Noice!

I'm afraid the perspective is all wrong where the modules are concerned - they look as though they're suspended in mid-air at an angle to the glass panes. And the recycler/waste bin lacks a shadow - all the furniture has one. Just thought I'd point out the obvious, trying to help. Sorry.

As always your feedback is appreciated. Nothing to be sorry about.
There is next to nothing inaccurate about your feedback. I could theoretically angle the module placeholders 8-10 degrees to the right, or remove the view completely from the window panes so the suspension aspect if I felt it important would be completely unnoticeable. Honestly, if I did that while it would be geometrically accurate, I believe it would feel more uncomfortable than you suggest it is? Some of the modules could be moved to far left on the wall so it would be unnoticeable and if I moved the Calendar to the far right the angles would be more noticeable.

The 'next to nothing' being the trashcan actually does have some shadow, just not as much (2 pixels), but in terms of making it look more like it is part of the floor scene which an educated guess thinks that this is what you mean, I could look at doing a larger 45 degree shadow that is on the left, save it, then hone in on only the left shadow and make it around 50-65% transparent.

I appreciate your perfectionism, it's a credit to you.

EDIT:

I did what I mentioned I could and moved to the left as you can see. It is after all, modular. I did make enough space to do this in the design
I additionally played quickly with the shadow and as you can see it still doesn't look like the others but in fairness to myself, I never intended it to be, though it does look like it sort of belongs better. If I wished to be more critical, the Monitor angle needs to be adjusted too, it's also marginally wrong geometrically by around 12 degrees.
It works though and I can actually live with being less perfect for once. If I mess with angles too much, I can knowing myself, get annoyed with myself because I can easily mess the entire theme up without much effort . I can already see without changing anything, that if I corrected the monitor to match the module angles it would look incorrect against the table. If I corrected the modules which is feasible, I'd need to enlarge the canvases of each one because more than likely, I'd have to redo the information absolute placements.

Hello BassdudeNZ...

Out of curiosity, I downloaded some of the themes you've created, and I commend your enthusiasm and perseverance with all due respect.

However, several things bother me, and without meaning to be presumptuous, I'd like to discuss them with you, particularly regarding the values ​​you insert into the .wst and .wsw files for the taskbar, menu, tablet, and grid stack.

For example, with the "Modern Office 2" theme, I had to reconfigure these two files to make the theme consistent while keeping the bitmaps you created with virtually no modifications, apart from three or four.

The menu:
For me, this is the starting point for building a theme.

You created a 240 x 399 pixel menu. You split it into 3 parts: Title 240 x 85, Button 240 x 236, and Endcap 240 x 78. Why are you changing the values ​​in the .wst file? If you want your menu to be identical and not distorted on output, use the same values:
TitleVSize=85
ButtonMaxWidth=240
ButtonMinWidth=240
EndcapVSize=78
EndcapHzSize=240
TitleHMenuSize=240
Furthermore, you've decided to make the ButtonAS and ButtonIS buttons 29 pixels wide, OK, but why make them 313 pixels wide? No, they should be 240 pixels wide, the same width as your menu. The same goes for your spacer, which should be 240 x 29 pixels, not 416 x 10.

The Taskbar:
You've created Start buttons with a width of 42 pixels. Make the taskbar 42 pixels wide, not 50. The same applies to Tasks, SysBack, BarSep, and Quiks; all should be 42 pixels wide. :
nTaskbarLeftTile=10
nTaskbarRightTile=10
nTaskbarButtonWidth=61
nTaskbarButtonHeight=42
nTaskbarALeftTile=10
nTaskbarARightTile=10
nTaskbarMLeftTile=10
nTaskbarMRightTile=10
For the Starts tiles, the correct values ​​are 65 x 42.

The tablet:
This is more complicated because the tablet's structure will also be used for the grid stack.

You created a wsFullBody tile of 1600 x 194. I resized it to 1920 x 189 without modifying it, just lengthening it and removing 5 pixels from the bottom. The goal is for it to display with the same height of 189 pixels when the theme is launched. So, I take screenshots, open them with GIMP, measure the height in pixels of the full body, and then increase or decrease the values ​​in the .wsw file as needed for each screenshot to achieve a height of 189 pixels and center the grid. It's tedious, but that's how I do it.

For the various buttons: Hide, Show, Prefs, and others, Winstep is programmed to render them in 16x16 pixels. You created them in 65x42 pixels, so when rendered, they appear as oval 16x16 pixels. I changed them to 42x42 pixels to keep them round.

Regarding the modules, I have no issues; I have nothing special to report.

I also looked at the "Steampunk Air" theme. I don't understand it. Building a 1130 x 1738 menu and then shrinking it to a blurry mess by reducing its dimensions in the .wst file is heresy to me, but that's just my opinion, and I say it with all due respect.

I've outlined part of my theme development process, but it's only a part, and it remains my personal logic. Other methods exist and are perfectly valid; everyone has their own experience and vision.

One more thing:
Also, to compress a theme and install it with one click, don't compress a folder inside a zip archive.

To do this, open your theme, select all the theme's bitmaps, and compress them using WinRAR, 7-Zip, or another program with the .xtreme extension.
When you open your .xtreme file with WinRAR or another program, the theme's bitmaps should appear directly, not a folder containing the theme.

01-Your theme with a white background and icon reverberation:

02-Your theme with a white background after modifications:


I offer you my sincerest regards and please continue...
Picco14.

That's the best compromise, I think, and much more believable. It doesn't jump out at you screaming that this space can't possibly exist. Glad you figured a solution.

@Picco14 and
@Nexter

I won't make any excuses and say that Graphic arts has never been my specialty even though it is 100% true.
I will however say you two have done it as a living in one way or another so I appreciate your encouragement and constructive criticism from experts.

I enjoy doing the skins and I know I have become better with more practice but acknowledge freely that I am still learning and appreciate your honest feedback.

I do experiment with things and some work well and others, not as much.
I will take onboard your helpful dimensions @Picco14, some of the lesser ones I was not fully aware of and thank you, that was a big help.

@Nexter, there also comes a point where I ask myself "Do I really want to go back and edit all of the information?" - I will most likely do it with more than just this theme but honestly, while time is all I have these days and not a lot of it, I also believe in using it properly. Getting motivated to redo something takes some self-psyching sometimes

P.S. - being completely self-taught in Graphic arts has an advantage of having no boundaries, but the disadvantage I teach others in my real profession of not knowing all of the rules before I break them.

Just thought I would reiterate something.
In the course of my life, I have never created something in my chosen field or anything fun and creative with the intention to be liked. These themes I do because I enjoy doing them and I LIKE THEM. If others do reiterating, that is wonderful. If they do not, sorry, tough shit.
Whether that is the creation or me.
Frank Zappa said something like - "Any creative venture if the goal is money it is a business decision not an artistic one".

THEME:
I love food and there isn't much I do not like...so why not The only difficulty was I couldn't get every possible form of food in one theme. They are skinned themes with a limited amount of space and limited number of modules, not a book or a thesis.

Merry Christmas people.

Don't know why you're referencing editing info here in relation to me - never mentioned that.

Too true about bounderies - it really is an advantage of knowing them/the rules before breaking them.

Don't we all! Especially anything with chillis and I'm game. I take it there are some meatballs there somewhere? (Looks like it.) After all, every meat-consuming culture in the universe has some form of them. At least, according to B5's G'Kar.

And a Merry Consumerfest to you. And a Happy New Year - let's hope it's a good one, Kinky sex and free beer! (Apologies to John Lennon)

You were honest enough about some things like Picco14 to point out some things that might need changing.

I lost my magic wand and forgot the Shazam abracadabra words, so last I checked, without editing, I know no way I can change anything

Ah well... I'll take that. You'll always know where you are with me - always straight up, no BS, no fluff, sometimes even blunt but always frank, sincere, and honest.

@NEXTER

Neither of us are spring chickens anymore, so anything resembling patronization or fluffiness uses up the precious time we have unproductively.

Before I tackle the other thread (sigh!) I want to say this is what I like, and would like to see more of: users (and especially skinners) helping each other out.

Picco, you once asked me about making a theme-related thread in the forums, and I told you at the time that there isn't much user interest but that you could start one yourself. BassDudeNZ did exactly that, and he is an example of perseverance, a kind of "build it and they will come" (eventually lol).

Pretty sure that if you stay on this thread, Picco, and you comment regularly, more would-be-skinner users would start to come out of the woodwork asking for help and guidance. If something like that ever happened, I could even create a new category on the forums solely dedicated to skinning.

I'm probably going to repeat myself in the other thread, but I want to point out to both you and BassDudeNZ something which I think should be obvious by now: my focus at this point is NOT on the skinning aspect of the Winstep applications (in much the same way you guys are so focused on skinning that neither you nor BassDudeNZ are giving me any feedback on the "What's new..." posts - and this is not a criticism, just a statement of fact).

You may or may not believe it, but this is not bad will at all, it is just the way I compartmentalize stuff in order to get things done. Skinning is a whole universe by itself, with ancient beginnings and code done decades ago that I no longer remember how it works.

For now I am completely focused on tying loose ends and on the functionality side of the Winstep applications - and all you need to do to realize that is read the last "What's next after v. x,y..." threads. My plate is completely full.

One thing I know for sure is that eventually my focus will turn itself back to skinning, most likely once I decide to start working on the mythical Winstep Theme Builder again. Then, as it happens currently with functionality, I will focus almost exclusively in the skinning aspect of the Winstep applications.

There is only one of me in this project, though, I am working as fast as I can, and I do burn out from time to time too, not to mention that baby Noah - now a 2 year old hyper-active toddler - also takes a lot of my time.

I will look into skinning issues from time to time, but you have to be patient with me as I have to be dragged kicking and screaming to THAT part of the code. It is ancient, it is complicated, it is HUGE, and there are many, many, things I no longer remember how they work - which means I would have to spend a ton of time looking at the big picture and figuring that out before I tackle an issue, so that fixing a bug here does not create 10 more over there.

BassDudeNZ, keep going! Practice makes perfect and you are humble enough to learn FAST. You remind me of Tretog. You should have seen some of his early NextSTART themes back in 1999 when he had just started, ugh, eheh! Barely a couple of years later he was one of the best Winstep (and not only!) skinners around. Nobody is born an expert.

Ok, said what I wanted to say. Now going back to finishing the new disk meter module I'm adding to Xtreme and Ultimate (and replying to your other thread, Picco. Fasten your seatbelt, we're going on a ride lol!).

Well I'm certainly not! Although age has certain advantages, getting further ahead also isn't all it's cracked up to be. And yes, spot on re: WOT - waste of time.

While I certainly appreciate useful feedback and better ways to be productive, I have to admit that Jorge and I have been going to and fro and whether it is me, Winstep, MS or GPU's causing me to pull my hair out over things that never seemed to before doing weird things on scaling and adjustments that made no sense and definitely made no sense with menus and scaling. I felt like I was stupid for a little while and I certainly am not.

TODAY - I found on a forum complete with a link on that forum to Microsoft's admission, that my frustration had nothing to do with Jorge or me.

Look it up. The bad news? It's not like they're going to release the fix for it immediately. Go to MS and look up for yourselves. I'd be sarcastic, but honestly since MS's fixes have really not improved that much e.g. "DOS 6 will be fixed in 6.1, will be fixed in 6.2, will be fixed in 6.22..." = Nothing has really changed... Well I suppose they can say that they are consistent...Later...
(NOTE - the problem was the July patch and the Nov 21 patch of theirs exposed it)

From the forum (screenshot):