Seeking a better icon--non-gratuitous icon post

[redbird]

I'm not entirely happy with this icon--the edges of the teacup look pixelated. Would someone who has and understands image-editing software be willing and able to make me a similar but better icon?

What I'm looking for is one that is clearly and visibly a cup of tea, so the liquid has to show and be visibly tea rather than coffee. The pouring image isn't necessary.

Comments

[laurel]

I'd look at the basicbases community in the "memories" for a post that features beverages/coffee/tea. I know I snagged a couple good ones from a post sometime in the last year. (Like the hot cider icon I'm using here).

[bayarts.livejournal.com]

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

Speaking of beverages, soy milk and blueberry juice do not belong together.

[calimac.livejournal.com]

the liquid has to show and be visibly tea rather than coffee

Tall order. Thinking of the number of coffeepot-bearing waitpeople who can't tell a cup of tea when it's right in front of them.

[avram]

The first is the same image you used, but less pixelated.

[redbird]

Thanks, that's great. (Using the first.)

[redbird]

I've put in agrumer's improved version, keywords the same so it will overwrite anything I used the pixelated version on. The previous version is on this comment, for the record.

[holyoutlaw.livejournal.com]

Oh, now I see. Reading your original post, I thought the icon didn't look very bad. I get it now!

[gerisullivan.livejournal.com]

Ditto! I like the pouring liquid. And, in this era of animated gif icons, I find myself inordinately pleased that the tea is not animated!

(Though drewan has an animated Individual-I gif that I'm so taken with, I've asked him about using it myself!)

[redbird]

I have animation turned off, so not only do I not use animated icons, I don't even see them.

If an icon is text that looks incomplete or makes no sense, I guess that it's animated. If the first image in the animation makes sense in itself, I may never realize that there are other things behind there.

Conversely, there's one person whose journal I read on my friends list, and the first time I tried looking at it by itself, with her background and such, I hurriedly hit the "back" button--she has it set with some kind of moving background that Firefox doesn't treat as animation-to-disable and that flickers in ways I really don't like.

[kip-w.livejournal.com]

If you're doing your own icon, one thing to remember is not to shrink the picture down to final size all at once. The way I learned it, you shrink it down in jumps of no more than 50% at a time and sharpen it between steps. The final result looks a lot better than letting the software decide what details to throw away in the transition.