Boston Icons 0.5 release
When Boston icons 0.2 was released in March, the new design wanted to maintain and strengthen the original idea of 2015. The base was correct, but the colors failed over and over. The corrections weren’t enough to adapt the palette for coexistence with other icons. Also the colors were too much pale for a correct visualization on screens and some brightness levels. The branding failed too because the style was directly taken from 2015–2016 versions despite typography update, and it didn’t connect with the new look. That’s why errors were dragged along and the solutions weren’t good enough till now. For this version 0.5 it has been decided to design all this again specifically for the 2019 proposal, and the results are better than ever: a good visualization in multiple brightness levels on our computer screens, a new balance between the colors showed (avoiding too much hues and respecting combinations), a better coexistence with other themes (specially default GNOME) and the evolution of the style in itself. Now Boston moves away from the more generic and natural style and gets closer to the mix formed by “retro style + minimalism”.
The color treatment is the most important thing in this release, because was tried to make an exhaustive study and brainstorm of it during almost two months to increase the chances of success.
Colors: the original idea of reduced color palette is maintained (8 hues with two lights each one + 8 monochrome based on marengo), but those new hues are more saturated, perfect for a better contrast, visualization on UI elements and compatible with a bunch of icon themes like the new Adwaita collection (GNOME default style).
Own style: Boston icons avoid to show too much color, emphasizing its minimalist style. Now the color treatment is more selective and is focused on representative ones used by the theme, always trying to respect the chromatic mixes at all times whatever happens, even with many items showed on screen.
Hierarchy and design language: changes in colors have also made possible to adjust the icon hierarchy and intensifies the original idea. This means monochromatic (and discreet) ones by default, a little bit color for slightly important ones and full of it for directories or fairly important/most common use files in desktop. The color tries to capture our attention in what is really useful, being the rest completely secondary looking for a discreet, neutral and elegant look.
More compatibilities: Boston 0.5 has increased its compatibility with some file types like CAD, 3D models, drawing software (Krita, Photoshop, Corel Draw, OpenRaster and EPS formats, etc) and office templates. Some revisions was made too, as well as new icons for FLUID software installed by default in some Linux distros. A new full color icon for AppImage is also provided, which highlights the applications that uses this distribution method.
Of course, you can read the Changelog file for the complete list of the news.
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