Avatars, Signatures, And CS's Oh My!

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Avatars, Signatures, And CS's Oh My!

Postby Traverse on February 13th, 2014, 1:48 pm

Hrm...let's see.

So I learned a couple things about type in school, one being that their is a width for text that is more comfortable for the eye to read (or scan along), which is why books are arranged as they are. This fits into why I enjoy boxcodes more because you can control this aspect. Reading non formatted text I don't have much of a problem with, but sometimes aesthetic pleasure aside its arrangement isnt the easiest to get through which makes the boxes anywhere from 550-650px wide nice in that respect. Elsa's post is a good example being non formatted but also doesn't sit as wide across the screen.

As far as avatars go I always feel weird when someone doesn't have one. Vick, I can totally get your reasoning for putting off having one, but I absolutely love that little creepy kid you have as an Ava now. Like Timshel mentioned its that first glimpse into a PC's character, most likely taking place before you've learned anything about them, so when its blank, as a visual person, I'm always a bit bummed.

On the flip side of it I'm always excited about Avatar's I recognize. It bugs me a little bit when you pick someone uber famous, but I'm always willing to give a writer the chance to create a new entity of their character. Like Simon and River Tam from Firefly are running around the site, and coincidentally are both Vantha, but not sibings, that makes me smirk because it allows players to connect on a shared interest outside of just the love of roleplay.

Hrm...rambling, well I think that was all my thought process on the matter, but I really enjoyed hearing about everyone's thoughts.
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Avatars, Signatures, And CS's Oh My!

Postby Matthew on February 19th, 2014, 3:55 am

I tend to dislike a population of pretty people, but I think all RP sites do that. And really, dislike is a bad word. It just makes me chuckle a bit, I suppose. Funny, coming from me with the somewhat sultry avatar I have. I worked hard to give Matthew a reason to be beautiful. He even wears makeup and hair product!

I know, excuses excuses.

But still, I haven't fully read this thread yet because I am sure that I am painfully guilty of more than a few pet peeves that will be mentioned.
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Avatars, Signatures, And CS's Oh My!

Postby Shijara on March 28th, 2014, 7:09 pm

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This is hard for me to really answer, but I'll do my best. First off, I want to discuss the boxcode/siggy opinion.

I am a very visual person, and I do enjoy a good box code and/or siggy. It grabs attention, yes, but I think it shows not only the personality of the character, but also the player. I've recently learned how to stylize my own and so I'm kind of an advocate for them since I'm finally creating some I like. I've also been working on a few for other PC's. I'm not sure if what I have now is considered "too big" or obnoxious, or whatever, but I like it. I apologize if it slows down anyone's computer or anything. That's not my intention.

Now, continuing on, for beautiful play-bys or what have you... I am guilty of this. HOWEVER, although my character(s) might be models, they do not revolve around their looks. People are drawn in by first impressions, so if they want to rp with me because of how attractive my character is, so be it. Just know, you might hate their personality because their looks do not define them.

Shi has Chaktawe eyes. I think she's beautiful but not everyone does. I think this is both a huge physical flaw and bonus. Kol is attractive (... and tall. OTL), but for the purpose of showing that he's not what he looks. He can't talk to people (women especially) and is actually pretty respectable and submissive in terms of certain people (such as his sister). I think his appearance added a good contrast and made him more interesting.

And as for Navyri, she is beautiful. She's gorgeous, actually. But she's also a bitch (excuse my French). She's half Epyharian, so I wanted her to be obsessed with her looks. So while people might find her appealing to look at, they will most likely hate her personality. She also pushes those away so I don't use her looks to enrapture male PC's. That's not her purpose. I wanted her to grow into her appearance, making her inside match her outside through trials. Or perhaps mar her in some way that would make her question herself and go through internal struggles.

Also, when writing my CS, I tend to be fairly vague, focusing on their racial features, dress, and attitude more so than their breasts or rippling pectorals. It's important to note that while my play by might have make up on, or good hair, in posts, if they're in dirty clothing, or their hair is matted, I write that. They're not flawless and I will never pretend that they are.
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Avatars, Signatures, And CS's Oh My!

Postby Xira Hezmek on March 28th, 2014, 8:27 pm

My biggest pet peeve is when people use "width" instead of "max-width" in their style code. Especially when the width is over 650px. I browse Miz on my phone 80% of the time. It is easy to spot box codes that don't shrink down for mobile browsing and it forces you to scroll sideways to read the full post. Incidentally, swapping out for "max-width" makes no changes to your box code.

Other than that, Avatars, signatures, CS's and threads are all groovy for me. :)
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Postby Gale Austin McCenry on March 28th, 2014, 10:35 pm



Alright, I have to put in my two cents on this. (I might have gone a little overboard on this, sorry)

So, let me start with this. I am almost entirely visual person. I cannot learn something unless I see, I cannot get motivated to do something unless I see the ending produce. I don't know why this is, but it just is. My inspiration to do anything is entirely based off of what I see, so if I can't picture my room clean, I likely won't clean it. I can't make a signature or boxcode if I can't see it already. I have a very hard time doing it, because I draw what I come up with from my imagination. So inspiration to write, for me, is entirely from what I am picturing is happening.

Given that, I have an extremely hard time getting motivated to write with someone who has a crappy avatar, box code, or none at all. When they don't have an avatar or picture or something for me to look at, I just can't write with them, or when I do, it's very bad. I don't care if it's a framepicture with a frametrans with a simple background pattern, as long as it reflects your character in someway that I can look at, it's at least something. But once you strip that away, I just can't do it. I almost never read a CS if there isn't some sort of Aesthetic, even if it's just the city template. It simply distracts me too much to read it and really, I have better things to do than to read a CS or a post that no one put anytime time into to make it look at least decent. So basically, for me, if you don't have any sort of aesthetic at all in your stuff, it will take a lot for me to thread with you. Doesn't mean I won't, but it'll be hard.

Secondly, as far as famous character models go, I can tolerate them more than some people, I think, because one: I hardly know the names of any famous people except a small handful since I'm not into celebrities personal life and stuff or anything. Two: when I'm on Mizahar, I tend to drown out the real world. Yes, I'd probably go 'Oh, it's that actor' or something, but it wouldn't make anything more complicated for me. The only time when it bothers me is if it's someone that I personally hold as a celebrity among celebrities. Like, if you go around using Jack Sparrow (or simply Johnny Depp) as your character model, or Sheldon Cooper or Will Smitth, just no. I will just picture your character as a weird, drunk, clever pirate or an annoyingly smart scientist or an epic badass action person who fight's Zombies and robots and helps men get their true love. I will think that the entire time, so when you do something different than what that character does, I will be confused and lose focus.

But if you use someone that's not one of my biggest heroes, then I'm usually fine. However... However, I question your effort if you use any famous person. I tend to think that someone who uses a famous person as their character model didn't put that much time into actually thinking about their character than others who search more for their character model did. For me, it took friggin weeks to find Oliver, Gale's model. I put so much time into finding him and making Gale entirely what I pictured that I get a little mad when someone uses a famous person. This is because they didn't spend weeks finding their model. They just typed in the actors name and loads of pictures come up and they don't have to do almost anything to find what they want. When someone is too lazy to find the right model, for me, it tells me that they were too lazy to think about anything about there character and it was just thrown together. Though, usually, I can push past that and actually consider the character, but really, that just makes me mad. It annoys and frustrates me.

As for anime, I really shouldn't get started. When someone uses a anime character as their model for their PC, especially a popular anime character, I just- aaaaugh, that pisses me off soooo much. Because, like I said, my inspiration comes entirely from what see, so if I'm threading with an anime character, I will literally picture Gale, a real person, talking to a cartoon/anime. Then for me, it turns into something like The Space Jam with all sorts of whacky stuff and then I can't take anything in that thread seriously. It just pisses me off and I can't stand it, so, I'm sorry if I offended any of you anime users, but I'm being completely honest. I will still thread with someone with an anime character if they asked, but I won't be too happy about imagining the thread.

Alright, as for having 'pretty people' for their characters, I feel like there is just too much complaining about this. Okay, so most people here choose 'beautiful' models and such. But so what? What do you want everyone to do? Just choose a random person who's not as attractive? No, that's not going to happen. I think it is because people who aren't models or actors and stuff don't have pictures! Just think about this for a moment, okay, have you ever seen more than 2 or 3 decent pictures for any average person on the internet that you don't have to search months for? No. Maybe one or two pictures per person, and those pictures are usually bad quality. Therefore, all the people who have multiple pictures of at least decent quality are models, actors, famous people, etc. Also, not everyone says their character is 'beautiful' either. Not every character that has a nice models says they are as handsome or beautiful as the sun or anything. I've seen a good handful of people who use attractive models for their character but are written and portrayed as an average person.

I mean, yes, it bugs me when someone is portrayed overly sexy or attractive in their avatar or box code, like with their breasts hanging out out or with a guy showing off his six pack, but if someone is attractive in their avatar,it doesn't really matter. Besides, many of us, looking back in this thread, said we are visual people, and therefore, which one are you going to look into first? Someone with an ugly/average character model? Or someone who has an attractive model? I know I would look at the attractive model first because that's just more visually pleasing than someone who uses a less than attractive model. It's just how it works. You can complain about how everyone in Mizahar is beautiful all you wants but you know it's true for at least most of the players on this forum. You can't hide that. An attractive model attracts your attention more so therefore, they are more likely look you up or thread with you.

Another subject that I've been seeing is people talking about their appearance in their CS and threads. I try not to focus too much on how Gale looks, both in his CS and his threads. Besides telling you what he is wearing or anything else that might have change from thread to thread, you can figure out what Gale looks like based of his pictures. That's what I put them there for. For you to look at them and know what he looks like without having to read five paragraphs about how he has high cheeks bones or any of that. So, basically what I'm saying, it kinda ticks me off when someone writes an essay on their appearance alone, especially when they have pictures telling you exactly what was written. If they have a tattoo or gnosis that's not in the picture, or something you think is important to add like how your character typically keeps their hair, then sure, go ahead and write a little about it. But please don't write five sentences on how your nose looks (or breasts) or anything that we can simply see in the picture. It's repetitive and very annoying.

So, I just wanted to say that, yes, I do judge people on what their avatar is and their CS and stuff, though I am seriously working on trying to have it be less of a problem. But that doesn't mean none of this ticks me off. So, there you guy. There's my two cents.
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Avatars, Signatures, And CS's Oh My!

Postby Gossamer on March 28th, 2014, 10:36 pm

This thread isn't about removing box codes and signatures. This thread is about limiting the hellish sizes we keep seeing. There is seriously some kind of arms race going on about who can have the biggest and they are out of control. I'm going to limit their sizes. It's not if, its when. I just want to know what you guys think are good limits. I've already asked the moderators. Now I'm asking the PBASE. This will mean that about half of you out there will be asked to cut your codes down.
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