[IC] it is coming... SA RETRO!

Eszett · 18 Apr 2015, 12:20

Maybe matt3o thinks cream legends look more retro (they simulate the yellowing which comes by ageing). On the other side cream legends are less readable, and the "retro effect" doesnt show advantage. That is the issue with legends in general: they are optically too flimmsy to show any special feature at all.
a special font => not remarkable and readabilities worses
a special color => not remarkable and readabilities worses
Is it that what you were saying Muirium?

Muirium · 18 Apr 2015, 12:22

Yeah, I had something similar in mind when I first colour matched the Round 5 Honeywell keyboard. But 7bit soon corrected me. Only the underside of caps tell the truth!

The trouble with pre-yellowed tones is they will yellow anyway with age. And that stuff does *not* look better the deeper it goes.

The readability should be fine, though. I just think pure white "pops" better than any sneaky cream. Caps should be honest to themselves.

Eszett · 18 Apr 2015, 12:51

Sure. Bright white is eventually perceived as some sort of grey anyway. Not only objectively due to age, but also subjectively from the very beginning due to dim lights (my desktop is not well illuminated); and due to the psychological effect, that hue/brightness is perceived dependant on its surrounding hue/brightness (i. e. keycap color). Is it called interdepedence?

matt3o · 18 Apr 2015, 13:33

WCK is just a warm white, it's not properly "cream". The difference with WFK is little and I'm pretty sure you could hardly tell the difference when placed on such a dark background as TBN.

also, the original I believe was a creamy white (before yellowing)

Omikron · 18 Apr 2015, 16:21

Any chance of Cyrillic?

trauring · 19 Apr 2015, 00:33

On the ErgoDox, is the issue of the modifiers being blank that the ErgoDox is traditionally highly customized (and thus labeling the keys might limit the user), or is it that the 1.5u keys would each need to be custom-designed and thus cost-prohibitive?

I noticed that the ErgoDox-EZ folk are offering Printed Doubleshot-PBT keycaps for their version of the ErgoDox, but I have no idea where those are coming from.

If the reason is the first one and it's not a cost issue, perhaps the way to offer the configurability of the ErgoDox is actually to offer multiple version of the modifiers. Many of them are interchangeable anyways - there are 6 1.5u R3 keys for example. Your version has extra R3 1.5u keys to allow modification of colors (and to add the Commodore logo). The same idea could be used to offer multiple printed keycaps.

It would be nice to be able to buy a fully-printed set of keycaps for the ErgoDox, something which seems hard to do. This is especially true considering that there are over 850 people buying the new Infinity ErgoDox, about 350 people who are buying the new ErgoDox EZ (most who are not getting printed keycaps as the early-bird pricing doesn't include them), and all the people who previously built ErgoDox keyboards and might want an alternative set of keycaps.

If it adds too much cost to the ErgoDox kit, would it be crazy to have a separate Printed ErgoDox Modifiers set that would have lots of options?

Muirium · 19 Apr 2015, 04:04

Okay, that's a much subtler "cream" than I feared. Looks pretty good in those sample chips. Though I do wonder if so subtle a difference is worthwhile. We'll be explaining the multiple whites to people every time it comes up, and any extra variable is another thing for SP to trip over and screw up big time. If you think it's important, go for it. But there's a case against it too.

Omikron wrote: ↑Any chance of Cyrillic?

Nope. This is doubleshot. Alternate alphabets would require tens of thousands of dollars in tooling fees to make all the extra molds.

Omikron · 19 Apr 2015, 08:11

Could SA be dye-subbed after molding?

I'm practically interested in front side legend placement.

http://kinesis-ergo.com/wp-content/uplo ... 09x390.jpg

trauring · 19 Apr 2015, 08:36

Just for the record, I'm a fan of the WCK cream color, as I think it goes better with the brown and burgundy.

matt3o · 19 Apr 2015, 08:48

trauring wrote: ↑On the ErgoDox, is the issue of the modifiers being blank that the ErgoDox is traditionally highly customized (and thus labeling the keys might limit the user), or is it that the 1.5u keys would each need to be custom-designed and thus cost-prohibitive?

It's impossible to foresee all possible configurations, we tried with Granite and we covered a mere 70%. To have all options double-shot we would need to sell like 200 ergodox kits

If it adds too much cost to the ErgoDox kit, would it be crazy to have a separate Printed ErgoDox Modifiers set that would have lots of options?

you mean pad printed? Naaaaah!

Muirium wrote: ↑Okay, that's a much subtler "cream" than I feared. Looks pretty good in those sample chips. Though I do wonder if so subtle a difference is worthwhile. We'll be explaining the multiple whites to people every time it comes up, and any extra variable is another thing for SP to trip over and screw up big time. If you think it's important, go for it. But there's a case against it too.

I believe the difference is subtle but important. I will ask SP if that makes things harder for them, if it adds too much complexity I will drop it, but I really dig it.

Muirium · 19 Apr 2015, 08:53

If you dig it, it's probably really worth it. I know to trust your taste, especially when it comes to caps!

(Incidentally: first DT post on my now, hopefully, fully 100% working beamspring! Just done cleaning the insides and bringing everything up alive and well. Ohhh yeah!)

matt3o · 19 Apr 2015, 10:05

- added dvorak to colemak kit
- added stepped ctrl
- moved "super" to base kit
- removed OS kit
- merged UK with ISO kit

PLEASE review the Ergodox and the colemak+dvorak kits! I know nothing about them I need your feedback! You have 24h.

trauring · 19 Apr 2015, 10:33

matt3o wrote: ↑It's impossible to foresee all possible configurations, we tried with Granite and we covered a mere 70%. To have all options double-shot we would need to sell like 200 ergodox kits

I'm not suggesting all possible options, but at least 2 variations for each row/size. i.e. there are 6 R3 1.5u keys that could all be interchangeable (or 4 vertical and 2 horizontal if you want to label them correctly). In that case you wouldn't need variations necessarily. The Pro Modifiers set has 3 1.5u R3 keys which could be used, but that leaves 3 without legends. There are no 2u R3 keys in the Pro Modifiers set, although there are 4 such keys in the ErgoDox (even if you want to count two of them as space bars, you still need two of them labeled). There is a green R1 1u Esc key in the base set, although for ErgoDox that would mean you'd need to put it on the right side of the left hand board, or the left side of the right-hand board to keep the colors consistent - and there is no options of the other 3 R1 green keys.

I would just love to see a fully-legended option for ErgoDox, where the vertical 1.5u and 2u keys are labeled vertically, where the R1 modifier keys have labels, etc. Even if the options were limited, I'm sure many people would like to have something printed on their modifier keys.

you mean pad printed? Naaaaah!

I didn't mean pad-printed. I just meant a separate set for ErgoDox modifiers with legends (by printed I meant with legends as opposed to blank). As there are over 30 blank keys in your current set, I was suggesting a second set just for the labeled modifiers, possibly with multiple options of various row/size combinations which would bring the key count up to 50-60 keys. I imagine there would be many ErgoDox users who have built their own keyboards and couldn't get printed modifiers who might only be interested in this modifier set. Frankly, even if you offered a simple printed set with no variations (i.e. 32 keys that replaced the 32 blank keys in the ErgoDox set) I'm sure there would people interested in it (although I still strongly prefer variations to allow people to customize).

7bit · 19 Apr 2015, 10:38

HONEY/COLRAK
Price: $29

Order now!

3 keys seem to be missing:
@ '
U (normal version)
H (normal version)

--------------------------------- also missing --------------------------------------

: HONEYB_NUMPAD_CREAM_missing.png (24.09 KiB) Viewed 4457 times

HONEYB/NUMPAD/CREAM
Price: $39

matt3o · 19 Apr 2015, 11:04

trauring wrote: ↑I would just love to see a fully-legended option for ErgoDox, where the vertical 1.5u and 2u keys are labeled vertically, where the R1 modifier keys have labels, etc. Even if the options were limited, I'm sure many people would like to have something printed on their modifier keys.

Can you make a proposal? A very quick sketch with all the keys you'd want in an ergodox kit?

7bit wrote: ↑ 3 keys seem to be missing:
@ '
U (normal version)
H (normal version)

thanks, I'll double check that.

:?
HONEYB/NUMPAD/CREAM
Price: $39

What the hell are those for?!

(and what the hell is the cream kit?! when did it come out?!)

7bit · 19 Apr 2015, 11:23

It came out in 2017.

These are for numpads without those annoying 2 units keys!

Ch3rry · 19 Apr 2015, 12:17

Why did you remove the OS kit?

matt3o · 19 Apr 2015, 12:35

Ch3rry wrote: ↑Why did you remove the OS kit?

coherence with the set spirit. if you really want to debrandize the keyboard you can use the "super" keys.

trauring · 19 Apr 2015, 13:16

matt3o wrote: ↑
trauring wrote: ↑Can you make a proposal? A very quick sketch with all the keys you'd want in an ergodox kit?

Sure. I'll try to get something done by tomorrow. Out of curiosity, what do you use to generate your keyboard layouts?

kokokoy · 19 Apr 2015, 13:54

I think we lost full support for minila. Still will use this though for that board but with R4 lime arrow keys.

matt3o · 19 Apr 2015, 14:24

trauring wrote: ↑
matt3o wrote: ↑
trauring wrote: ↑Can you make a proposal? A very quick sketch with all the keys you'd want in an ergodox kit?
Sure. I'll try to get something done by tomorrow. Out of curiosity, what do you use to generate your keyboard layouts?

inkscape

kokokoy wrote: ↑I think we lost full support for minila. Still will use this though for that board but with R4 lime arrow keys.

what do we miss?

kokokoy · 19 Apr 2015, 14:50

For R4 bottom a 1.75 control.

matt3o · 19 Apr 2015, 15:06

oh right. we have that. it's just in the wrong row

matt3o · 19 Apr 2015, 15:47

when switching from R3 to R4 in the bottom row I introduced some errors here and there. I hope everything's fine now, but please help reviewing it!

I don't know what the @' key 7bit is suggesting is for. Also I'm not sold about his numpad design...

scottc · 19 Apr 2015, 17:08

True Retro and Retro Burgundy, the spacebar is still Row 3 instead of Row 4.

Edit: I honestly don't know if the Pro kits are correct since I have no idea what they're supposed to be for.

7bit · 19 Apr 2015, 17:12

Thanks for the corrected numpad. Why don't you remove the space bars from the standard kits and add alpha and alpha int kits, so the ErgoDox kit can become just a collection of modifiers (blank or not).

matt3o · 19 Apr 2015, 17:25

scottc wrote: ↑True Retro and Retro Burgundy, the spacebar is still Row 3 instead of Row 4.

Edit: I honestly don't know if the Pro kits are correct since I have no idea what they're supposed to be for.

all spacebars are row-3

@7bit. it's to make things easier for the logistics

Ichigo87 · 19 Apr 2015, 17:29

I've just started looking at this thread and i saw French Azerty, It's awesome !

I love your group buy matt3o.

Too bad we loose the OS kit but i understand the reason.

Extra ISO ENTER color could be nice as an extra kit even if it's expensive (like the granite one).

matt3o · 19 Apr 2015, 17:44

I'm trying to make things easy for logistics, I wouldn't add more kits unless strictly needed

7bit · 19 Apr 2015, 18:13

What do you mean by "easy for logistics"?