Don’t shoot a programmer, He
draws as he can..
Things to keep in mind with
UI Assets..
Scale and Size of Image and
Icons. For every icon/image that we
would use strictly follow android UI guidelines so we need 5 size for icons
with 2:3:4:6:8 scaling ratio. This means the baseline (MDPI) asset is 48x48 px, and the
high-density(HDPI) asset should be 1.5x the baseline at 72x72 px, and the
x-high density (XHDPI) asset should be 2x the baseline at 96x96 px, and so on.
So we must create icons/image
with above scalling. The easiest thing for a
developer to use http://romannurik.github.io/AndroidAssetStudio/ link.
Howto’s : If
we have the highest density and scaled image we can easily create assets
with the above link for Luncher/Action bar/Notification/Generic Icons. This
tool will create all necessary set of icons for all device size. Note : Create
an image/icon with highest density/scale
with GIMP or adobe illustartor first then use them as the input for the above
tools.
Some Take away :
Splash Screen – I couldn’t implement it cause the
screen-shot that the UXD gave me was not covering the phone width, it was little
ugly when I tried to stretch and I didn’t have screen shot for the Icons that I
had created with a replacement for the icons shared by him, for the helper
views too. So skipped for this release (I liked the proposal, if not today some
day I will incorporate with the app)
SearchWidget
– I am using the default android search widget in which the search_icon comes
in the left side I tried a lot, did some search but could not make it possible
to keep it in right side. (I could have achieved with my customized search
widget which would take me few days to build !, Why ? if I make my customized
control again that should follow android UI specifications which would need me
to create controls for every device size, everycolor, 9 patch image, icons-
which would be cost me around a week of time, its lack of time that forced me
to keep it still hidden and pops up from a menu click).
Location Icons – Customized location Icons again has to be for different device density.
And the location icon given to me was eye catchy though I had to use the
default map icons. Icons were left anchored but my requirement was for centered
gravity.
Theme with the app color : It took me a few days to find out the best theme
color that suit my app. I did a lot of experiement with themes. There are still
some controls, for which its hard to create theme specific controls e.g android
switch ! So I am still living with the
default android theme controls.
Refer : The links that I refer while creating my icons for my app /
webpages.
Geo-Pulse list icons – Again the asset that he shared was awesome
but I couldn’t generate icons using http://romannurik.github.io/AndroidAssetStudio/icons-generic.html link. We must generate all icons with the android
studio as it ensures that we have the right size and scaled icons. But remember
any given icon by a designer should be with the highest size i.e 192px/192px (if not minm should be atlest
96px / 96px) so that you can create smaller and bigger icons wihtout loosing
the quality. The most important thing is any icon given by a designer should be
transparent in nature without which you cant create icon for different devices
using the above links. So I had to create my own icons with cliparts that
collected from web which are holo and tranparent and matched the UXD’s
proposals.
Luncher Icon :Luncher icon should be created from a 512px / 512px Image without which
you will loose the quality again for
different devices. Just a small note, all the assets name should be in small
letters and underscores (no hiphens) .
This is just for book keeping of all that I did for ZPulse which might help for an enthusiastic android programmer and ease him for beautification for his/her app.
