Young Composers Roadmap - August 2006 Onwards

Looking very gooooood !!! I got all exited now !!

I'm sure that I will be canceling my soundclick subscription for this one.

I wished that I could be any help regardig the graphics. I am very good at photoshop and graphic design, but I am in the middle of a very difficult composing period since I am trying to finish my master degree. But anyway if there is something that I can do, which will not take too much time, ex: small logos or manipulations on graphics, I am willing to do it.

I don't actually need any help with graphics for now at least as I've all but finished the new skin - something I certainly didn't expect to achieve within a day of receiving the software, and also something that I believe can be put down to just how efficient vB's skinning system is.

And, with that, here are some tasters:

http://www.youngcomposers.com/forum/...es/vbindex.png
http://www.youngcomposers.com/forum/style_...es/vb thread.png

First image is the new board index, second is an example thread (with some actual posts from this thread included to simulate what it might be like). As you can see, I've based the colours largely on the Light theme we have at the moment. I'm hoping that by using more contrasting shades, the on-screen text will be rendered more legible than it is at the moment.

There are still a few more things to sort out, but the finished product will definitely look like something a lot like this.

Well, I didnt like the colors so much. In fact I dont like the current ones either. I was hoping that it will be something different. It's kind of dull. I would advise some different colors in there instead of the same tones of brown.

Could you suggest specific colours?

Primarily, we want to remain unique. Most other sites use the classic colours like blues, greens etc. Our colour scheme is quite distinctive.

EDIT: And of course there will be a skin selector, as Daniel says below.

There will be different skins to choose from, I'm sure.
Excellent work, Mike Looking great. (despite certain inherent uglinesses that are a part of VB)

Yes I agree that this sites colors are distinct than other forms. It's just that it is built on only one color that makes it boring after a while.

If you want to keep this brown look of the site than it might be more interesting to put more colors to the edges, borders, and other elements. You might also completely re do the main banner with manuscript paper, piano and pen, to be more relevant, and make them with color dont make it exactly the same as the whole site.

My suggestions to contrast with brown would be: This , This or maybe THIS

these are just my suggestions but I realy do think that you need more colors.

Brown and purple? I'm no designer but that sounds like a losing combination to me.

If you look around, forum skins (and often websites in general) are primarily based around one colour. vBulletin and IPB are both based around blue, for example. It's rare that you get a truly multi-coloured design as normally people just seem to use different shades, which is what I've done.

I didnt mean to put different color all over the place. I just meant that it is too much of a same color. It looks like this is not bothering you.

Yes brown and some tones of purple will go well, if you can put them nicely. You could put purple to thin borders for example, or some of the text.

I really like this PopOrange I'm using. Bright where it needs to be, and soft everywhere else. My suggestion would just be to make a few skins with a hot color, like orange or red, that are basic and not too involved.

The Nightfly, I've tried experimenting by adding some purple and I'm really not feeling it... Where exactly in the skin would you suggest adding purple?