Same thing with more tweakings, shape, increased contrast etc :



If you don't get exactly the above within the soft, then you must have a problem with the 32x32 size; in such case, if the pict is centered within the button, try reducing the pngs to 28x28 without scaling to keep the nominal resolution and try again to see what happens...

pngs:




If those ones aren't good enough, then I suppose you should follow your last idea with two different buttons...

Christophe,

unfortunately rather worse than better with these 32x32 designs. It seems too much room is vasted. The patterns are way smaller than the apparent available icon border. Possibly they are NOT reduced to 32x32. It's not easy to tell. Perhaps I'll have to set the icon size explicitly in the code. I have to study this.

Many thanks,

Fridger

_________________

Then Qt must probably be coded to use 64x64 files and reduced them with a proper algorithm depending on the needs (here 32x32). If you can set precisely the icon size, then you'll get full control on the result, else in general the results aren't very good because it's a one pass reduction without any care over fine details...

Here is my latest attempt for the boundary and constellation icon pair, both in 64x64 size:



These are the 2 PNGs in original size:



Nothing changed yet in the code. The boundary shape equals Christophe's original design, except the line thickness is increased to 3 pixels. The constellation icon is my original maximized design without any blue boundary lines. Also there the red constellation lines are 3 pixels thick.

I reduced the Cassiopeia constellation layer in the boundary icon by a few pixel (64x64 ->55x55) and re-located it optimally within the boundary. This allowed to use Christophes original boundary. Also, I increased the star disks to 9 pixels.

I can see both really well.

Opinions?


Fridger

They look good.

_________________
Guillermo Abramson
Bariloche, Argentina

Not sure the smaller dots (others stars) are useful but the overall result once reduced seems fine!

@Guillermo: Thanks!

@Christophe:


Agreed, but I had them originally in the constellation icon. For symmetry reasons I also put them into the boundary icon, where they even serve the purpose to illustrate that the boundary does not only inclose the bright asterism stars, but also dim ones.

Yet, they are hard to see, I know

Thanks,
Fridger

Fridger,

I like your tool-bar. It's stylish and has... character.

Maybe I would reduce the font-size a bit (mainly the "movie"-menu-items). the red grid looks something "clumsy". For a better harmony I would probably use two colors (red, blue) and no
"overlapping" lines.

Just a suggestion, not really important. More a question of individual taste...

Regards
Michael

Michael,

thanks for your suggestions. I suppose with "movie"-menue items you mean the time-bar entries on the left ? If yes, these are PNG images and their apparent size depends on the hardware settings. The fontsize is set by the OS not by me. Generally, I prefer to have sufficiently large and clear graphical symbols rather than too small ones.

I'll try to use a somewhat smaller line width for the red 'grid' icon. Again here I had put in some "size reserve". We'll see, perhaps it is not necessary.

I strictly used TWO colors (bluish(Celestia), red). What did you mean here?

Which overlapping lines did you mean? A grid image, for example, necessarily has overlapping lines . Did you mean the last, boundary icon? Here the overlap of the red boundary with CAS is unavoidable as it seems.

Fridger

The red grid problem is due to the automated (so non controlled) reduction of the 64x64 file. This kind of details can be solved once the icon use directly some 32x32 custom made set of icons. Anyway at this stage I'm not sure it's really time to focus on such details unless we are talking here about a final UI; or do we?

Do we? DO WE?

_________________
Guillermo Abramson
Bariloche, Argentina

Michael's above remarks about my "clumsy" red grid icon triggered another systematic design attempt of mine :

I reduced the RED line widths of ALL icons in the toolbar from 3 pix to 2 pix.
Notably for the red grid it gives a big improvement, I think!

So here is the result:

1) With some icons clicked (and thus darkened):



2) same, but with NO icons clicked:



Altogether, I like this finer linestyle MUCH better. I think it's still very well readable.

How about you?

Fidger

PS: I have deleted those small stars both in the constellation and the boundary icon.

Yep better!

The UI can hardly be finalized right now, since IMPORTANT menu entries are still missing, where the code is still in development! Just to repeat some:

• color profiles,
• optional overlay plots of data base entries,
• various statistics options for these plots,
• settings to display parameter uncertainties,
• settings to display multiple star property of stars in info popup (from adding double star catalog info) etc.

that have no counterpart in Celestia.

But I want to push the UI to a fairly advanced and pleasing stage in the next few weeks.

Until recently I still had hope that an acceptable solution could be found that would lead to a merging of this large amount of new celestia.Sci code with the official Celestia distribution. However, recently, the final word has been spoken (by ChrisL) and thus celestia.Sci will take off by itself.

Celestia.Sci will exhibit many complementary features to Celestia, with a main focus on a Colorful Deep Universe and Cosmology simulation in 3D.

For a number of reasons, it seems preferable to make the further development of celestia.Sci public at a stage when its appearance and "personality" has become conspicuously different from Celestia 1.7.x SVN.

So certainly, the plan is to open a public SVN archive for celestia.Sci ASAP.

Fridger