Goals
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This section describes the steps we followed to construct the Flame artistic motif. This section may be useful for anyone interested in reproducing the Flame artistic motif, or in creating new artistic motifs for The CentOS Project corporate visual identity (see Repository trunk Identity).

Description
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The Flame artistic motif was built using the flame filter of Gimp 2.2 in CentOS 5.5.

The flame filter of Gimp can produce stunning, randomly generated fractal patterns. The flame filter of Gimp gives us a great oportunity to reduce the time used to produce new artistic motifs, because of its ``randomly generated'' nature. Once the artistic motif be created, it is propagated through all visual manifestations of CentOS Project corporate visual identity using the centos-art.sh script (see Repository trunk Scripts Bash) inside the CentOS Artwork Repository.

To set the time intervals between each new visual style production, we could reuse the CentOS distribution major release schema.  I.e., we could produce a new visual style, every two years, based on a new ``randomly generated'' flame pattern, and publish the whole corporate visual identity (i.e., distribution stuff, promotion stuff, websites stuff, etc.) with the new major release of CentOS distribution all together at once.

Producing a new visual style is not one day's task. Once we have defined the artistic motif, we need to propagate it through all visual manifestations of The CentOS Project corporate visual identity. When we say that we could produce one new visual style every two years we really mean: to work two years long in order to propagate a new visual style to all visual manifestations of The CentOS Project corporate visual identity.

Obviously, in order to propagate one visual style to all different visual manifestations of The CentOS Project corporate visual identity, we need first to know which the visual manifestations are.  To define which visual manifestations are inside The CentOS Project corporate visual identity is one of the goals the CentOS Artwork Repository and this documentation manual are both aimed to satisfy.

Once we define which the visual manifestation are, it is possible to define how to produce them, and this way, organize the automation process. Such automation process is one of the goals of centos-art.sh script.

With the combination of both CentOS Artwork Repository and centos-art.sh scripts we define work lines where translators, programmers, and graphic designers work together to distribute and reduce the amount of time employed to produce The CentOS Project monolithic corporate identity.

From a monolithic corporate visual identity point of view, notice that we are producing a new visual style for the same theme (i.e., Flame). It would be another flame design but still a flame design. This idea is very important to be aware of, because we are somehow ``refreshing'' the theme, not changing it at all.

This way, as we are ``refreshing'' the theme, we still keep oursleves inside the monolithic conception we are trying to be attached to (i.e., one unique name, and one unique visual style for all visual manifestations).

Producing artistic motifs is a creative process that may consume long time, specially for people without experienced knowledge on graphic design land. Using ``randomly generated'' conception to produce artistic motifs could be, practically, a way for anyone to follow in order to produce maintainable artistic motifs in few steps.

Due to the ``randomly generated'' nature of Flame filter, we find that Flame pattern is not always the same when we use Flame filter interface.

Using the same pattern design for each visual manifestation is essential in order to maintain the visual connection among all visual manifestations inside the same theme.  Occasionally, we may introduce pattern variations in opacity, size, or even position but never change the pattern design itself, nor the color information used by images considered part of the same theme.

     Important When we design background images, which are considered part of the same theme, it is essential to use the same design pattern always. This is what makes theme images to be visually connected among themeselves, and so, the reason we use to define the word ``theme'' as: a set of images visually connected among themeselves.

In order for us to reproduce the same flame pattern always, Flame filter interface provides the Save and Open options. The Save option brings up a file save dialog that allows you to save the current Flame settings for the plug-in, so that you can recreate them later.  The Open option brings up a file selector that allows you to open a previously saved Flame settings file.

The Flame settings we used in our example are saved in the file:

trunk/Identity/Themes/Motifs/Flame/Backgrounds/Xcf/800x600.xcf-flame.def

Construction
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Step 1: Set image size
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Create an empty image and fill the Background layer with black (000000) color. Image dimensions depend on the final destination you plan to use the image for. For the sake of our construction example we used an image of 640x480 pixels and 300 pixels per inch (ppi).

Step 2: Add base color and pattern information
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Create a new layer named Base, place it over Background layer and fill it with the base color (7800ff) you want to have your background image set in.  Add a mask to Base layer using radial gradient and blur it.  You may need to repeat this step more than once in order to achieve a confortable black radial degradation on the right side of your design.

Duplicate Base layer and name it Paper. Place Paper layer over Base layer. Remove content of Paper layer and fill it with Paper (100x100) pattern. Once you've done with black radial degradation, reduce the Paper layer opacity to 20%.

Notice that when we duplicate one layer, the mask information related to layer is preserved from previous to next layer. This saves us some of the time required to produce different layers with the same mask information on them.

Duplicate Paper layer and rename it Stripes. Remove paper pattern from Stripes layer. Fill Stripes layer with Stripes (48x48) pattern and reduce the Stripes layer opacity to 15%.

Step 3: Add flame motif
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Create a new layer named Flame. Set the foreground (003cff) and background (0084ff) colors to the gradient you want to build the flame motif.

To build flame motif, use the flame filter (Filters > Render > Nature > Flame...) on Flame layer. We used a layer mask, with a radial gradient on it to control the boundaries of flame motif on Flame layer.

Duplicate Flame layer and rename it `Flame Blur'. Place `Flame Blur' below Flame layer. Apply Gussian blur filter (Filters > Blur > Gussian Blur...) until reaching the desiered effect.

The opacity value, in Flame layers, may vary from one image to another based on the place the image will be finally placed on.  For example, images used as desktop background have the Flame layer opacity set at 100% but Flame Blur is set to 70%.  However, you may find that background images used in anaconda progress slides have opacity reduced differently, in order to reduce brightness in a way that texts could look clean and readable over it.

Step 4: Add foreground color
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Create a new layer named Color, place it on top of all visible layers and fill it with plain color (4c005a). Reduce Color layer opacity to 20%. You can use the Color layer to control the right side color information you want to produce the image for.

Duplicate Flame layer and create a new layer named Color#1. Place Color#1 layer on top of layer named Color. Remove the mask information from Color#1 layer and recreate a new one using an inverted alpha channel as reference. Remove Color#1 layer content and fill it back with plain black (000000) color. Reduce Color#1 opacity to 20%.  In this step we created a mask to protect the flame artistic motif from black color, so when we decrement or increment the opacity of layer, the flame artistic motif wouldn't be affected, just the environment suround it.

When you set color information, remember that the same artistic motif needs to be indexed to 14 and 16 colors, in order to produce Grub and Syslinux visual manifestations respectively. Using many different colors in the artistic motif may reduce the possibility of your design to fix all different situations in.  Likewise, using more colors in one design, and less colors in another design will reduce the connectivity among your designs, since color information is relevant to visual identity.

When you propagate your artistic motif visual style to different visual manifestations of CentOS Project corporate visual identity, it is up to you to find out justice and compromise among all possible variables you may face.

See also
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