Do you like the default wallpaper? Should it be improved?

[suchawato]

Personally, I think that there should be better default wallpaper than the current set including the brown swirly thing.
Some really nice wallpaper can go a long way to selling the look of Ubuntu.
Both Vista and OS X both have really nice wallpapers and XP does too.
There could be a contest with a vote of a choice of maybe five or so finals to save memory space on the disc.
Abstracts, CGI, Realy nice photograpy, etc.
What do you think?

[smartalecks]

elephant is pretty cool, but the "Simple Ubuntu" i dont really like

[TidusBlade]

I would prefer if they included a few fan-voted wallpapers with the install, or it could be an option during installation.

[sloggerkhan]

I like elephant. The other one looks like garbage on both my monitors.

[CAD-MAN]

The first thing I did was change the wallpaper - its disgusting ('the skid mark').

Other OS's have nice wallpapers by default. Take a look at the hot air balloon (http://fedoraproject.org/) one that comes with Fedora - thats just cool. I don't see why Ubuntu shouldn't have a good quality wallpaper, that will be liked by all (well, as close as) - its one of the best distros out there (if not the best). The artwork lets us down.

[Wardje]

I'm not too fond of it and changed it to the bg of Mac OS X :P

[suchawato]

I'm not too fond of it and changed it to the bg of Mac OS X :P
LOL, So did I!

[suchawato]

The first thing I did was change the wallpaper - its disgusting ('the skid mark').

Other OS's have nice wallpapers by default. Take a look at the hot air balloon (http://fedoraproject.org/) one that comes with Fedora - thats just cool. I don't see why Ubuntu shouldn't have a good quality wallpaper, that will be liked by all (well, as close as) - its one of the best distros out there (if not the best). The artwork lets us down.

Yes, tha'ts been one of my primary headaches, Art as an afterthought.
"oh go ahead and put a wallpaper in there will you? Yeah, no, just put something brown or something in that matches the theme"
It's kinda of silly. Especially now that Compiz-Fusion is enabled by default, IF you have a nice video card, you get to see this beautiful, cube, and all these cool desktop effects with things like "cube reflection", and what does it reflect? As CAD-MAN put it: a Skid Mark.
Come'-on. They can do better than that. A voted contest would be a great idea.

[qamelian]

Personally, the Gutsy default is my favourite wallpaper in a long time. It's the first one since the one orginally proposed for Edgy (the one that got pulled before release) that I haven't been tempted to change.

[sloggerkhan]

The elephant was pretty cool.

I've got some zebra going with it up top.

[Codename]

Personally, I think that there should be better default wallpaper than the current set including the brown swirly thing.
Some really nice wallpaper can go a long way to selling the look of Ubuntu.
Both Vista and OS X both have really nice wallpapers and XP does too.
There could be a contest with a vote of a choice of maybe five or so finals to save memory space on the disc.
Abstracts, CGI, Realy nice photograpy, etc.
What do you think?

Again, I personally like it.

[potentia]

elephant is pretty cool, but the "Simple Ubuntu" i dont really like

Elephant is great and should be the default wallpaper. The default wallpaper didn't impress me. But remember, they are just wallpapers. People want great productivity software that can cover the wallpaper!

[suchawato]

Personally, the Gutsy default is my favourite wallpaper in a long time. It's the first one since the one orginally proposed for Edgy (the one that got pulled before release) that I haven't been tempted to change.
I actually think the default is not bad, its just not great.
It's way better than Fiesty, and the elephant isn't bad. Its just not all that great.
You don't look at it and say "WOW, that's some of the coolest desktop wallpaper I've ever seen!"
The wallpaper in Vista and Leopard are really great Photography and Abstract Art.
The kind of quality that would be worth printing and hanging on a real wall.

Somebody got WELL paid for those works. Payment isn't totaly nessicary though, there are plenty of great artists who would apprecieate the publicity of having their work as the centerpiece of a major OS.

Ubuntu is a great OS. It should have Great artwork.

As they said in Trainspotting: " ...Yeah 'is not bad, but 'is not great either, is it? And even though you tell yourself it's not bad, in your heart you know 'is really jus shite."

[Hairy_Palms]

the skid mark is terrible, the worst since that bubbles one back in hoary (or was it breezy?)
the elephant one is respectable, but the "brown gloss" i think its called just sucks

[qamelian]

The wallpaper in Vista and Leopard are really great Photography and Abstract Art.
The kind of quality that would be worth printing and hanging on a real wall.


It's all a matter of opinion. There is not a single wallpaper in Vista that appeals to me. I find them all boring. Same goes for OSX for that matter. I just find them all boring. There is just something about the default Gutsy wallpaper that I like.

I think the elephant skin wallpaper is okay, but it's not new. I had similar wallpapers that friend had created back when I was still using Win95. Not everyone likes them though. My G/F thinks its gross to have something like an animal skin on your desktop. You can't please everyone.

[Codename]

A lighter color would be nice.

[smartboyathome]

Orange would be nice too. :)

[Codename]

Orange would be nice too. :)

That would be awesome!

[Ralphie]

I voted that they need to all be changed up.
When I installed gutsy, I was really disappointed with the default look, it was so dark and drury. like it is ubuntu of death or something.
Where as fiesty was warm and inviting.

my girlfriend walked into the room and was like "why is you computer so ugly?? Are you going with a caveman theme or something?"
Needless to say, i have since completely changed everything about it. I hope that future releases are not so dark.

[damianvila]

I think the elephant skin wallpaper is okay, but it's not new. I had similar wallpapers that friend had created back when I was still using Win95. Not everyone likes them though. My G/F thinks its gross to have something like an animal skin on your desktop. You can't please everyone.

qamelian, if I've got something clear is that you don't like the elephant wallpaper. You happen to mention it every time someone says something nice about it...
:lolflag:

Anyway, thanks for the comments about the elephant wallpaper to everybody.
I'll try to expand the series for Heron.
I'll put everything here: http://ubuntu.damianvila.com (http://ubuntu.damianvila.com/) (it's incomplete, though)

[suchawato]

Anyway, thanks for the comments about the elephant wallpaper to everybody.
I'll try to expand the series for Heron.
I'll put everything here: http://ubuntu.damianvila.com (http://ubuntu.damianvila.com/) (it's incomplete, though)
Damian,
would it be alright with you if others sent you wallpapers to review?
It would be nice to have some diversity in the set to reflect the diversity of the community. If someone had a really nice photo or piece of artwork they were willing to submit, could it be taken into consideration, and maybe put in to the package or voted upon? There could be maybe three available spots for people to submit entries to. the community could vote on all the entries, and maybe the top one to three could be allowed in the final release.?
what do you think?

[maxlpk]

its an odd question.. regardless of whether people like or dislike the artwork, it is artwork and therefore it should always be attempted to be improved upon ;)

And I can say that after picking up a book with some of my old published artworks the other week, at the time I thought most were good and some great, and I got a lot of good feedback from the people who bought the books, but now when I look at them I go ' I thought that was good?'

art is a constant struggle towards greater perfection

you can have the same reaction to the code you have written too, its what makes us better artists/coders.

[damianvila]

Damian,
would it be alright with you if others sent you wallpapers to review?
It would be nice to have some diversity in the set to reflect the diversity of the community. If someone had a really nice photo or piece of artwork they were willing to submit, could it be taken into consideration, and maybe put in to the package or voted upon? There could be maybe three available spots for people to submit entries to. the community could vote on all the entries, and maybe the top one to three could be allowed in the final release.?
what do you think?

Yes!, no problem with it.
I've already included other people's work in other repositories I have (listed at the foot of the page).
Keep in mind, though, that it's a static repository. Maybe there are other places that are more suitable for that end, like Gnome Art (http://art.gnome.org/), Gnome Look (http://www.gnome-look.org/) or the forums' Gallery (http://ubuntuforums.org/g/).
I made those repositories because I want to keep my work in just one place. Other people prefer places like DeviantArt for their work.
But if you want to be included, just let me know. Try to be critic with your own work, so as to keep a good level.
I'll include other materials in the repository, like fonts and logos, in the same way I did for the Fon repository.
Regards.

[graabein]

Personally, I think that there should be better default wallpaper than the current set including the brown swirly thing.

Hey dude, for us that are behind the latest and greatest Ubuntu release can you please update the first post with the current default wallpaper?

Thanks!

[linuxlizard]

They should do something on the wallpaper that has to do with the animal theme of the release.

By the way, what's after hardy heron? I vote for lively lizard:guitar:

[Hairy_Palms]

it has to begin with an i after hardy, i vote interesting iguana :)

[CAD-MAN]

They should do something on the wallpaper that has to do with the animal theme of the release.

By the way, what's after hardy heron? I vote for lively lizard:guitar:

Naah - its Itchy Iguana (http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=579480&page=6) :lolflag:

[potentia]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_of_the_bikeshed

und

http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/misc.html#BIKESHED-PAINTING

:-\"

[suchawato]

Hey dude, for us that are behind the latest and greatest Ubuntu release can you please update the first post with the current default wallpaper?

Thanks!
??
I'm not quite sure what you are asking.
The brown swirly thing.
Its called Simple Ubuntu.
I personally don't think it's "bad", I just don't think that it is good enough to be one of the three (maybe four?) only wallpapers in a major OS distribution release.
My point of starting the thread is that while the general consensus is that the "Elephant" wallpaper is probably worthy, the others are just kinda "eh.." which is the reason for the post.
It is my opinion that we can do better.

[suchawato]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_of_the_bikeshed

und

http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/misc.html#BIKESHED-PAINTING

:-\"
That's the reason for the poll.

[argraff]

Where'd you get that Firefox logo? It rocks! Very cool desktop - I love the elephant too. (So, who snuck up next to an elephant to photograph him?)

Also, the Leopard-like dock is cool. As an admin who wants to install linux but has too many terrified users, I'd be interested in how you did that. (wouldn't it be cool to customize the desktops so that Windows users saw a windows-like screen, and Mac users would see a Mac theme? I bet my bunch wouldn't realize they were using linux...)