer I had more time and inspiration to make icons, so I think I'm fine with most of my winners and nominations being oldish. I'm more surprised about your nominations being oldish though cause imo your latest posts were brilliant. But at least your second to winner icon was new and a really good representation of the things I think you're really stellar at, I really would have liked it to get the first place.

Yes part of the reason why I made this post was cause I think it's good to give people a place to express their icon feels. I have them and think it's ok for everyone to have them, positive or negative, so maybe getting to express it and seeing everyone elses reactions can be good, especially if the results were disappointing. though now I feel almost guilty for getting such a satisfying result personally!

Yeah that's totally nitpicking ;) I had to look extra closely to see what you were talking about. I'll admit that I usually layer mask pretty much everything over the eyes since I was traumatised by a tutorial that mentioned yellowish eyes and how ugly they looked, but most of the time I don't notice such things in other people's icons (and apparently not in my own icons either because Tink in my icon here has one blue eye and one pink eye O.o also green hair, hahaha, I fail actually I noticed the green hair ages ago but I still like the icon :P)

Aw, thanks! Yeah... Here is my top 11 (most of them are ties tbh)


I don't hate any of them, in face I like them, but I've made much better icons technically-wise. 3 and 4 are so over-topazed it hurts, 7 is blurry and weird, 9 has this weird light blob over the text, and 11 made me so proud when I made it, but that was a year ago :D

But you totally deserve a satisfying result! I think we're all impressed by your work, I know I am. Motivation issues aside I know I still have a long way to go to get ~there. I still need to find a proper style, and be more consistent, creative and patient when I make graphics. Maybe this year, if I feel like making graphics often enough. The goal should be to not post icons I don't like :)

Oh but that's such a colorful and gorgeous selection. I get what you mean that there possibly could have been even better choices in your newest posts but at the same time I'm in love with most of these too! the Topaz on 4 looks actually pretty excellent to me, I mean, it's not like this most plastic-looking icon ever which was in my top 20 results too, wtflmao. Besides who cares about topaz when the coloring is as stellar as in 4 (I'm pretty sure I even voted for it, all I thought was all the color porn, I'm easy like that, give me vibrant cyans and yellows and I'm sold :D). My other faves of these are of course 2, 5 and 6, I think 5 and 6 were even nominated by me, and 10 is incredible too, and the rest are awesome but I would have picked something newer, probably all from the newest post tbh, and would have liked to see your default place in the top10 for sure (I hadn't noticed the eye colors either and the lime colored hair is actually really cool!).

But I have absolutely no clue why you seem to think I'm any 'further' than you?!? :O I totally look up to your icons! They have none of the quality issues my icons have! And also I think you definitely have a style, or a set of things that make your work distinctive. The curse about styles though is that in 2012 I agonized over not having one. Like, I desperately wanted to develop one. And then it just hit me in December that year and I noticed that I really liked making ~vintagey/pastelly icons, and as a result, almost all my 2013 icons look the same cause I can't give up using the same coloring methods :p so, I went from no style to too much of the same style. You should enjoy the phase where your icons are distinctively yours, yet varied!! :)

I think my comment was marked as spam because of the icons :/

well that wasn't very nice of the spam filter, thanks for letting me know! :D

Hot damn that is a collection and a half of icons there! I definitely think you are right in your assessment of it representing your style, and it just goes to show how much people love your style, if these are the icons they selected for you!

This discussion (and other discussions I've seen) is so interesting to me. I guess perhaps, people take to voting with their own stylistic preferences in mind, and that can obviously impact their icon selections. So something they love putting into their icons is something they would potentially be drawn to while choosing their picks for other people. I also think sometimes exposure (or over-exposure) of an icon can skew the results as well. It's probably not always the case, but the icons that have come out on top for me for the last three years have been ones that have been well received, and potentially not forgotten... if that makes sense?

I shall stop rambling now. Just know that I have enjoyed reading this discussion, so thank you for creating it!

WHAT???? YOU SAY YOU CAN'T PAINT? ARE YOU INSANE? #2 IS ONE OF THE MOST PRECISE PAINT ICONS I'VE EVER SEEN AND I'M NOT EXAGGERATING.

Ahem. Anyway. Pardon the caps. (No, wait, caps are fun, though.) But seriously, your icons are insane (in a good way). #9 is, like, one of my favorite icons by you. Ever. HOW did you GET that COL-OR-ING?!???!

Oh, gosh, I hate my winning icon. I really do. It's blurry and virtually colorless. I'm really surprised it won. I thought for sure the Sherlock icon I'm using now would win. Also, Tommi, you're the only person who voted for 10 of my icons. =P

omg thank you so much :> (especially for the 'insane' comment, hee!)

9 actually has a two-part PSD in this PSD pack in case you're interested in a more detailed look at how I made the coloring cause honestly I don't really remember anymore :D but in short, I have a vague memory of making everything really pink at first and then using some yellow coloring (probably a color balance layer with a layer mask so it only affected the hair?) to make the hair yellow. Really glad you like the coloring :)

Oh I'm sad to hear an icon you didn't like won! I think the icon is gorgeous but at the same time your closecropping skills and use of cool colors are incredible so I was pretty sure one of those would win, and the one you're using was definitely one of my top favorites. But, like I replied to ladyhadhafang, negative space works for almost everyone, so that might have been a factor :)
Really? That's weird, I thought everyone would just vote for 10 icons from everyone! I can never choose any fewer than that (picking just 10 is difficult enough) :D