Custom "skins"/"styles"/etc. for Geeb?

[Tripler]

Hey, Giraffe. . . your board damn near got me killed. Fuckin' background thing was so yellow an' shit, I lit up the area and brought some ::ahem:: unwanted attention. I pay you good money for this entertainment, and I don't expect it will get me killed until I die from it.

I need something more tactical for discreet Geebin'. How do I go about making my own skin/style/whatever? I flipped through all teh existing ones, and just about the only thing that fits my VSO-Chairborne needs is "lite," but even that lights up the room and silhouettes me in windows.

How's about it, dude?

Tripler
Tactical Geebin', yo.

[Salambo]

Ambient not dark enough?

[Kat]

I've heard that people like Raffoween for darkness purposes.

[mothedrine]

If you know a little javascript there's always grease monkey.

[Tripler]

Ambient won't fit the width of the screen, and has 'brightwork' at the top and bottom. Raffoween has too much . . . flair at the top.

Ambient would be awesome if it could completely minimize the graphics (leaving avatars, maybe) and go full-width. The colors are good.

ETA: You know what? If it went the layout of 'lite', but with the colors of 'Ambient', that'd be perfect.

Tripler
I don't really want to have to hide under a poncho to Geeb.

[Tripler]

Originally Posted by mothedrine

If you know a little javascript there's always grease monkey.

Crap, I haven't seen script since the 3rd Grade, and even then, my penmanship sucked.

Tripler
. . . that's why I type.

[Chacoguy]

Originally Posted by Tripler

I don't really want to have to hide under a poncho to Geeb.

This made me laugh. Hey Giraffe, make Tripler a skin that's IR readable.

[Giraffe]

I'll admit, I'd feel bad if someone got shot by a sniper because of my CSS style choices. So I made a new style, just for our fighting men in uniform. It's called Tactical, and hopefully it will be good enough for you to browse without getting shot. Please don't hesitate to request text be made more/less white, or backgrounds be lightened/darkened. When I'm in front of a computer with Photoshop, I'll make an appropriate banner, maybe the Evil Giraffe being interrogated or something.

I also renamed the Default Style to Clear Blue Sky, since I finally figured how to rename the damn things.

[Zeener Diode]

Tactical looks pretty damn good. I might run with this skin for a while.

I used to use Ambient for the longest time. Then I cleared my cache and never bothered changing from Evil (default).

[Tripler]

Oh my God this is sweet. . . and for several reasons:

1. It's a darker background, which
a) keeps the light discipline to a maximum (profiling) and
b. reduces the need for light from the screen, keeping power consumption down/battery life extended.
2. The colors look good
3. The text blends in with the colors well enough that it's not easily readable at a 3 or 4' distance, that way I can post about the guy sitting next to me, or from across the room, and it's tough to read. Your color choices enhance Operational Security.

Thanks, man. I have Photoshop as well, so I can help ya with a banner. Need some pics of shots?

Thanks again!

Tripler
The Giraffe Board supports its troops.

[Zombies!]

"Clandestine Banner Image Coming Soon"

Fuck, Giraffe. I love you man.

2 hours from "Hey, I've got this pretty specific problem" to "Here's a solution dude"

[Tripler]

Originally Posted by Giraffe

So I made a new style, just for our fighting men in uniform.

. . . oh, and don't forget the chicks, man. And the Spouses. We have fighting chicks and fighting Spouses too.

Tripler
Yes, my spouse often fights the urge to strangle me for dragging her into this.

[Portia]

Originally Posted by Tripler

. . . oh, and don't forget the chicks, man. And the Spouses. We have fighting chicks and fighting Spouses too.

Tripler
Yes, my spouse often fights the urge to strangle me for dragging her into this.

Strangle seems like such an ugly word for something that brings such peace and tranquility.

[Merestil Haye]

Oh wow.

Less glare than Raffoween. My eyes are in love (especially since they've been ... whinging ... about glare recently).

[Giraffe]

Originally Posted by Tripler

Oh my God this is sweet. . . and for several reasons:

1. It's a darker background, which
a) keeps the light discipline to a maximum (profiling) and
b. reduces the need for light from the screen, keeping power consumption down/battery life extended.
2. The colors look good
3. The text blends in with the colors well enough that it's not easily readable at a 3 or 4' distance, that way I can post about the guy sitting next to me, or from across the room, and it's tough to read. Your color choices enhance Operational Security.

Hooray! But please don't hesitate to request tweaks once you've tried it out -- my color choices were mostly informed by typing convenience (e.g. #EEEEEE to darken white a bit), and could easily be tuned further. It's quite easy.

[KidVermicious]

Just in case it matters, in Tactical I still get "this post is hidden because blah blah". Doesn't happen in M-style.

[Tripler]

Originally Posted by Giraffe

Hooray! But please don't hesitate to request tweaks once you've tried it out -- my color choices were mostly informed by typing convenience (e.g. #EEEEEE to darken white a bit), and could easily be tuned further. It's quite easy.

Will do! There are a couple of other websites I used to frequent (wargames) that once I get home, and settled in this weekend, I'll pull down the page sources and recommend the RGB values to change it up a little bit. You've hit a damn good start with this one!

Tripler
Thanks, brother!

[DoubleJ]

Originally Posted by Tripler

b. reduces the need for light from the screen, keeping power consumption down/battery life extended.

Minor note, and not that terribly important... Dark only equals less electricity on certain screen types, like a CRT. On an LCD screen the backlight, which draws the most power, is always on at the same intensity and the LCDs have to turn more fully on to block the light. So dark requires ever so slightly more juice, not less. Plasma (IIRC) and LED screens are like CRTs in that the darker they are the less they pull from the wall socket.

[Zeener Diode]

Something else I noticed while using Tactical: when I open the home page and see links to the latest replies in each forum, some threads are presented in bold font and others are normal. I opened each thread and realized the bold fonts were threads in which I had not replied, and normal contained replies by me. (This may already be apparent to other users but I've been using Evil as my default skin and all threads are in bold.)

[Wolf Larsen]

Woah. I just tried Tactical and it totally rocks.

Tripler, my suggestion for a banner image is a giraffe in full operator mode with an MP-5 and tactical harness.

[Dragonlady]

I get the Megapoll in my "new threads" with tactical. I don't with Angry Giraffe. Weird!

[Giraffe]

Originally Posted by KidVermicious

Just in case it matters, in Tactical I still get "this post is hidden because blah blah". Doesn't happen in M-style.

Originally Posted by Dragonlady

I get the Megapoll in my "new threads" with tactical. I don't with Angry Giraffe. Weird!

Ah, right. Those were template edits I need to propagate over to Tactical. One sec...

[Harry]

I don't care for the way smilies look in tactical, but since I don't have to use it, it's not worth the time Our Beloved Admin would have to spend to fix it. Having a skin called "Tactical" and having it be smilie friendly seems kinda ridiculous, anyway.

[Giraffe]

OK, those things should both work now.

[Giraffe]

Originally Posted by Harry

I don't care for the way smilies look in tactical, but since I don't have to use it, it's not worth the time Our Beloved Admin would have to spend to fix it. Having a skin called "Tactical" and having it be smilie friendly seems kinda ridiculous, anyway.

Yes, this is the downside of just stealing smilies from other places -- many of them are made for a specific background color, usually white, and don't look good on dark backgrounds.

[Dragonlady]

Mine is better now. Thanks G!

[DoubleJ]

Originally Posted by Giraffe

Yes, this is the downside of just stealing smilies from other places -- many of them are made for a specific background color, usually white, and don't look good on dark backgrounds.

Most of the buttons/icons are that way, since they're for the most part transparent GIFs. If you feel like messing around with Photoshop you can load in a GIF, switch the palette from Indexed to RGB, and then use the eraser to smooth out the edges. Then under "Save for Web" do a PNG-24 with transparency. You'd also have to switch all the places where the images are referred to, to make them ask for the .png versions, so that may be a bit much.

But it'd look a lot nicer.

[Tripler]

Originally Posted by DoubleJ

Minor note, and not that terribly important... Dark only equals less electricity on certain screen types, like a CRT. On an LCD screen the backlight, which draws the most power, is always on at the same intensity and the LCDs have to turn more fully on to block the light. So dark requires ever so slightly more juice, not less. Plasma (IIRC) and LED screens are like CRTs in that the darker they are the less they pull from the wall socket.

Interesting, I was under the impression modern LCD monitors lit up pixels that added to colors. I learn something new every day. . .

Giraffe, later on tonight I'll puy together a 'page 'o' text and backgrounds' and throw 'em up online for a poll--wanna see if anyone prefers any different colors. For ultimate tactical, I believe I can turn off avatars thru the CP, correct?

Tripler
I'm assembling pictures for ya.

[Tripler]

Update: I'm working on a slim banner for Tactical. It's gonna include some Geeber-provided photos.

Giraffe, I know you're busy, and I'm really obliged for the work you put in. Can I still make recommendations to colors? . . . solely for 'fashion', I'll find the RGB values of greens/greys closer to the Multicam/OCP patterns.

Trip
Thanks again, man!

[Borborygmi]

This site provides MultiCAM color codes... don't know if they're official or anything.

RGB: 59, 47, 35 Hex: #3B2F23
████████████████████████████████
RGB: 129, 97, 62 Hex: #81613E
████████████████████████████████
RGB: 164, 177, 103 Hex: #A4B167
████████████████████████████████
RGB: 214, 210, 180 Hex: #D6D2B4
████████████████████████████████
RGB: 78, 105, 59 Hex: #4E693B
████████████████████████████████

Incidentally, I'll echo others in saying I thought Trip's request for a new skin and Giraffe's quick response were both awfully cool.

[Argyle Sock]

Originally Posted by Giraffe

Yes, this is the downside of just stealing smilies from other places -- many of them are made for a specific background color, usually white, and don't look good on dark backgrounds.

has a funny ragged edge around it where it's colors are trying to "fade to white".

has the same thing, only in an octagon shape, rather than ragged.

:o is like

has a really bizzare figure-8-like version at it's four diagonal corners.

has a few random spots in the upper right that actually work well. They look like sweat drops that were smacked off and flying away. Don't bother touching those.

has a horrible, ragged upper edge.

has the same octagon problem as

's 'whistling' is too dark to show up, but fixing that would ruin its look on a white background. Don't bother fixing it.

has the same problem, with the same non-fix.

is just horrible. No suggestion on how to fix it.

:snark: has a rather strange beard. I don't know why. I'll look closer if you want to go to the effort of making smileys more compatible with this color scheme.

has the previously mentioned 'figure-8' problem. Probably the same fix.

:w has the same 'ragged edge' problem previously mentioned. BTW, how is this one different from , and why is it still here? It should be killed with fire come January, when we can repudiate results of the last 'Smiley War'.

:watch: has the 'figure-8' problem, in spades, with sharp, pointy corners. Rigs would not be happy...

altr: has the same ragged edge as , which I noticed, but didn't fix, when making it the avatar for my nr_elove sock, which you permaboxed after 5 posts... <mutter, mutter, asshole long-necked cunt, mutter, mutter>

has some serious problems. It looks like it's wearing rather ridiculous woolen leg-warmers, and has some major static electricity problems going on around it's head, possibly as a result of that static.

:disco: unfortunately, has no problems. I was hoping for a reason to kill this one. Nope. Works just fine in "Tactical".

:gorilla: is surrounded by a nice bright white square. It needs to bend to it's background, regardless of how bleak that may be....

has an unfortunate, but not too abysmal, ragged edge.

:skeleton: wouldn't look good regardless of what kind of background you put it on. It sucks on any background.

:weeraff: has the same stupid square white background :gorilla: suffers from.

's head has that same 'figure-8' problem, previously mentioned, but it carries it on thru the animation. Definitely needs fixing.

has the same 'octagon-head' previously mentioned.

:noyoudint: has some lovely earrings that you don't normally see in the white. Works better in this style than the previous ones.... The only one that's true for.

:iloveu: still looks like a 4-handed Goatse, to me. Only even more so. But no problems in "Tactical". Damn.



I could fix all of these, if you like, because I've been doing shit like that since DOS machines could display GIFs. Just say the word, and give me a place to upload the corrected ones.

Oh, and BTW, if you made the borders and shit totally black, there would be less light produced, and so less background light for snipers to zero in on Trip's head with. And I'd like it better, too.

[Giraffe]

If you wanted to edit those smileys to work better on non-white styles, that would be amazing. Get them to me however is easiest -- my preference would be bundled in a .zip or .tgz file, which you can either email to me (giraffe@giraffeboards.com) or host somewhere, but you could also upload them as attachments (either in Photo Safari or Getting Started) or just stick them on imgur or Photobucket. Whatever is easiest for you is fine with me.

[mothedrine]

I've noticed that the latex tags don't work very well with tactical either, but since no one uses those, I guess it's not really a problem.

[Random Precision]

Not a complaint, as I rather like the Tactical skin overall, but I have noticed that signatures appear to be turned on by default. Since I never think to uncheck the box, I've gotten rather tired of seeing my own sig every time I post.



Okay, so this time I remembered.

[Tripler]

So, I did a little work, and did an alternate color scheme based on the MARPAT (thanks Borborygmi!)



The text in the new quote box is a littel hard to read, and I think my MS Publisher lightened the colors in the JPG conversion process if you compare 'em to Borborygmi's linked colors.

But, I put that to a vote or y'all's input. I'm still working on the banner (in progress):



I'll happily take input on that too. . .

Tripler
Workin' along. . . but it's time for me to rack out.

[Chacoguy]

Originally Posted by Tripler

Shouldn't the Mec Inf unit on the left be in blue?

[KidVermicious]

Isn't anybody just a little bothered that the guy who's supposed to be protecting us all from IEDs in our grocery carts is surfing the Geeb when he's supposed to be standing watch?

I for one shall be issuing a strongly worded letter to the editor, just you see if I don't.

[Giraffe]

Originally Posted by Random Precision

Not a complaint, as I rather like the Tactical skin overall, but I have noticed that signatures appear to be turned on by default. Since I never think to uncheck the box, I've gotten rather tired of seeing my own sig every time I post.

Sorry, should be fixed now.

[Random Precision]

Originally Posted by Giraffe

Sorry, should be fixed now.

That was quick. Thanks!

[Giraffe]

No prob, it's easy enough once you remember that it needs to be done. (I did it the first time like a week after the board started, so it's been a while.)

[Scuba Ben]

Originally Posted by Chacoguy

Shouldn't the Mec Inf unit on the left be in blue?

What the banner also needs is an APP-6A style symbol for giraffes.

[Portia]

Needs more viking.

[Tripler]

Originally Posted by KidVermicious

Isn't anybody just a little bothered that the guy who's supposed to be protecting us all from IEDs in our grocery carts is surfing the Geeb when he's supposed to be standing watch?

I for one shall be issuing a strongly worded letter to the editor, just you see if I don't.

Dude, come on. Even I need down time--which happens to be between my 6 minutes for meals, and my 4 minute shower. Oh, and don't buy any celery this week. Trust me.

Originally Posted by Chacoguy

Shouldn't the Mec Inf unit on the left be in blue?

Yeah, it should be--I was in a rush last night to get the draft done. . . I'll fix tonight.

Originally Posted by Scuba Ben

What the banner also needs is an APP-6A style symbol for giraffes.

I can actually jerryrig one. For years, I'd been using an actual Font Set that does it for me. It takes a little getting used to, but with a couple of keystrokes, you can text-up just about any unit or size echelon. Pretty helpful when you're trying to build OPLANS and crap.

Oh, and I put "We own the night. . ." up there but I'm gonna change that too. . .

Tripler
I'll fix it tonight--may add a little more to the banner though (will have to widen it).

[Old Overholt]

Originally Posted by Tripler

<snip>
Oh, and don't buy any celery this week. Trust me.
<snip>

This makes me think of a guy I know whose sig line is "Everytime you eat celery, an angel gets sick in a filthy truck-stop men's room"

Old Overholt

[DoubleJ]

Styling note: Spoiler tags are extremely light colored. Kinda jarring/mildly painful after staring at a darker screen for a couple minutes.

[Glazer]

Originally Posted by DoubleJ Styling note: Spoiler tags are extremely light colored. Kinda jarring/mildly painful after staring at a darker screen for a couple minutes.

Well what do ya think.

[Random Precision]

OKay, not to say that Tripler's banner isn't totally kick ass, because it is, but I had a slightly different idea for the Tactical banner: A giraffe seen through a night-vision scope - right in the cross hairs.

Unfortunately, I have neither the talent nor the software to kludge up an example. So I'm throwing this out in case some talented, software possessing 'raffer wants to give it a try.

[DoubleJ]

I could've sworn I had a screencap from some Animal Planet show with giraffes viewed through NVGs, from when I had a similar though a few years ago, but I can't find it now. So I dug up something on GIS, inverted it, dinked around with colors and here you go. Crosshairs are optional.

[Random Precision]

Thanks DoubleJ! I think I like that better than what I've been working on the past 1/2 hour.

[Chacoguy]

I love this place.