Pick your favorite header background

[webwit]

Background 1:
Background 2:
Background 3:
Background 4:
Background 5:
Background 6:
Background 7:
Background 8:

[Crazy9000]

I voted 2,6,7. 2 is the best one though .

[webwit]

I like the second one best as well, especially on the front page.

The happy hacking one is my own, I like the composition and it plays well with the fact we're hacking keyboards, but my lack of photographic skills shows by the glare on the label.

[IanM]

I haven't voted so far, but I have some thoughts on this:

• can these images be set to cycle as alternative headers? or maybe have new examples with the site logo and tab buttons in place? so that we can judge the overall framing better?
• a splash of colour is good, the happy hacking blue gives a nice balance to the look and maybe the all black/dark grey tones of some of the other alternatives won't be as eye catching?
• RGB colours re part of the forum scheme - maybe it's too much to repeat all those colours in the header?
• happy hacking is maybe not ideal as a tag line - it's brand specific and maybe programming specific. Something more general may be appropriate?
• I like 2 for the colour, but I'm not sure the framing and composition is optimal. Possibly the keycaps are framed so that the area of colour is too large for the overall balance? and the upper right tab buttons may look messy and unclear over the green.
• Shift Alt Ctrl are nice and specific to keyboards, so could be better than happy hacking (trademarked name?) but Shift Alt Ctrl keycaps are also arguably the too obvious choice and risk being a cliché.
• 2, 3, 6, 8, are good, 1 is poor, and the surface textures are nice on 3 & 8.
• Would 3 work better with one or more LED's active? With lights on or off, the framing and composition may need to be improved to accommodate the site logos and tab buttons.

Many questions, not enough answers, yet...

[IloveYou]

i voted for 1,2,7
but the number 1 is the best

[webwit]

I haven't voted so far, but I have some thoughts on this:

• can these images be set to cycle as alternative headers? or maybe have new examples with the site logo and tab buttons in place? so that we can judge the overall framing better?
• a splash of colour is good, the happy hacking blue gives a nice balance to the look and maybe the all black/dark grey tones of some of the other alternatives won't be as eye catching?
• RGB colours re part of the forum scheme - maybe it's too much to repeat all those colours in the header?
• happy hacking is maybe not ideal as a tag line - it's brand specific and maybe programming specific. Something more general may be appropriate?
• I like 2 for the colour, but I'm not sure the framing and composition is optimal. Possibly the keycaps are framed so that the area of colour is too large for the overall balance? and the upper right tab buttons may look messy and unclear over the green.
• Shift Alt Ctrl are nice and specific to keyboards, so could be better than happy hacking (trademarked name?) but Shift Alt Ctrl keycaps are also arguably the too obvious choice and risk being a cliché.
• 2, 3, 6, 8, are good, 1 is poor, and the surface textures are nice on 3 & 8.
• Would 3 work better with one or more LED's active? With lights on or off, the framing and composition may need to be improved to accommodate the site logos and tab buttons.

Many questions, not enough answers, yet...

Good points, I like your attention to detail.

[IanM]

Good points, I like your attention to detail.

I just hope it all made sense, I read this back earlier and concluded that I really shouldn't write stuff when I'm about to fall asleep. Anyway, the good ones are good, but if you're aiming to try and refine a final look I can see a few more possible tweaks:


2 - looks better than I first imagined as the header, but FAQ and Logout [xxxxx] are less clear than ideal (you can say it's legible, so good enough) So a possible tweak would be to re take this photograph, in order to try for a stronger 'bokeh' and make the foreground control & alt keycaps very sharp and in focus, but allow the shift key in the background to be very much more out of focus. That way the tab buttons will be sharp against a soft and blurry background. Not an easy photograph to take, so the other alternative is to just make the transparency slightly more opaque.

2 - that photo looks very compressed, look at the noise and macroblocks on the keycaps. Is it possible to use less compression / higher quality and still be small enough for fast speed?

3 - if the original, uncompressed, photo is still available, you could use GIMP or Photoshop to slightly rotate this image, maybe 3°-5° clockwise, and re crop it. That would stop the "Caps Lock" text vanishing under the upper right tab buttons.

8 - I like this photo, but it's not so good under the header. The sharp focus and interesting subject is somewhat lost underneath the DeskThority text and lower left tab buttons. Re crop the original photo? The focused keys in the image run upper left to lower right, and there is a space between Deskthority and the FAQ button, so I'm thinking it may be possible to move the crop and ensure that the out of focus parts are ideally placed lower left and upper right (ideal soft background to contrast the buttons) and the subject of the image (the sharply focused keys) are mostly in the clear area of the header i.e. to the right of Deskthority and below the buttons.

[sixty]

I probably still have the raw files to all photos. Most of the photos were taken randomly and were not planned for headers originally, that is why I never thought of the position of the buttons.

[IanM]

After you comments on the deskthority.net vs geekhack.org thread, the thought occurs that regular updating of the header background works, it could become an occasional feature to use a "mod of the month" or "unusual keyboard of the week" to guest star as the header photograph - to highlight the cool stuff that shouldn't be marginalised. It would need some regular admin work, you'd have to have some short text somewhere to tell people about the subject, and direct them to the specific discussion thread.

[sixty]

I like that idea! We had already toyed around with the idea of running another contest for some header images, but yours might just be better.

[tehpassenger]

I voted for the #2. The main reason (not necessarily a good one haha) is that I love those coloured-keys >< Anyway, jsut a feeling :p

[Seriously]

Voted for 2, 4, and 5. #3 would be much better with some amber LEDs going on or something. 2 reinforces the color scheme of the forum really well. 4 is also pretty rad, it just looks cool. It's essentially soft-core keyboard pr0n. Finally, picked 5 just because it's got hiragana keycaps and feels very 'international.'

[ripster]

Such analysis.

I voted for #8 because it's the only pic with Nubbly, Nubile, Nubian Nubs on the F key.

Although 2 is useful. It's how I realized I needed to bring down the color saturation on my monitor.

[sixty]

I'll take some more nipple pics just for you.

[sixty]

A new one. From a current modding project.

[itlnstln]

I kinda like 3. It has that classic, old-school appeal.

[keyboardlover]

I like 2 and 4 best.

[Crazy9000]

4 looks pretty good as well now that I've seen it a few times.

[webwit]

A new one. From a current modding project.

Replaced the Happy Hacking background with this one. Number 5 was replaced earlier by another instance of number 2 (it gets double rotation).

[webwit]

Btw, we're open for contributions. If you have a great background you want to share, post it here in the right dimensions (980 x 190). Copyright will remain yours and you get the credits, but please no visible watermarks, such a header picture is not the right place for it.

[Findecanor]

I like them all, except the first one that shows shrinking plastic artifacts from the molding process.
I prefer rotation.

[Julle]

A new one. From a current modding project.

This is my current favourite, I love it.

awe.jpg (34.79 KiB) Viewed 4923 times

[webwit]

Number two still rules.. blends in so well with the RGB theme.

[sixty]

[webwit]

Ooh, I like it.

[webwit]

I cheated.

dashboard9.jpg (31.24 KiB) Viewed 4847 times