Icon-A-Day, Icon #10, Hard Drive.

Getting this one in just under the wire.

from WinCustomize Forums
Icon 10 (Hard Drive)

    Ok, so it's 11:10pm and if I don't get this posted to my Icon-A-Day plan will be in tatters. I wanted to do something special today since it is the 10th Icon. So I decided to do the hard drive icon. In the last few packs I have done I have done a modified hard drive with a window in it. Now it seems everyone is doing that so I figured I would do something different. I noticed that all the my External Hard Drive icons show up the same as internal drives in Windows. So I thought I would try that as our drive.
 
Step 1:

This icon is going to be almost entirely made of Mesh fills. First thing I do is mock up the basic concept, with a few Mesh Rectangles.

 Step 2:

Then I start "Sculpting" the meshes. Check out the Mesh Fill 101 Video for details on this technique.

 Step 3:

Now I start adding the bevels that will make the drive enclosure match our folders, and My Computer icon.
 
Step 4:

Once I have worked up the shapes to mostly what I want, I copy the side of the drive, Fill it grey, and give it brush transparency.


 		 Step 5

Now I want the drive to have a cord. I do it quickly with a mesh fill; all state lines, and delete my original line.


 		 Step 6:

Now I give the mesh a fill of black with some gray highlights, and smooth the node of the mesh to make it look more like a cord.
Step 7:

Now we add the Reflection. This is a bit harder this time because I have to do more skewing and messing with the image to make it fit properly.
I also pull a quick shadow off the cord.

 Finished Icon Image.

Download Finished Icon Here

Now we have a Hard Drive icon, and further established our metallic style, as well as give ourselves something to inspire the rest of the drive icons.
Once more: For a better idea of how I did the mesh's in this icon check out the Mesh Fill 101 Video.

Read the other Icon-A-Day Articles: Icon # 1, Icon # 2, Icon #3, Icon # 4, Icon #5, Icon # 6, Icon # 7. Icon # 8. Icon # 9.

CorelDRAW for Skinners videos: Mesh Fill 101, Gloss 101.

And don't forget to check for all the Icon-A-Day icons as they get made, in the Miscellaneous Icons Gallery at Wincustomize.com

icons
28,164 views 11 replies
Reply #1 from WinCustomize Forums Top
someone needs to make a case like that
Reply #2 from WinCustomize Forums Top
ooooooooooh...pretty.....
very nice
Object Desktop - Get all of our enhancement utilities in one suite
Reply #3 from WinCustomize Forums Top
This is the best HD icon I have ever seen, seriously.

And the whole pack begins to remind me of a modern version of D.O.T (for the dozen or so people that remember those).

Paul : Next series of tutorials : Doing a WindowBlinds skin going with these.
Reply #5 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Paul, Stunning work mate, can I ask if you are making a series of HDD,FDD,CD Writer, DVD Writer, Network HDD & USB Memory Keys(Subtle Hint) I have been looking for a set of stunning icons for my Drives for Object Dock Plus....
Reply #6 from WinCustomize Forums Top

jvenables, I should cover all of those in this pack.

Reply #7 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Excellent work Paul. Again, most impressive.
Reply #8 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Oh no - where are the pictures? I see broken image icons...
Reply #9 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Good! But, can i do some nice-looking icons with GIMP 1.2 ? i'm doing some internet explorer icons, but they are getting ugly .................
Reply #10 from WinCustomize Forums Top
You can do Nice Icons with MS Paint if you have the talent and Time. But yes I am sure you can do wonderfull stuff in Gimp. I however cant realy help you with that. As I am a Vector man. But if you look around for Photoshop totorails, you should be able to make a translation of most of the tools to Gimp, since they are more simaler in nature then Corel and gimp.
Reply #11 from WinCustomize Forums Top
The deal with the GIMP is that it is mainly what it says it is: a Image Manipulation Program (that's the IMP in GIMP). You can use it for creating things, but it mainly is for modifying images made elsewhere. A great free vector drawing program is CreatureHouse Expression 3.3b which can be downloaded from Microsoft (MS just bought it) and can be found here: http://www.microsoft.com/products/expression/ If you want to go the open source route then try Inkscape (inkscape.org) but as far as I can tell it does not have as many features as Expression.