[Private Project, WIP] Modern Custom Emojis

[aFrInati0n]

Hey community,

the old Emojis may have reached their iconic status since long, I still wanted to test for the possibilities of creating a modernized version.

As I finally had time for a little side project, I want to share you the current WIP status & ask for opinions:

1. What is your honest opinion?
   (I am open for any feedback please, the critical ones are most of the times the best!)
2. Does the shape of the head fit a rough estimate of a Minifigure head?
   (I did intentionally not want to have a 1:1 copy, because of IP issues)
3. How do you like the gradients, creating the impression of some visual depth?
4. Some faces are not always a 100% fit towards the brick-heads - how much do these details annoy you?

Please be aware that is is currently just a free-time-project of mine with the main interest of improving my Python programming skills & create at least something useful from it.. ;)

Here is the current selected set of new emojis as SVGs:

 

[SpacePolice89]

I like these and they would be a great addition to the old ones and I'm totally fine with the head shape but please don't remove the old ones.

[aFrInati0n]

Thanks for the feedback & I have the exact samefeeling that they may not ever be considered a replacement for the old ones -  as some possibly useful outcome has been produced from my PoC I wanted to ask for opinions - I have not planned to replace anything at any point please.

But we may have more additional options in the future. 

One more sentence possibly for my motivation: The forum vendor has implemented the so called Twemoji library (Open Source, from former Twitter) & as the emojis are offered as vector graphics (can be scaled without quality loss), I wanted to test how replacements of the vector graphic elements may work in programmatic ways and what level of outcome could be achieved.

[idlemarvel]

Great idea. Can we have a forehead-slap one please!

[aFrInati0n]

Unfortunately the base of Twemoji does not offer that face..

All original available Twemojis can be check out here: https://allsvgicons.com/pack/twemoji/

 

So I would consider the finding of "some expected faces missing from the whole stack of emojis on that library" -> meeeh - but it is a good spotting haha, thanks for pointing that out.

[Jack Sassy]

A lovely idea! I do like some designs more than others but that just be my bias. The shape does seem a lot more stretched in comparison to a casual minifigure. Good work either way! 

[Murdoch17]

No offense meant, but personally I prefer the current ones... something about a human hand on a minifig head (like in the examples above) just seems unnatural to me! 

Edited July 19 by Murdoch17

[Sven J]

Nice work.
But, honestly, like @Murdoch17 I prefer the old ones. Not only for nostalgia, but also because I think the new ones are too detailed (especially with the shaded sides), which might make them hard to distinguish on small screens.
After all, the basic idea behind emojis is to express a feeling with minimum graphic effort.

[Toastie]

2 minutes ago, Sven J said:

After all, the basic idea behind emojis is to express a feeling with minimum graphic effort.

I am with @Sven J and @Murdoch17 on this one. Why? Because I am already mentally swamped with the good old ones.

And I love the pirate emojis because I enjoy (and pursue) my personal and romantic myth interpretation of piratry 

When the old ones are still available, add whatever comes to mind. But then a search function would be good.

Best regards
Thorsten

   

[Agent Kallus]

These are a fun idea but really they are just emojis slapped on a minifig head, they don't have as much soul as the ones here. And some like shushing one or the sideways laughter are quite cursed.

[aFrInati0n]

Thanks for all the opinions already - those are verifying my believes of the old ones being recognized as iconic already!

@Murdoch17 I can agree to the hands not really fitting in some cases - I appreciate the feedback as I wanted to hear exactly such details coming to other peoples' eyes.

 

Again, this is just a private project to improve my IT skills in some domains - there are and will be no plans to replace the old set of emojis!   

 

19 hours ago, Agent Kallus said:

they are just emojis slapped on a minifig head

for the obvious visual outcome very true, technically it has been some steps already:

1. Creating an SVG in the shape of a Minifigure Head
2. Creating a script which is deleting the correct background shape elements
3. Take the remaining faces and slap them over the Minifigure head
4. Finally apply gradient layers over the combined SVG to allow the slight 3D-impression

So for me it was mainly the technical topics of finding ways to achieve it for allowing us to come to the conclusion "not so well looking" 

@Sven J The gradients for the 3d-Impression could easily be removed - and I agree it may get ugly when emojis consist of too many details for not easily getting their meaning. This is another form of art I would believe.. 

If you like I could create another set without the gradients / 3D effect for comparison.

[Ben S]

I agree with the rest, I prefer the old ones. These are also cool, though. Could be an addition. Cool Python project! 

I'm fine with the shape and gradients. Some of them look a little weird. Maybe making the emojis a little smaller and centering them on their heads would make them look better?