Design/Motif

Welcome to the LibreOffice Design Motif page. A Motif Design called "Scatter" has been created for use with LibreOffice material. This is the Motif featured below, you can download a vector(SVG) or raster(PNG) version that you can use in your own Designs just below the table of contents.



FINAL MOTIF
Download a copy to use in Design materials:

Guidelines for usage
When using this motif in your Design material, please feel free to:
 * Scale/resize it (proportionally)
 * Move it to any location except behind the LibreOffice logo (unless at very low opacity)
 * Crop it/not show it in its entirety
 * Fade it/reduce its opacity
 * Desaturate it/use it in greyscale
 * Convert it to CMYK before using it in Print material

But please avoid:
 * Pinching/stretching it (horizontally or vertically, disproportionately)
 * Warping it / distorting its perspective too strongly
 * Re-colouring it (except when necessitated by a specific background-colour)

Following these guidelines should lead to a common visual approach and a general design integrating our consistent branding language - and furthering LibreOffice by public recognition on the first sight...

Examples
Nik made a first example with a postcard:

At the end of the day, the context you use the motif in will play the most important role in determining how it should be used. For guidance on implementing the motif, head to the Design mailing list.

DESIGN PROCESS
The remainder of this page is dedicated to documenting/archiving the Design process used to arrive at this Design. It remains here as a reference for the Design Team, you are not obligated to read the following contents to use the motif. Just enjoy it!

What exactly IS a Design motif?
For our purposes (it has other industry-specific meanings) a motif is a Design element that is used to bring consistency to a range of Design artifacts and sets a "mood" or "atmosphere" visually without taking up too much attention. It is a support element and should compliment the contents of every Design. As such, it usually takes the form of a background-image/vector. Some examples? ...
 * The typical (read predictable/cheesy) example is ornate flowery vectors
 * Here is a decent professional motif from Landor & Associates;
 * You might remember that OpenOffice.org had "wire gulls" as their background motif.
 * Otherwise, my personal fave is the Bahama's use of their irregular curved/cornered logo-shapes as a pattern

Members active in this discussion:
Bernhard, Christoph, Daniel, Ivan, Jaron, Nik, Paulo, Rob, Tobias

Preliminary schedule for Motif Design

 * Brainstorm ideas: Monday 21st February - Sunday 06th March


 * Design vectors: Monday 07th March - Friday 18th March


 * Voting: Saturday 19th March - Sunday 20th March


 * Revisions: Monday 21st March - Tuesday 22nd March


 * Finalised: Wednesday 23rd March 2011.

Purpose of this task
The production of a Design Motif will address a few current concerns;
 * Right now, Design elements are being borrowed on a case-by-case basis, a consistent Motif will reduce this variation


 * The Project Community needs resources to be able to produce professional looking Marketing material on their own


 * The Design Community needs resources which strengthen the visual communication of an identified "theme" (yet to be finalised)


 * A general abstract/ambient Design element is needed to replace the metaphor-specific elements currently used

What's next?
This task is now closed. If you need a hand implementing the Motif in LibreOffice artwork, just head to the Design mailing list:

You can [mailto:design+subscribe@libreoffice.org subscribe using this link].

If you need some information before you decide to join, this page might be handy;

https://www.libreoffice.org/get-involved/ux-visual-designers/

If you need to chat with someone about this, the Design mailing list is very friendly,

but if you don't feel comfy with that option yet, I'm all ears for a quick chat.

--Nik 2011-02-21T13:20:17 (CET)

Brainstorming
Paulo Jose AMARO's input (2011.02.20);

As a portuguese native speaker and english reader, the word Libre is easily recognized as Livre (Free, In freedom), and Office makes me think about programs related to the office work (not properly the "office" ambient, since in my language it's called "escritório" - very different). Flying in these concepts, I imagine a program that allow you do everything you want for a office job, or still a program that is not limited by nothing (have no limitations). Some concepts came from our Logo:
 * Freedom
 * Independenc
 * No limitations

Since these are some concepts achieved with the logo, we could focus the motif in other concepts we would like to express (of course, no forgiving these ones). As a recent member of this community, I think this project have the follow concepts to express:
 * History; This is a project with many experienced people, with a large historic of participation in StarOffice and/or OpenOffice projects. Now they are in the new LibreOffice, but his experience came from these past projects. LibreOffice is not a childish project.


 * Revival; Although its experience, the life led the OpenOffice people to start a new project, with new people, new face, new directions and fresh air.


 * People / Community; The most important thing in a open source project are the people. They are actually the project. The contributions, the opinions, the hard work, the personal growth, the challenges. All these things are lived by the people, not by the software itself. And the LibreOffice is one of the best examples.

An additional concept I strongly feel, but may be just me:


 * Imagination/Creativity; The white/empty paper in our logo gives me a huge desire to draw something in that, or writing a good text, express some crazy equations or everything else my imagination can create! It's a mysterious element which inspires me good feelings.

Rob CUMMINGS' input (2011.02.22);
 * Reinforcing the brand through use of color elements, namely green or thecorresponding color for the app.


 * Anchoring content space (cards, brochures, web pages, etc) with the use offull-bleed color bars on the left or bottom. For example, create a greenbar at the bottom of every web page and use the same thing for printmaterial.


 * Develop (or find one we can use) a web icon set with a distinct look thatreinforces the rounded corners of the logo clipped corner triangle. Paperclips, paper stacks, pencils, and other office-like imagery.


 * Develop other imagery (minor or less-formal logo) that can be used torepresent the project in a less formal manner. Eg. Coke vs. CocaCola, Chevyvs. Chevrolet, except visually.


 * Reinforcing the brand through the careful selection and use of typefaces, fonts, styles, weights, etc. and their specific uses, locations, functions, etc. (Rob CUMMINGS, 2011.02.22)

Daniel MERKER's input (2011.02.22);

The motif of this suite should attempt to bring in the color scheme of the individual programs into a cohesive product. I notice that green seems to be a predominant color for the website, but it also seems to be the main color of the spreadsheet program; furthermore, the color of main screen icon is blue (in the windows version at least) when that seems to be the color for the writer program. I guess what I'm getting at is that any banner or suite specific design/marketing device should have a consistent look that doesn't match any specific program within the suite.

Ivan MISKOVIC's input (2011.02.22);

I think we should definitely go for something abstract, as you sugested. The LibO/TDF logo is the (mostly blank) page, and thisconveys possibility: the page is a neutral space to project specificideas onto. Abstract artwork would allow us to show something moretangible than a blank sheet, but at the same time it would involve adeal of projection. Of course, my description of abstract artwork hereis pretty abstract in itself; more specifically, I'd suggest usinglight colors (for subtleness, using all application colors iftastefully possible) and something to do with the processes associatedwith documents and paper: typography, printing, layout/formatting,binding, etc.

Bernhard DIPPOLD's input (2011.02.28);

If we want to look at a utopia world, I would like to see a motif that covers
 * Freedom; freedom of choice, a free file format, freedom from computer and Internet quality, freedom to be used on every platform, freedom to be used by people without a large monetary budget.
 * Openness; open to all people by providing the freedom above, open to impaired people, open for improvements by free and proprietary additions, open for new single contributors as well as new language or platform teams, with an open mind and an open heart.
 * Security; secure to be readable in future times, secure from exploited leaks and bugs - or in a more realistic way: a security concept that closes all these issues in a very fast way, secure to be worked on in future - at least with the ability for everybody to keep on improving it.
 * Individuality; individual themes, personal choice of extensions, support on individual strategies to use the office suite - individualized start center.
 * Professionalism; professional quality, a reasonable choice for business and administrative / governmental usage, professional look and feel, professional way to handle alternative products.

Christoph NOACK's input (2011.02.28, update 2011.03.06);

I'm still thinking about the triangles that equal the document symbol edge. Those triangles can form repeating pattern that is altered by using filled triangles and "randomly positioned" triangle contours. The pattern can be used positively (e.g. hiding parts of the background), or negatively (e.g. showing parts of a otherwise hidden background element). The pattern may also be adapted by applying a color / transparency gradient, or by removing some triangles to e.g. realize some kind of "wave". The latter one can also be achieved/emphasized by non-homogeneous color for the pattern.

Please note that the graphics below are just for demonstration purposes - I think that my graphical skills might transport the idea, but nothing more :-)

Source file: 2011-03-06 DesignTeam MotifCreation Idea Christoph.svg

Tobias BERNARD's early prototype;



Daniel MERKER's early prototype;



Past/existing improvised motifs

 * the single triangle (like the bullet points on the website)
 * the grouped fading triangles in the left upper and right lower corner (from the start center)
 * Paulo's idea of five colored triangles sticked together in a vertical row (on his light banners in the donate button)
 * outer border with rounded corners and cut-off right upper corner (don't know if this really qualifys as motif, but it has an impact on the general visual impression)

Motif Proposals
Add your proposal here! Remember to describe what you attempted the Design to communicate.

And a context-image would be fantastic!

Technical Details
The image consists of 5 circles (with extremely soft edges) with LibO colors (generally the second strongest color for each application) using a 'soft dodge' blending style. Overall, it looks more like a linear rainbow gradient than 5 individual circles. A number of overlapping rectangles are laid on top of this with linear gradients going from low transparency to high transparency in varying degrees. Finally, a light texture is applied to the overall image to make it seem a tad more organic. It's a simple design, so it could easily be adapted for various uses.

The message
The overlapping rectangles signify the collaborative nature of the project while the crisp, clean lines signify the discipline that is required to produce a high quality office suite. The blended colors signify the fluidity of LibreOffice's concept of a document and the interactions between its modules.

Self-criticism

 * Colors might be too strong, could be arranged better
 * Texture should be better
 * It looks a little kitschy right now (probably because it looks too rainbow-y), but in the right hands with a bit of time and love it might be made into something more appealing.

Nikash SINGH
Just a few proposals, shown in context on an A4 letterhead. SVGs available on request. Some proposals continue the "corner" idea without re-applying "verbatim". Others try and hint at the connections between the "suite" of applications and the community that makes them. Most make reference to the paper document metaphor. In the order they appear; MessyStack, OpenBook, ApplicationCorners, DocumentFlower, FoldedPage, Scatter SVG source for scatter).

..

..

Scatter in-context update
A few people mentioned that they thought the "Scatter" Design above showed promise but wondered how it would fit in certain circumstances. I've made some further in-context preview images of how 3 variations of the Scatter motif (Bunch, Horizon and Stream) would look on a Letterhead, Splash Screen and on a Webpage (as per Christoph's request).

.

.

Daniel MERKER
Goal: While I do believe that the look should help show individuallity, I think it is equally important to show that the suite can work together to form a more impressive document. The motif should show how these applications can be blended together to generator interesting, novel documents.

Critiques: I wanted to stay with the approved color patellete, but the blended colors came out a bit drab. Also, the shaddow on the logo may make it look too busy.



Voting
The voting is now closed. Voting occurred between Saturday 19th March and midnight(GMT) Sunday 20th March 2011.

Alpha problem
The Motif uses complex Alpha transparency that is not supported in many vector formats so far attempted for export. The image below displays the problem;

The outcome on the left, as is currently achieved through the PNG format, is the desirable outcome. But currently, SVG and EPS vector formats only support binary transparency creating an unwelcome white "backing" for triangles which should appear transparent. If you can assist in exporting the file to usable SVG and EPS formats which support alpha channels, a vector version is available here in PSD format; http://tdf.nikashsingh.com/misc/ScatterWithTransparency.psd

Here is a further image documenting the alpha-problem not correctly rendering using SVG;

The SVG simplifies the transparencies present in the Illustrator file. Almost flattening this depth (but not completely, as can be seen by the subtle traces of a second layer of transparency on the bottom-half image). Here is a link to the SVG file; (preview inaccurate)

And for anyone wanting to get to the root of the issue, here is the only file (other than the PNG image at the top of this page) that contains the "intact/perfect" version of the scatter vector; http://tdf.nikashsingh.com/misc/ScatterWithTransparency.ai (Illustrator CS5 file).

Variants for Future Use
The following files are derived from the main motif "Scatter" and are intended for future use only. Please use the variante "Bunch" instead.