Circles vs Squares: The Most Pressing Migration Concern

[redheeler]

Around the time of me asking (Friday evening, UK), the line was very noticeable – more than in @AngerDanger's example – for at least one person whose avatar was shrunken so that the user-preferred square appeared properly shaped within the MacRumors-preferred circle.

In weight and colour, the line of the circle was comparable to the dashed line that's drawn above by redheeler. What I saw were solid lines, and I thought that I saw those circular lines around the shrunken square avatar of more than one person. But it's possible that just one person intentionally drew the circular line around their square within a square. Unfortunately I didn't shoot the screen; I assumed that everyone could see the oddity.

The circular line was not visible around a square avatar when I reviewed this topic at 18:07 yesterday, with @Porco as an example:

View attachment 564863View attachment 564862

An optimistic guess: maybe the circular lines were transient whilst site administrators experimented with a combination of auto-detection plus shrinking of square avatars.

It looks fairly consistent in every browser I've tried. This is Safari 5.1.10.

Like @AngerDanger pointed out with the inconsistent outline on his avatar, there may be some rendering issues causing what you're seeing. Another reason that gray background should be removed (and different generic avatars chosen).

It won't appear where the avatar is shown as square, on user cards or profiles.

 

[grahamperrin]

… Safari 5.1.10 …

Yes, that's how it appeared to me; an unbroken circular line with a regular width. Maybe a little broader (more noticeable) when I saw it in Safari 7.x last week.

And now I see it in an earlier screenshot:

– but I couldn't detect a circular line around the square of @Porco with OmniWeb 6.0 test (v625 r219164) on OS X 10.9.5 (13F1077):

… I never even noticed it.

Please: what's your browser, version and platform?

Postscript

I wondered whether the circular line effect would appear in OmniWeb after logging in. Nope, looks good.

 

[Porco]

Hmm, the outline shows up in Firefox for me, but not Safari (I don't do Chrome).

Never had this issue with square avatars…

Incidentally depending on people's avatars the circles often look very harshly cropped on the left hand side to me, like some pixels or anti-aliasing is missing or something - I don't know if that's down to the formatting of the circular crop or the source image for the avatar or what… .

 

[maflynn]

Hmm, the outline shows up in Firefox for me, but not Safari (I don't do Chrome).

I just opened this thread in Chrome and I didn't see any gray outlines - Odd.

Never had this issue with square avatars…

Nor do I with circular avatars

Incidentally depending on people's avatars the circles often look very harshly cropped on the left hand side to me, like some pixels or anti-aliasing is missing or something - I don't know if that's down to the formatting of the circular crop or the source image for the avatar or what… .

This is less about square vs. round and more about image selection and proper size. I think if if you select what looks good at 200px it will look good as an avatar. Some experimentation may still be needed however.

 

[AngerDanger]

Incidentally depending on people's avatars the circles often look very harshly cropped on the left hand side to me, like some pixels or anti-aliasing is missing or something - I don't know if that's down to the formatting of the circular crop or the source image for the avatar or what… .

Oh, yeah, I noticed that too. It's pretty minor and, like the prominence of the gray background behind an avatar, seems dependent on the position of other DOM elements*. Resizing my browser window produced the following:

*check out the username above

 

[Porco]

Oh, yeah, I noticed that too. It's pretty minor and, like the prominence of the gray background behind an avatar, seems dependent on the position of other DOM elements*. Resizing my browser window produced the following:

View attachment 565150

*check out the username above

Yes, that shows what I was getting at exactly. Animated like that it makes it look like the dog is in a James Bond movie intro though, which is almost worth it.

 

[Porco]

*sigh*, I give up. I have decided to conform. I still think squares looked better though.

 

[redheeler]

*sigh*, I give up. I have decided to conform. I still think squares looked better though.

You lasted much longer than I did

 

[AngerDanger]

*sigh*, I give up. I have decided to conform. I still think squares looked better though.

It's about time, too; circles are much better. I realized that if avatars were meant to be—HELP—square, our eyes wouldn't be circular. And who even needs the option—ME—to not have their avatars cropped as they like? It's actually a feature when you think about how much more consistent—THERE ARE NO CORNERS IN HERE—circles are than squares somehow!

 

[grahamperrin]

Hmm.

Let's see what I can do with GIMP … oh, no, it's on a separate drive. Let's see what else is good, and readily available, for changing canvas sizes of things that were previously good as avatars :-(

 

[AngerDanger]

Hmm.

Let's see what I can do with GIMP … oh, no, it's on a separate drive. Let's see what else is good, and readily available, for changing canvas sizes of things that were previously good as avatars :-(

View attachment 567810

Whoa, you have an avatar. This is kind of… disorienting. Feel free to try out the attached Graham Perrin Sequence, which should get you something like this:

 

[grahamperrin]

Before the redesign

I had an avatar that looked nice enough elsewhere.

Now

Whoa, you have an avatar. This is kind of… disorienting. …

I have a head full of expletives, all of which are aimed squarely at the round-minded people who obviously have no concept of how frustrating it is to try, to fail to get something circular from what was previously a perfectly good rectangle.

Look, look at this mess after an hour of me trying –

– are you happy now, you people?

In the past, elsewhere, other people offered help with avatars. That was lovely, but now – making my first proper attempt to work with MacRumors Circles – I have developed a very low opinion of the design gimmick that makes me unable to help myself.

 

[AngerDanger]

In the past, elsewhere, other people offered help with avatars. That was lovely, but now – making my first proper attempt to work with MacRumors Circles – I have developed a very low opinion of the design gimmick that makes me unable to help myself.

That's quite irritating. I'd recommend expanding the edges of the original image with an app like AntiCrop and then centering the result in a circle. This really wouldn't be an issue if consistency wasn't valued over function. Circles are fun!

 

[grahamperrin]

https://forums.macrumors.com/members/?type=staff I can see that some members of staff have made an effort but – frankly – only five avatars have a smart fit, and one of those is the generic grey head and shoulders. So: congratulations, the four of you.

Hint: where it's apparent that some effort has been made, that's not necessarily smart. For me to view the end results as smart, your avatars must appear smart, at a glance, in a variety of situations, and the fit should appear:

1. natural; and
2. effortless.

OK so it's only a discussion forum, but the decision to abandon squares was design-oriented, and (for future work) @Audentio and others might appreciate some semi-honest feedback about what it's like, in reality, to be given circles as a starting point for someone who's not inclined to explete around with GIMP or Photoshop or whatever.

Semi … not entirely honest. Designers, if you had me with you now, face-to-face (or silently looking over my shoulder), there'd be strings of expletives, and I have confidence that you'd soon understand exactly why this is not fun for people who simply want a photograph (or anything naturally rectangular) to look reasonable without expleting around with software for iOS that can't be used on my Mac.

@AngerDanger thanks but as you can see, the reality of trying to adapt to the expletive circle has wrung the last, patient drops of moisture from my fun sponge. This circular gimmick makes me humourless.

 

[redheeler]

Optimization

I have really worked hard on my post-redesign avatar to get it to look nice in both circles and squares. I had to cope with the loss of space bought by the circles, and excess background space becoming visible when my circle-cropped avatar is viewed in square form.

I first experimented with different croppings, and afterward different methods of making less obvious the excess background space. I think I've finally settled on one I like and looks good in both circles and squares.

Adaptability

You're right, most people won't go to quite this much trouble to make their avatars work in circles. But you will still see plenty of:

• Avatars that look ok in circles without modification.
• Avatars that have been specially selected, cropped, or made for circles.

#2 is the key point here. Many avatars you'll see that don't look good in circles were uploaded before the migration. Avatars uploaded afterward were specially selected or cropped for circles.

Usability

I agree there are still many avatars that look better in squares or could take advantage of the extra space provided by squares. This is why I am still against forced circles.

-----
@grahamperrin: Your avatar seems a bit off-center. Also, at the risk of going slightly off-topic, what's with the number 405?

 

[maflynn]

– are you happy now, you people?

Avatars are not here to make others happy, they are a personal preference.

Hint: where it's apparent that some effort has been made, that's not necessarily smart. For me to view the end results as smart, your avatars must appear smart, at a glance, in a variety of situations, and the fit should appear:

1. natural; and
2. effortless.

What do you mean by "the end result as smart" as I said avatars are a personal representation, one that I feel I want to represent myself in the forum. I don't think it matters if it looks natural as long as I'm happy with it. I'm not quite sure what you mean by effortless either. I'm sorry but your post seems confusing to me.

 

[redheeler]

What do you mean by "the end result as smart" as I said avatars are a personal representation, one that I feel I want to represent myself in the forum. I don't think it matters if it looks natural as long as I'm happy with it. I'm not quite sure what you mean by effortless either. I'm sorry but your post seems confusing to me.

He's referring to having to crop/resize his particular avatar to fit in the the circle, which makes it appear a bit uglier.

 

[Zxxv]

squares , they look better, and beside everyone knows

 

[grahamperrin]

… what's with the number 405?

I'll explain later …

… as I said avatars are a personal representation … I'm sorry but your post seems confusing to me.

It was, admittedly, the restrained ranting of someone who simply can't get a preferred avatar to look good at MacRumors. When things are bad enough to inspire ranting, I don't expect everyone to appreciate/understand the big picture behind the rant.

I can probably help by offering screenshots of what I mean by appearing smart (smart as in, neat and tidy). Not intended to depersonalise anything, just drawing attention to the overall effect in some areas of MacRumors. Particular attention to how avatars appear when grouped in different ways. Screenshots later … and in the meantime, there's the link in my previous post; readers will either perceive the untidiness, or not.

To avatar creators/holders and other readers: don't take the criticisms personally and my third post, on page one, should be a reminder that I do like circles and other non-square shapes.

 

[maflynn]

He's referring to having to crop/resize his particular avatar to fit in the the circle, which makes it appear a bit uglier.

I can probably help by offering screenshots of what I mean by appearing smart (smart as in, neat and tidy).

Ok that helps, thanks for the clarification.

 

[grahamperrin]

Efforts

He's referring to having to crop/resize his particular avatar to fit in the the circle, which makes it appear a bit uglier.

Not quite. I don't mind making an effort, maybe multiple efforts spread across hours and days, if I think that the end result will be good.

I'll try to explain later.

 

[grahamperrin]

Quality and usability

… at the risk of going slightly off-topic, what's with the number 405?

For me, 405 was:

• for a television system with very high frequency radio waves
• years later, by coincidence, a membership number in a private area where quality and usability are close to paramount.

Usability, here, is very topical.

The televisions on page one were somewhat topical; there's something ancient about circles.

Off-topic stuff, including the spooky loss of power that switched off my TV during edition of this post, can be discussed elsewhere

Postscripts

Food for thought: in the early days, TV screens were circular. Then, typically, rectangular masks were applied to improve the experience; and those masks were typically provided by the manufacturer. The experience for the end user did not involve paper and scissors. As technology progressed, cathode ray tubes for TV became more rectangular. And so on …

… and unless I'm missing something, no modern Apple device uses a circular display. All such devices allow an individual's personality to be expressed without forced use of circles.

 

[AngerDanger]

Circular avatars present an interesting problem for certain images that are framed to completely fill their shots; any detail near any edge will be reduced in quality or cropped. The circular avatars seem to therefore encourage pictures of faces and inscribed logos, which wouldn't be so bad if everybody's previous avatars were removed.

It was, admittedly, the restrained ranting of someone who simply can't get a preferred avatar to look good at MacRumors. When things are bad enough to inspire ranting, I don't expect everyone to appreciate/understand the big picture behind the rant.

…

I'll admit, I took your preferred avatar and messed around with it in Photoshop, and the the results were… disappointing at the very least. It's a picture of a landscape oriented television, so it simply needs to be shrunk to fit inside the circle, right? Well, then you wind up with white space in addition to cropped corners. So you can synthesize edges by using a content-aware fill on the empty space, eh? No, the picture, like most pictures, is so closely cropped that any synthesized edges are irregular. Attempting to simply stretch out the edges produces a bizarre tunnel effect, which is just as bad.

I won't post corresponding screenshots unless requested to, but golly, that was annoying.

 

[LordQ]

Circles, looks more elegant in my opinion.

 

[redheeler]

Your current spinning wait cursor rainbow avatar is too circular, comrade. A spinning square might be easier on the eye. Joking aside …

An open mind

… seriously, some of the images below remind me that circular can be exceedingly cool.

Will circular stand the test of time; will the novelty wear off? Probably. But short term cool could be fun.

Anyway. Food for thought, about roundness in general. Few written credits, but do please click on any image to view it in context. None of what's below exemplifies an avatar, so it's potentially off-topic, however the intention (on-topic) is for some of the images to 'loosen' prejudiced aversions to rounded avatars.

----

From Out of the Unknown:







A nice idea, but not well-balanced:



Not nice; change (round) for the sake of change; the round is not a good fit for the naturally rectangular objects, and square check fabric spoils a potentially nice chair:



Lush, novel … ultimately abandoned:

…


Craftsmanship with enduring appeal:



From the first commercial television with a cost below $100:



In my early teens (Essex, late 1970s) as a schoolchild I worked part-time in a wonderful home electrical sales and repairs shop – Sound and Vision – where the not-for-sale gems included a magnifier similar to this, but with a Bush set (the icon TV12 or TV22 series):



Someone's vision of the future:



Flat (like, an Apple vision of the present):



Miscellany:





…



Sweet dreams xx although I must say, some of what's above is nightmarish. That thing with the palm tree, FFS …

Revisiting this thread I found your post hilarious. Good job finding all those images.