In my previous articles I mostly dealt with the matter of how to draw. Certainly there may be some reader who is plagued with a question: why not a word has been said about what to draw? I apologize to this reader, and correct my mistake.

What to draw? How to find a metaphor? From where to pull an idea? An icon remains the icon until it is readable, recognizable, understandable. If you are an icon designer you don’t have a universal excuse “It’s my view!”. If your customer is silently watching your creation like a hen watching a Faberge egg then try to turn all thing into a joke before he or she asks you any further question.

The process of inventing a metaphor can be very long and very painful, and often it is a staging point after which you may sigh with relief and relax for a bit. Some designers run into this process and catch every idea they spot around, others are thinking slowly and consecutively, sometimes with a face full of sorrow. But the result has a great chance to be dumped in case if the preparatory work hasn’t been done.

Before you sit and invent the idea you must be sure you understand your task, conditions and goals. Once again, the designer’s work is utilitarian. Like a cook who starts with buying products, finding a recipe, counting a number of guests and checking if anyone has any allergies, the designer should take similar steps before he actually “cooks”.

So, what you should think about before inventing the Idea.

Size

It has been a sweet time when icon sizes ranged between something small and something tiny. But now it’s gone. Icons know no limits these days, either hiding into several pixels, or filling almost the whole screen.

Why does it matter?

• the smaller size you have, the lesser variants you can choose from. You can’t fit a piano keyboard with 88 keys into 16 pixels.
• the smaller size you have, the more strict requirements for icon readability you have to follow. (but as a benefit you can decide in favour of simplier metaphor instead of puzzle over something more creative).

For example: we want to make a xmas presents icon.

A big icon lets us draw Santa, and his red nose, and his sack, and there is even a room for a couple of deers.	A small icon can only handle a sock.

Context

An icon is a part of an interface and therefore must meet the requirements of the environment in which it is built. Context wants something round — then be round. Environment wants something bright – then glow! Neighbourhood requires sweetness – add some sugar, honey!

That is, if you create an icon for the site of mattresses and pillows it makes sense to bypass the scope of ideas, in which we draw a cup of coffee on “about us” section.

Activity

A very important parameter, which for some reason is often not even taken into account.

What does your icon do? What action does it commit?

• When it describes or reports something - more attention should be given to image itself and it’s details.
• If it calls to action – you should focus on the active component.
• If it prevents or prohibits something – then it has to to be a bright, visible, instantly recognizable.
• If it makes advances or entertains - then you have an open space for imagination and innovative solutions.

For example, the similar metaphor looks different in different cases:

Icon for «Our service».	Icon for «Call service»

Another example. What would you put into icon which is intended to say: “Please don’t walk along this house, because there are some builders working on the roof and they are well known for dropping bricks”?

Would your icon look like this?	Or like that?

It may seem that all these preparatory stages are redundant limiters, which only hamper the brain and prevent you from bathing in ideas. And what about brainstorm rule that is “no rules” actually?

Do not hurry with conclusions. These “restrictions” instead of braking minds build a track, which will help us not to go round and round the deserted field, but bring us to the correct metaphor straight and smoothly, and with hardly any traffic lights.

How to go there — will tell you in a second part.

Denis Sazhin
Iconka.com