The interviewee of this edition is:

*Emotikonz      

  

opening words of the Artist:
"  Can't think of anything, and I know I'll be talking a lot in these questions, so--
Oh wait, got one.
Kadul () is not a bear. He is a 5-year-old (human equivalent) male European beaver from Russia. So please, no 'pedobear' jokes. No, you are not the first. Or even the dozenth.
(Just thought I'd put out some preventative measures.)  "
  

  

   Photoshop CS3. I used CS2 while at school, animating in the packaged ImageReady, but CS3 'merged' ImageReady into Photoshop and Fireworks, apparently. Which cannot open animated GIF files like IR could, so I use the GIMP to look at individual frames of other GIFs I don't have the *.psd files for.

I like Photoshop because of the layer system in animating, especially the 'propagate' effect, which makes modifications easier. In the GIMP, animating is done on a frame-by-frame basis so if you want to make an item slightly higher across the whole thing, you need to redo ALL the frames.   

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  Used to be , but they've since added , which can be better used in the same context I originally used the 'paranoia' one.

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    Shading - very important. In the old days, it was a gimmick, but now that emoticons actually turn you need shading to make your emoticons look like physical spheres instead of flat cut-out circles.

Size - I wouldn't have thought important, but I noticed my emoticons looked way better, cuter, and just... right when I went from 16² to 15². Of course, having to redo my base may have contributed.

Colour - not altogether as important. However, you should keep in mind that people link colours to emotions - both through school training and subconsciousness. Green and blue are soothing colours, often linked with freshness, calmness (and the latter with depression). Red and yellow are appetite stimulating colours, which is why food restaurants just love to use them (McDonald's and Burger King for example). Red also inspires confidence, and the emotions are usually red as rage, love, boldness and determination, and yellow as joy, hope, excitement and eagerness, and other positive emotions. Orange is a colour that provokes passion and inspiration but with no emotional ties, so I like using it. (Okay, I admit it: I did study colour theory and how colour affects the mind and emotions. I also admit that makes me a colour-nerd. )

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Yes, but the mostly don't understand. They still thinking of emoticons as (: on their cellphones and can't see how it could ever become an art form. My family 'gets' that they're more than that, but none of them particularly care to follow on what I'm doing with them.  

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  Most of the emoticons I make are for IMing, because when I IM I feel like an emoticon is needed to express a certain emotion or action. That's why a large portion of my gallery is the IMing set I made of my OC, which I make other IMing sets off (I saved the *.psd for them all and can swap parts out). There doesn't seem to be much interest in a giant pack of nearly a hundred complex IMing emoticons right now though, and the Panda pack is on the back-burner.

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   I don't feel like many people can truly be a good judge of themselves - all those failures out there that insist on making art/music/etc, and all those fantastic creators who feel ashamed to share their creations... I feel other people would need to inform you of how good you are. However, I have issues with patience - I have to complete them within one sitting across an afternoon or it will probably never be finished. That, and I have difficulty with animation, and getting it looking smooth. Studying the physics of moving objects helps with inertia effects on my text, but I could never match `CookiemagiK.  

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   I'm pretty good to my emotes, I think. The only one I believe would resent me is the one who will be, for the rest of time, continuously stabbed in the face by a duck.

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   I don't know. Sometimes I feel... not that it is 'fun', exactly. Like I'm not after the 'fun'... but instead I'm after the sense of satisfaction and accomplishment that comes from making something people like and use, that I am proud of.  

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I wish I could answer this, but anyone who knows me will know I am awful at making estimates. Combine this with my poor sense of time and any number I pull out of my ass is as likely to be as accurate as a genuine guess. Usually a couple hours to almost a whole afternoon, but I couldn't say which ones take the longest or for what reasons.   

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I honestly don't see why I should 'convince' anyone focus on an art form. I'd encourage them to try it, but if they're resistant that's their choice.     

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    Well, maybe stop 'revamping' the emoticons that already have a billion new versions and revamp one of the less appreciated ones. We already have way too many new s and s.    

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    Well, it sure helps, but what you really 'need' to capture an audience is subjective. Different things will capture different people --> [link] <-- Quality is favoured, but people really love emoticons that make them laugh, and emoticons that are fresh and new rather than recycled ideas.  

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   Cue my literal mind picturing invisible me breathing down ~Seiorai or `CookiemagiK's neck while they feel uneasy and their eyes flit uncomfortably across the room every couple seconds. Though I suppose if they did notice I was there, I would lament having to search through my favourites to remind myself how to spell 'seiorai' every single time I use it. I think she stole all of Wales' vowels...  

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I would explain the time and effort that goes into making something both expressive and small, show them example by the above two artists, and challenge them to make something even HALF as good. I don't care if they personally think it's art of not, but if they start arguments about it, that better be prepared to get them back.     

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     Though this was primarily a collaboration - only one of the emoticons are mine - I think the shield and ship turned out amazing. Probably because I actually bothered to search Norse shields, Norse ships, and modern space shuttles to give it a good final form. This is one of the works that took the longest.   

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    Emoticons fall primarily into two categories - artistic expression, or replacing real human expressions as an IMing tool. The first is art, straight up, and I can't see how it would fit into reality. The second will pale in comparison to an actual face. Though given my poor interpretation of tone facials, I WOULD like real faces to make their expressions as delightfully extreme as emoticons' are.   

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  I am often 'on hiatus', because I only make things when I am inspired by a truly great idea, and that isn't often. I never leave deviantART however - it's the 'Facebook' of my life. I check and recheck my inbox every few minutes (or ever hour if I'm doing something else) and it's the last thing I do before I log off and hibernate my computer. Therefore, there are several bizarre late night comments on deviantART's servers that show clear signs of my sleep deprivation.
  

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    How close-knit a large number of them are. Photographers, manipulators, fractal artists, etc usually only hang out  if they already knew each other first, or by debating on similar topics. But emoticonists get to know each other simply through their art form, and that's great.   

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   I don't use groups as extensively as I probably could, but when people come asking me "how can make emotes?" I direct them to #Emotication - it has just so much helpful information and plenty of good links and support.  

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They'll probably become more and more realistic in action and expression, gaining more complex limbs to show more subtle movements and such until they look like human faces and skin stretched over the skeleton of Mike Wazowski. This will presumably make them dive so deep into the uncanny valley it will be killed off forever.       

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Anything else you want to say?

  Nothing I can think of. I bet I'll think of a half dozen things after sending this on, but I've most definitely talked enough.    

   

Thank you very much for reading!

"See" you next time ;D

<sub>and now a huge thanks to the deviants who suggested these Questions to me:  

1.`Mirz123, 2.=EastSideSunsets, 3.=angelStained, 4.`SanguineEpitaph,  5.~litecrush, 5.`HazelCraft,  
6.~dirtypaintbrush,  7.`stuck-in-suburbia, 8.`IceXDragon, 9.*eon-krate32, 10.~TheGroovyMurphy,
11. / ,    12.`stuck-in-suburbia, 13.`stuck-in-suburbia, 14.~KatataEtc, 15.~KinnisonArc,
16.^SparklyDest,  17.~litecrush, 18.=Indae, 19.=Indae, 20.~dirtypaintbrush</sub>