Thursday, January 24, 2013

Icons

No, not this...

....I don't have any of the seven Cubs from 2009 Upper Deck Icons.

No, today I'm talking about computer icons.   Desktop icons.

I shared a while ago that I've got all of my Cubs cards scanned.  It was a nice winter project a couple years back.  And I've been able to keep up with the new cards I've bought since then, scanning as they arrive.

The scans are kept in folders on my computer and backed up onto the family computer.  This is what the Cubs team set folder looked like back in 2010, when I first finished all the scans...


...your basic Windows file folders.  Practical, but kinda boring looking.

I wanted something with a bit more pizzazz, but also something that would make it easier to identify the folders.  I wanted folder icons for each of the brands.

I nosed around the web a bit to learn more about icons, and I found that they're just a special picture file---.ico   With that, I next looked for a program to make icon files and found a simple and free program--Toycon.

I already had jpegs for most of the brands (I needed them for my year cards), so it was just a matter of using Toycon to convert the jpegs to icos.  I put all the new icons into a folder, and then  changed the Cubs card folders.

With that, voila!



The team sets are in folders with brand logo icons!

OK, maybe its a little over-the-top, but it's real easy for me to find a brand.

And if you want to make your own icons, the Toycon program is here.

5 comments:

  1. Your organizational skills never cease to amaze me. I need to hire you to come here and perform your magic on my mess of a collection.

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  2. Great idea, I'm going to do this for my customs. The sets have names now but I'm a pretty visual person so seeing an example of the custom as my icon will make it easier to know which set is which.

    As for regular cards, you might have more icons than I have cards scanned!

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  3. I'm mezmorized like a unicorn caught in the headlights. I might have to steal this idea now.

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