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 Posted: Thu Mar 11, 2010 3:40 pm
It's common, these days, to see two and three-color avatars. They are usually a base and any number of accent colors. Most of the time, they look lovely and give a sense of matching.
But what about monotone avatars?
Personally, I think these rare occurences deserve more respect than their especially colorful counterparts. From personal experience, I know that it's difficult to create a full outfit out of just one color, especially when it's not black or white.
But, of course, my opinion isn't the only one. So I'm asking yours. Please post in here what you think about monotone avatars and how you think they compare to two or more color avatars.
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Posted: Thu Mar 11, 2010 4:42 pm
While I do know the difficulty of making a monotone avatar I consider it should be treated just like a matching avatar, that is all and every shade should be well distributed along the whole length of the avatar.
Just because they are all red (or any other color), doesn't mean you can mix and match whatever.
The other case is if you are trying to make a complete avatar that is a single tone. In that case, you should be very careful not to have slight differences in the shade and texture of your avatar because that can really make it look like a mess. So if you are using gold, don't use yellow and don't use Fremere's orange.
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Posted: Thu Mar 11, 2010 5:07 pm
¨*:·.♥.·:*¨
I can appreciate that they are difficult to make, but avatars made of only black and white are sooo annoying to me. I've made one, to be sure but I can't stand them. I've never seen one that blew me away with it's amazingness. Same with single tone avatars. I have done those also but mostly when I'm in a creative slump. Besides, most of the people I've seen who have single toned avatars never have a single tone. They have similar colors but not the identical color. I think I've seen one avatar pull it completely off. (I was impressed with her avatar. )
All in all, if someone wants to do one of those avatars, I don't care, as it's their avatar. I'm just saying I'm not going to be a fan of it.
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Posted: Mon Mar 15, 2010 8:57 pm
I don't think monotone avatars are bad. And when done well, they can be very eye-catching and neat to look at. Thing is, I see very few people actually pull it off. Most use items in hues that don't match because they're lazy, because they're apparently color blind, or because they're forced to since the right ones don't exist.
I believe that both the multi-tone matching and monotone matching styles are bound by the same thing: existing items.
If the needed items in a specific shade don't exist in the right shape or layer, then neither style will work.
*I'm going to say "multi-tone" instead "two or more color" just because it's shorter. :3
For multi-tone avatars, you have to work with multiple colors. Yes, you're working with less items. (As in, just enough to spread bits of one color in an area, not having to cover a whole area in that color.) All you really need to do is find three items in one color, three items in another color, and three items in some third color. You don't have to find enough items to fully cover an avatar. And heck, if you still have empty holes anywhere or if the color balance is uneven, all you have to do is add a fourth color to fill in spaces or cover other items to bring balance.
You just have to hope that the right items exist in the right shapes, sizes and layers. Otherwise, you're SOL.
For monotone avatars, you have to hope to find items all in one shade... and enough of them to cover the whole avatar. This isn't easy to do. But, I believe that the difficulty lies in the existence of items. Yes, you still have to have an eye for color and texture. You still have to search out the items. If there's a hole, you can't just add another color to fill it in. You have to hope that the right item exists... or hope that it gets created.
But... there's not much difficulty in plastering one color all around an avatar. It takes the same basic skill that multi-tone avatars need: Finding items that match. However, you don't have to worry about spreading colors evenly around an avatar. All you have to do is keep equipping items of one shade.
Good monotone avatars are hard to pull off. (In shades other than white and black.) However, if someone pulls it off, I don't believe it's due to skill. I believe they're just lucky that the artists have created enough items in one single shade and on all the right layers to cover an avatar. I think it's neat when someone pulls one off. I don't think it demands respect. I just think they're lucky that the right items exist.
So, though it may be hard to make a monotone avatar... I believe it's harder to make a good multi-tone avatar. Yes, some simple multi-tone avatars can be easier to make than monotone avatars... but if we're talking good avatars... then I believe that it takes slightly more skill to make multi-tone avatars. You have to get slightly more creative when trying to spread multiple colors evenly around an avatar.
(I'm not saying it's wrong to like monotone avatars. And I do not believe that anyone is less skilled for making a monotone avatar instead of a multi-tone avatar. It's just what they prefer. And I don't consider monotone avatars to be a bad thing at all. It's just like every other style... any good outfit in any style deserves awe. :} )
Years ago, I used to be very impressed by monotone avatars. However, that was back before we had skins. People had to get really fancy with masks and all sorts of items if they wanted to cover up an avatar's natural skin tone. We also have tons more items than we used to. This doesn't guarantee that the perfect items exist. And I'm not saying that it's easy to make a perfect monotone avatar. I just think it is easier nowadays than in the past for both mono- and multi-tone avatars.
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Posted: Wed Mar 17, 2010 2:12 pm
I guess it depends on your definition. A tone would be a single shade or else it makes no sense to compare the styles (in my humble opinion).
If you successfully achieved a mono-tone avatar that was truly monotone (very nearly the exact shade for every item) I would be impressed because it's difficult.
If you successfully made a matching avatar that was entirely blue but used several distinct shades of blue in a way that is as attractive and well-balanced as matching avatars can be I would also be intrigued and maybe impressed if it was good.
But if you slap on a pink body dye and a bunch of pink items of varying shades and make no effort to match the shades in any way I'm not going to call that either mono-tone or matching and I wouldn't be impressed unless (for some reason) you made it look cool in a way that didn't have a lot to do with the choice of using only pink (which I think would probably make it an entirely different style).
If you make a matching avatar with multiple colors but the shades match closely within the colors I will probably think it looks nice. I may even be impressed depending on what you did.
If you make a say red, white, and blue avatar but each blue piece and red piece is a different shade of their respective color and your "white" ranges from bleach to eggshell I wont be impressed.
So really they both have to do with tone. But only if you define tone as "shade" and not as "color."
A nicely shaded monotone avatar could be just as if not more impressive as a nicely shaded matching avatar because they're pretty much the same thing. One is a little more creative and one is a little more difficult to achieve. But most likely I'm going to be impressed more by "extenuating circumstances" than something that strictly adheres to a very structured style like matching or mono-tone.
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Posted: Wed Mar 17, 2010 5:37 pm
"If you successfully made a matching avatar that was entirely blue but used several distinct shades of blue in a way that is as attractive and well-balanced as matching avatars can be I would also be intrigued and maybe impressed if it was good. "
:3 This thought came to me while making my post too, so I just thought I'd comment. I consider that type of avatar to be matching, not monotone. I wondered what other people thought.
If someone made a perfectly balanced avatar using angelic blue, blue, and navy blue, I'd consider it to be a matching avatar. I wouldn't consider it to be a monotone avatar since, to me, monotone avatars should vary very little in shade. I know that the highlights and lowlights on items make it so that most items are not all one shade. And I do think it's those slight differences in color that really makes a monotone avatar look good. However, if the shades of the items used are far apart on the scale... welll... then to me, those avatars go in the "multi-tone" matching category.
...So maybe this is why I'm often disappointed by monotone avatars. I hold them to very high standards.
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Posted: Mon Mar 22, 2010 8:35 pm
I really enjoy monochromatics avatars if they are well done. Matching and flow are difficult to get right whether you are using one color or twenty.
I think they got a bad name from the massive amounts of poorly done black-white or black-white-grey avatars you can see around. Because as much as we wish it wasn't so, not all shades of black, white and grey are the same, especially on gaia.
While I find Black-White monochromatic avatars fairly boring, I think other monochromatic avatars are pretty stunning. They can really pop if you add in a bright shade of the color as either a base or an accent. Someone is traveling around the WG forum with a really great looking green monochromatic where she layers dark greens evenly over a light green base. I'll have to try to get a screenie of it.
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Posted: Tue Mar 30, 2010 5:36 pm
 Not a perfect sheet of black but the subtle shading is nice. I find this one at least a little impressive.
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Posted: Tue Mar 30, 2010 9:30 pm
Jace Quin Not a perfect sheet of black but the subtle shading is nice. I find this one at least a little impressive.
¨*:·.♥.·:*¨
I'll agree. Now I have seen two monotone avatars that I have enjoyed :p
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Posted: Wed Mar 31, 2010 5:54 am
I found that one in the AT, of course. If you can pull off something like that you're doing monotone justice.
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Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2010 9:34 pm
Jace Quin Not a perfect sheet of black but the subtle shading is nice. I find this one at least a little impressive. Wow, that's the first time I saw the huge Scarlet Mist hair being balanced well. As for single-colour avatars, I have to agree with you. They are harder to make than most people think. DX Most I see are lady-avatars with white hair and some white lolita clothes and the occasional neko ears, not much shade-coordination effort put into thar.
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Posted: Wed Apr 07, 2010 6:25 am
Ah. Apparently I somehow copied the media for their avatar instead of just the frame? I don't know. She had an interesting black one before.
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Posted: Wed Apr 07, 2010 7:25 am
If you copied the link to her avatar image instead of uploading it to a new url it does update when she changes her avatar.
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