How I Designed My First Icon Set
I love illustrating animals as I have a special place in my heart for these gentle creatures. I also love to illustrate people as they pose as interesting subjects. I love to paint landscapes with a lot of details and colors.
So my first icon project at TravelTriangle came as a daunting task for me. Since icons are generally created with very simple geometric shapes with minimal detail and color, this project was a challenge for me and I had to come out of my comfort zone to try something new.
I remember as a kid I wanted to be a magician, then a cook. It took me time to understand that drawing could be a job. But I loved it and was always drawing as far as I remember. Even my elder brothers were drawing all the time and watching anime and reading comics. I never studied icon designing.
The challenge started from the day when I got this icon designing projects and I had to do a lot of brainstorming. I took a few existing icons and started refining them. At first, I tried to figure out problems related to the current icons and started thinking about solving it. I researched the same and collect relevant information. I had a word with travel advisors about the current page and how they deal with it in their daily work. After gathering a quick understanding, I came to know a lot more about the page along with the nature of the business and the real need for these icons. After this, I started figuring out the synonyms of the given words to create a visually appealing icon. This is when I realized that creating icons could be fun.
I learned a few techniques to create the icons for our Agent Dashed Board Page. I wasn’t familiar with this page and or the in-house stylebook for recreating an icon and its proper size. All I knew was that I had to create something very small, say 16 pixels, and should be recognizable even in its smaller size.
To understand the use and functionality of the icons, I did some research online and it helped me gather ideas for the designs that I wanted to create. I made a rough sketch for the icon and showed it to one of my senior colleagues and they liked it! That was a big relief as all I had to do now was to make the final design digitally using the grid and the first icon was ready.
Soon I became comfortable with my role as an icon designer, and I started to love the drill. It was fun to play within the constraints of shapes and stroke styles. To be a more effective design communicator, I immersed myself in tons of tutorials and articles from everything related to icon design and visual storytelling.
When we go outside of our comfort zone, we feel scared. I used to work on Photoshop more than in Illustrator. After joining this organization, I got time to explore this software and started investing more time in watching and understanding the program and its various uses. And it really helped me to deliver the work in an easier way.
Change is what keeps us constantly striving to be more than we are today. We are always searching for new ideas and challenges to bring change in our present life. So, whenever you feel unmotivated and bored in the design field, or simply want to try out something new, give icon designing, type design, isometric drawing or something else you haven’t ever tried before a go.
To move forward, improve ourselves, and not be stagnant is what matters the most. You have nothing to lose! You would never know until you try.
