Are You Really Using Your D-l Styles?

The reason I'm posting this is that no matter the incredible styles I've downloaded, not even 1 of them is suitable for working everyday, all day. My work computer has seen it all yet the ugly blue Luna theme is the only one not hurting my eyes too bright or too dark, to much colors or too grey. I'm totally frustrated since I don't have the time to try and create what I want at work and have no computer at home, yet the blue titlebar is damn ugly ! however the rest - menus, buttons, etc. is more or less OK. The milks are too white. The darks are too black. The others mess my menus to a flattened look. Is there not 1 style usable ???!!!

p.s. all artists-don't hate me. I just want to try and make way for something more workable....

Topic Title Edited.

There's no such thing as a [poll] tag...

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Stevie BM

#182989

Have you thought that maybe you just choose the wrong combinations?

I, for example, consistently work with various visual styles and WB skins.

The trick, though, is to try to get a consistent, yet overall usable feel.

I find that the best working environment for me is typically something akin to Panther (I'm currently using Panther styles, as it happens), or Smoothstripes, and combine that with an unintrusive blue or green wallpaper, and matching icons.

I'm far more productive with my Mac-themed machines than with my unthemed (or rather, Luna-themed) machines. Why? Less visual "clutter", and generally more compact UI conventions.

#182995

i've been using milk exclusively for months. with a nice milky-silver background, white doc, snow E2-white icons.. yummy.

#183002

I don't use a wallpaper, since my dual-display is already full of apps running

I think that luna is ugly but it's menu handling is good and visible unlike many of the themes that are simply unreadable, also good contrast between active-non active windows unlike,again,many themes..

#183005

I highly reccomend Luna VX visual style, like luna but better and nicer on the eyes

#183006

I agree with you completely stevie. Smooth stripes is one of the most usable themes there is. You just have to find one that works.

for wb's theres of course any of the "panther" styles, smooth stipes, siro, paper and plastic, pro plastik, milk, panther snow.. etc...

#183007

I gotta agree with Stevie. The last time I used Luna was the day I downloaded StyleXP. Since then it's been either Jaguar or Panther almost exlusively. Iceman's Jaguar with the Y'z apps is (imo) still the most usable Mac emu for windows to date.

Iceman = god

#183009

I've been using ChosenOS for some time now. Since their is no color, there is little to be distracted by. The entire style is very simple, after modding it to help in a few areas, it's very usable to me.

#183013

All day with milk.....I think I couldn't work with luna in blue, the taskbar is so big and it's so ugly............... :6

#183015

bant's reluna (wb import)

xero's panther (wb, import? can't remember)

bose's puma (wb import): here

all highly usable. I find milk too low contrast.

#183016

Milk in conbination with silver thingys... mainly milk tho

Objectbar: Milk

Windowblinds: Milk

Nexplorer: Edit and combination of Milk with some other things

Firefox: I would prefer using Milk, but its not as fast as the skin I'm using (MetalXP) which is based on Pinstripe

#183019

I'm using Longhorn Pinstripe with LhP icons, dock and wallpaper (what else? ),

some brushed windows on my desktop too (firefox, wmp, qcd, ...)

Before that I was using Longhorn Inspiriat or Milk with SnowE 2 icons

#183023

There is no such thing as a [poll] tag. It already says "Poll:" before the topic.

// Lou

#183031

Use either Luna or Classic. Two of the best styles in the world. I tend to prefer Classic.

However if you are adamant on using a third-party Visual Style, download Rhapsodized by dazzla. Modify the VS in StyleBuilder and change all its fonts to Lucida Grande and modify your system font MS Shell Dlg to use Lucida Grande. Combine this with a nice Beach wallpaper from the Mac set. Add WindowFX for effect. Ta-da...a workable environment.

#183033

i always mod the visual styles i use. i mod it to suit my tastes and it's fun!

#183042

I've been using some kind of styles from the time i got my first computer years ago... even running win98 but up until now it's always been something smooth and consistent.

I am sort of a minimalist and well Milk has always been a way to go for me... it's soft on the eyes with the ever popular mac blue walls... always nice. I also think that most of the mac styles out there are fairly useable for most people. Even stefanka's longhorn inspirat looks great or even the pinstripes version.

Like stevie said... combinations always work best. I've been using milk for months on end now and every once and a while the odd new release. Icons i've always liked the panther hybrid set (customize.org) and well backgrounds always pick something thats appealling to the eyes but won't burn them out too quickly... nothing bright but something to promote activity when working.

if that doesn't work reluna, luna vx are probably the best luna like themes out there that aren't drab in comparison to the original luna. Bant, Gigextel (typo?) work well too.

#183052

thanx for all suggestions, d-l now...

#183447

Ive been using WB or VS for years now on every computer I do my design work on, without problem. You really need to find a neutral, basic theme. So far, a few excellent themes I prefer are:

Sosumi

iBar

SmoothStripes (sunken)

Panther

If you want to get really crazy, Metallic Shades or a Watercolor variation work well, as they are very complete, clean themes done by true professionals.

Themes I would NOT recommend using:

Faux Fur

SS Tuxedo

SS SimpleX

SS Final Cut

Cell

Beacon

etc...

See the trend here? Extreme colors, especially darks, throw off the color balance on your desktop, making it irritating to read fonts much less compose any sort of document.

Most importantly (dont laugh), is my Yz Toolbar theme. Once again it has to be simple, clean and make sense. For example, many good themes use some sort of strange glyph for the 'up' toolbar button, making the toolbar worthless... I dont have time to scan the toolbar over and over and over looking for the 'up' button if Im pulling files to upload to a client.

In many cases I find Luna almost impossible to use because of it's default icons max at 48x48. The pixellation of any size above that makes them almost unrecognizable. This is a huge strike against Luna IMO...large icons (64x64+) have too many benefits not to use.

#183454

well lunaVX is good....but for some reason it will not allow me to change titlebar fonts!

#183482

Longhorn pinstripe is all good for me but i dident like the titlebar , it's too big , i will like the grey substyle of longhorn inspiriat (with the grey taskbar) (only the titlebar) for lh pinstripe.

I use a mix : i diden't much like Milk Object bar , so i use the white substyle of longhorn inspiriat for obbar and it's good

Global Windows : Sunken Milk (port by me)

Fire Fox : Sunken Milk Flat :naughty: and Mills Milk skin ( how can we disable those milk scrollbars ???? )

Explorer : Sunken Milk Flat (I am making Finder Substyle for the explorer , like in JetBlack theme :naughty: )

BTW: what's sosumi theme ?

#183486

wierd thing that titlebar font....btw susomi is an old mac-like with aqua on it.

#183488

you can easly change the font in stylebuilder or skinstudion (depends of if it's an vs or an WB theme)

#183494

lunaVX is great not after manipulating fonts, some icons and bmp....thanx !

#183552

The style that i more use is the stefanka's panther snow I consider the cleanest style.

I also use sometimes LUNA VX, Panther WB Xero's port, And some of my mods

#183639

I change my vs whenever I like it. It seems that I get sick of eyecandy easily and I always end up switching to either the default class theme, hmmxp or minus521.

#183750