retro_icontest | Round 26 - somein30

tinny posting in

I finally managed to send neonspider a message, and while they sadly didn't respond, now enough time has passed that we can use a challenge from somein30! Several people have suggested somein30 before, and I loved the comm as well, so it was only a matter of time. I picked my absolute favorite round from the comm - and the one that means the most work for me, meeep. Be patient with me! <3

This challenge was originally posted to somein30 in March 2021 here.

I had to change a few minor things related to the randomized sources, but wherever it said "my collection of" and that meant neonspider's collection, you'll now get something from my collections (of textures, songs, etc.). Wherever I used ~~strikethrough~~ or "ETA", those are the changes I made to the original post.

Challenge Post by neonspider

This challenge is based on my favorite thing: randomizing! There is no inspiration post this time, since everyone will have their own unique set of inspirations. Request a set of prompts, and you will receive a list where each theme is randomized in a different way. Please read through these explanations carefully, I know it's a lot, but there are important instructions on how to use the randomized items here. The categories are:

1. Random character: Make an icon of a randomized character, with no other characters visible in the icon.

The character is randomized from a fandom you've made at least one icon of previously, so you should in all likelihood at least know who the character is. Some of you might get unlucky and get a character from a fandom you've only made request icons for, or stopped watching before the character appears. In this case just use Google to check what the character looks like so you can find images. Let me know if your character is impossible (not jus hard but actually literally impossible) to icon for some reason: galleries/zips no longer exist anywhere and not even Google search gives you images to use, or maybe the character is incorporeal or doesn't actually appear in the show but is only mentioned. Characters are randomized based on character tags used at Archive of Our Own, so your character could be anyone: a main character, a side character, a side character's mom, literally anyone.

2. Random icontest challenge: For this theme you'll get a link to a past challenge at ~~an icontest~~ retro_icontest, and your task is to make an icon that fits the challenge.

Obviously these are past challenges so don't post your icon to that community, the idea is just to use the theme of that challenge to make a new icon. The icon should fit the specific challenge but doesn't have to fit the idea of the community itself (for example, if you get a challenge from a fandom-specific challenge community, your icon doesn't have to be from that fandom.

3. Random praise: Normally you make icons first and get comments for them later - this time it's reversed, you get a praisey comment first and have to match whatever is said in that comment in your icon!

I've collected ~~all the~~ some positive comments from previous rounds of

turbo_rumble - it's a great source of good anonymous comments, since a lot of them are detailed. So for example, you might get a comment praising the coloring of the icon -> this means coloring chould be the main focus in the icon. Some comments go to more details, and you should try to match all those details; for example, if the comment is "great use of circles in the composition", you'll need to somehow use circles in the composition. The comments may be modified a little to remove unneeded things such as fandom-specific notes, anything the commenter says about themselves, or concrit parts. Note that the point is NOT to find which icon the comment was originally for; the idea is to make a completely different icon that could earn the same praise, so it's best not to even know what the original looked like.

4. Random screencap: A screencap randomized from all the entries at capspiration rounds 2 to 6 at

screen_icons (which also uses capspiration as a cap source).

Capspiration is a great source for screencaps that are preselected to only include good screencaps (to the poster's standards anyway). You'll be given a link to a random ~~post~~ cap there. You'll need to make an icon using that screencap. Blending with other caps is allowed. Posts with broken links are excluded.

5. Random song: A random track from my music library to be used for inspiration.

I have a huge music library of almost 5000 songs with a lot of different genres, mostly focused on pop/rock, but there's a bit of everything. I'll skip instrumentals and non-English songs, because I want everyone to be able to use lyrics if they choose. I tend to buy full albums instead of just singles, so most of these won't have music videos. Even if yours does, please draw inspiration moreso from the song itself than a possible video, to make things fair for those who don't get a video. You could draw inspiration from anything: the lyrics, the mood of the song, or even just one specific line, and make an icon of any fandom with that inspiration (so just to clarify, the point is not to icon the artist, although that is allowed too ofc). I won't include any over the top NSFW tracks, but I also don't have time to make a check for trigger warnings or explicit lyrics warnings, so click on these at your own risk, or check if Spotify has it classified as explicit.

6. Random tutorial: A random Ask the Maker tutorial to be used for inspiration.

icon_talk used to host Ask the Maker, a fantastic annual activity where people could request tutorials. [ETA: I also added more recent tutorials from

icontalking.] You'll get a random tutorial to use as inspiration. Most are tutorials for individual icons, but there are also general guides, resource recs, and even some basic q&a posts. I'll try to check that the majority of the images are still showing. Read the tutorial and see what speaks to you about it. Don't just follow the steps excactly, that leads to a copy. The point is to take inspiration from SOME part that grabs you - maybe the maker did the base prep differently than you're used to, maybe they used a tool you don't use as much, maybe it's just a philosophical thing about how they picked the cap or composed the icon. I don't want to see any icons that look like copies of the tutorials since that is very disrespectful towards the person who wrote it. NOTE FOR NON-PS USERS: most tutorials are written for some version of Photoshop. If you use something else, you won't be able to copy the steps excactly, but as stated before, that is not the point anyway. Some part will probably be translatable to another software, even if it's just the order in which the maker did things. I could only make an exception and re-randomize if you get a "how to use this PS-specific tool" type of guide, and you don't have access to PS. Please let me know if that is the case.

7. Random movie poster: You'll get a movie poster from IMP awards and you'll need to use that as an inspiration for your icon.

Full credit for this challenge idea goes to

burntheflaws who hosted this round at

the7days, I'll use the same site and the same randomizing method.

8. Random inspirational quote: A quote randomized from here.

You don't actually have to use this as a text in your icon, you can just draw inspiration from the spirit/meaning of the quote, or just a random detail mentioned in it.

9. Random textures: You'll get three random textures and need to use at least one in your icon.

These are randomized from my own HUGE collection of textures. I'm giving you three options because makers have different size preferences when it comes to textures. One of these will be iconsized, one will be a larger square (usually between 200x200-500x500), and one will be a largeish texture of some other shape (usually what I call "Tumblr textures", but some may be wallpaper textures or other misc textures). Since I have a lot more icon textures where I know who made them, there will be two icon-sized textures and one larger texture.

10. Random font: Random font that needs to be used in your icon.

Randomized from the ~~1830~~ 2350 fonts I have installed. I'll give you a download link that seems to be free and working based on a quick look, but please let me know if you can't download the font or if it's behind a pay wall, I'll give you another link or another font. Please Google instructions on how to install once downloaded, this is system-dependant. Many of you will probably get system fonts that come preinstalled, so check if you already have it before you download! Obviously this icon needs to have text, but it doesn't have to be readable words; tiny text or just one letter for decoration is enough to fill this challenge.

11. Random trope: A trope randomized from TV tropes.

Read the page until you get the idea of what the trope is, and use the described trope as an inspiration in your icon. You don't need to icon a character/scene/media that fits the trope to the letter, you can also make a technical interpretation of how to represent the trope in your icon. (For example, if it's a gory trope, you don't have to icon a gory scene, you could just use blood textures or something).

12. Random remake: I'll randomize an icon previously made by you, and you'll need to remake it.

A remake can mean two different things: a completely new icon from the same screencap, or an icon that stylistically resembles the original but has a different screencap. Both of these interpretations are ok for this challenge.

13. Random song title: You'll only get the title of a random song, and you'll need to use this word or phrase as an interpretative theme.

Titles are randomized from ~~Discogs~~. Since I couldn't figure out how to use discogs, I now use https://random-song.com/. You won't get any reference to what the actual song is like, because this is not meant to be a song prompt, only the title is relevant. I won't include any titles that have proper nouns in them, because I don't want these to restrict your fandom/character selection.

14. Random inspiration icon: An inspiration icon randomized from ~~my massive inspiration folder~~

iconpraise.

The point is to use some aspect of the random icon as inspiration. Again, I don't want to see copies of these icons, or even your versions of them - I want to see new original icons that just have some hint of the inspiration icon in them.

15. Random palette: You'll get a random palette from ColourLovers.

You don't need to use the full palette, one color from it is enough, as long as the most visible colors of the icon seem to match the palette to some reasonable degree.

16. Random art: You'll get a link to a random work of art from Google Arts & Culture.

Use the visual style, colors, composition etc of this artwork as inspiration. Most of you will probably get paintings or drawings, but there may be some sculptures, jewelry, design items or even art installations included.

17. Random album cover: Use the cover art of an album randomized from ~~Discogs~~ as inspiration. Again, since I couldn't figure out how to use discogs, I now use https://random-song.com/.

It may be for any medium: CD, cassette, vinyl etc. You can use the typography, composition, colors or any aspect you like. A fair warning, just to prepare you... most cover artwork is really not that great xD Many are super basic and some are just hilariously bad. But even if you get one of the really bad ones, I'm sure you'll come up with a way to reuse some aspect of it to make a good icon. The point is to use this cover as visual inspiration to make an icon about any fandom you choose, NOT to make an icon literally out of this album cover.

18. Random book cover: Random cover of a book for inspiration, randomized from Goodreads.com.

Same warning as for album covers, when using completely random things it's unlikely for the best covers to get randomized, and some of these are baaaad. I will skip covers that are completely plain with only the title in a basic font (so, most printings of research papers and stuff like that). Still, both fiction and nonfiction are included. (Also please don't be upset if you get an offensive book, as there's all kinds of books out there... these are not my readings recs, just completely random books.)

19. Random word: A word randomized from here.

Another 100% interpretive prompt, icon whatever the word brings to your mind.

20. Random screencap pool: You'll get a link to an album of 10 screencaps from a show/movie you've made at least one icon out of, and you'll need to use at least one of these in your icon.

The reason I'm including an album and not just one random cap is because I don't know all the fandoms, so if it's just one cap, you might get a cap of a nameless extra. With an album of ten, you'll probably get at least a few caps of relevant characters. The fandom needs to have galleries available (the type that supports cap randomizing), so unfortunately obscure fandoms won't get picked for this. I won't be perfectionistic about the included screencaps because then this would take forever, but I'll leave out caps that are extremely blurry/out of focus, way too dark to see anything, and caps where the characters have an obviously extremely weird expression (a little bit weirdish expressions are fine since characters tend to speak and emote instead of just posing for the camera). From this pool you can use one or more caps in the icon, but no blending with any caps outside of this pool.

As always, you can make 5-20 icons. If you don't make a full set of 20, you can pick which prompts you want to icon - no need to fill these in order. The icons should match the themes 1:1, so only make one icon for each theme. Please mark clearly which icon is for which theme!

There are no separate modes for this challenge.

HOW TO REQUEST A SET OF THEMES
Reply to this post indicating that you want a set of themes. This is not a signup, so there's no pressure to finish a set even if you ask for themes. I'll need a link to your icon community or the tag you use for icons; this is needed for themes 1, 12, and 20.

For themes 1 and 20, I need to be able to randomize a fandom that you've iconned before. If you don't post your icons anywhere, if all your icon posts are locked, if your community contains virtually no fandom icons (only celebs and/or stock), OR if the used fandoms aren't in any way indicated in your icon posts, it will be difficult to randomize fandoms; in these cases I'll use completely random fandoms that could be literally anything. This is just out of necessity, I hope you understand.

For the random remake (theme 12) I'll need to find at least one icon of yours that is posted somewhere publically. If there are none, I unfortunately can't randomize this theme for you, so just consider it a freebie AC.

Use this form if you like:

After receiving your set of prompts, I'd recommend checking immediately that the links aren't broken or geoblocked.

I know what you're thinking, "there's no way you can randomize all of this in a reasonable time", but that's why I've prepared by ~~pre-randomizing a good amount of sets, I only need to fill in the prompts specific to your iconing history~~ randomizing some of the prompts, but by no means all.... So yes this is happening and it's possible! I hope you'll like this challenge, have fun with the randomness! :)

ORIGINAL RULES - for reference only

+ Create 5-20 icons for the challenge.
+ Icons must fit LJ standards (100x100px, gif/jpg/png format, 100kb or less)
+ All icons must be new and made specifically for the challenge
+ Post either a link to your icon journal post, or post the icons directly to this community (in a new post)
+ Each entry should have three example icons before the link or the LJ cut
+ If linking to your icon journal, the post must be public at least until the end of the challenge.
+ Please make an effort to look at and to leave comments to other participants' posts

NEW RETRO_ICONTEST RULES - mandatory

Consider the original challenge rules and try to stick to them in spirit. You have to request a set of random prompts from me!

+ you may enter as many icons as you like. minimum 1 icon.
+ submit your icons as a new entry into the community. if there are more than five, put the rest under a cut or a link to your unlocked journal post. tag your post with round number and your username (or ask me to tag it for you).
+ submit the URLs along with your icons. i'll only put the first five per person into the roundup post. either you only list five, or i'll take the first five.
+ make an effort to leave positive feedback on other participants' posts. <3
+ read the full rules here in our userinfo.

This comm generally runs from mid-month to mid-month every month, always ending on Fridays. There is no voting. I will make a roundup post containing up to 5 icons per person after every challenge.

Deadline for round #26: extended to Friday, May 23rd 2025 your end-of-day

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Round 26 - somein30 - All Things Random

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