4 ms·

Susan Kare designed user-friendly icons for the first Macintosh (2019)

91 points by kiyanwang 4y ago

bigiain 4y ago
Heh. I remember back in the mid/late 90s, a friend of mine (now my brother in law) spent 6 weeks or so contracting at Apple, and managed to pick me up a DogCow t-shirt that wasn't available except to Apple staff. My other Mac/Apple fanboy friends were _so_ jealous!
- EricE 4y ago
  I still have my Dogcow shirt - managed to nab it from a rare visit to the company store. I finally stopped wearing it when it started to develop holes :(
neilv 4y ago
1984 "Computer Chronicles" segment of Susan Kare demoing the Mac, for anyone who hasn't seen it already (or who wants to watch it again, which you well might): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmWOtf4Ziso https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmWOtf4Ziso
russellbeattie 4y ago
So I bought a big print of the famous Mac "hello" from Susan Kare's site [1]. It's very cool, she signed and numbered it. But after I got it and stared at it for a while, I realized it's not the exact same as in the original commercials [2], but it is the same as in some old magazine ads [3] and the one they used for the iMac anniversary edition [4]. Recently, Apple updated the original design in high rez with rainbow colors in their recent brand refresh [5]. You can easily see the difference in the "h", which has a loop on one and is straight in the other. I emailed Kare a few years ago and asked about the differences and she said she only remembers doing the one that's on her site and isn't sure where the other one came from. I think I discovered an unknown Mac mystery!! Here's my best guess at an Occam's Razor explanation: Susan created the original loopy hello. Later, some magazine artist was laying out the ad and decided to clean up the letters a little bit. Fast forward a decade and someone at Apple decides to use the hello for the iMac and grabs an old magazine to use as a template. Later still, Susan sets up her website and is collecting together her art and somehow ends up with the modified version, as around that time, that was the hello being advertised by Apple. Not noticing the subtle difference, she slapped it on the site without much thought. Even later, Apple decides to reintroduce the hello, but this time they did their research (or, more likely, the web exists now making it easier to find) and used the original as a template. 1. https://kareprints.com/products/hello-on-blue?_pos=2&_sid=2825faadd&_ss=r https://kareprints.com/products/hello-on-blue?_pos=2&_sid=28... 2. https://photos5.appleinsider.com/gallery/29370-47319-000-3x2-Apple-History-Mac-launch-xl.jpg https://photos5.appleinsider.com/gallery/29370-47319-000-3x2... 3. https://i.pinimg.com/originals/58/8a/9f/588a9fceb5a3b24cc5825b37664d1664.jpg https://i.pinimg.com/originals/58/8a/9f/588a9fceb5a3b24cc582... 4. https://media.techeblog.com/images/apple-imac-g3-anniversary.jpg https://media.techeblog.com/images/apple-imac-g3-anniversary... 5. https://9to5mac.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2021/04/Screen-Shot-2021-04-20-at-1.22.24-PM.jpg?quality=82&strip=all&w=1600 https://9to5mac.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2021/04/Scree...
- bombcar 4y ago
  I think I see at least three versions. At least to me the o looks different in the print and (3). The line coming in comes in at a tangent or kind of dead ends.
dewey 4y ago
She also has a nice online store with signed prints (https://kareprints.com https://kareprints.com). I bought two a while ago and I still enjoy them, framed in my living room, every day.
- bombcar 4y ago
  For all the howling about Apple it’s nice to see that these are “Used with permission”.
  - nullcaution 4y ago
    Whos howling? There is only one sub comments here.
    - bombcar 4y ago
      Apple is generally considered “open copyright unfriendly”. It was nice to see they let her do this (even if they’re paid) as there was nothing demanding it.
  - musicale 4y ago
    Agreed - Apple has certainly made its zillions so it's nice to see the artist/designer get the credit and print sales! A signed print by the original artist is a pretty cool artifact - and unlike an NFT you can actually hang it on your wall! The Happy Mac icon is such a welcoming bit of pixel art - a modern classic. It's also interesting to see Steve Jobs in icon form in the 1984 set.
mistrial9 4y ago
- dangus 4y ago
  - hombre_fatal 4y ago
    Well, if you picked an example for men as ostentatious as large diamonds, like a garish suit, maybe it wouldn’t sound so silly. Besides, people comment on Jobs’ clothing all the time not to mention the appearance of men in general so it’s unclear what double standard you think you’re demonstrating beyond the trope of it being bad to comment on someone’s looks only if they’re a woman.
    - CharlesW 4y ago
      It seems you missed the gist of the top-level comment, which was "Susan wasn't talented enough to have earned the right to wear ostentatious jewelry". There were certainly people who diminished Steve Jobs, but not one of them questioned his right to wear whatever he wanted.
  - lostgame 4y ago
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  - dang 4y ago
    "Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead." a.k.a. please don't feed the trolls https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- dang 4y ago
  Please don't cross into personal attack in HN comments, and please don't post flamebait. We've had to ask you this more than once before. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
jbjbjbjb 4y ago
Am I right in thinking she created the icons which is the end product but would have built the process and a whole business around it through her firm? That is super impressive. I would like to read more on that part of her career.
- rjsw 4y ago
  There are several pages that mention her on Andy Hertzfeld's website [1], one page written by her. [1] https://www.folklore.org/ProjectView.py?project=Macintosh&characters=Susan%20Kare https://www.folklore.org/ProjectView.py?project=Macintosh&ch...
tinglymintyfrsh 4y ago
I assume then she also worked with Tog. Ah, the olden days when you made icons with hex constants and bitmap editors painting individual pixels.
musicale 4y ago
The Susan Kare icons, fonts, and visual design elements gave the original Macintosh a quirky visual charm that modern Apple systems and gadgets, slick as they may be, seem to lack. Their design was/is deceptively simple - subtle and brilliant with a sense of fun. All the original Mac bitmap fonts are beautiful. Monaco 9 is surprisingly legible at 1:1 resolution on my 4K monitor (though unfortunately Apple broke bitmap font rendering in Terminal on macOS Monterey.) I don't know whether the Chicago font is original to the Mac, but I still see examples of it everywhere.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
dirtyid 4y ago
I remember being very impressed by these in the school's computer lab and trying to replicate the pixel art in the paint app.

91 points by kiyanwang 4y ago

Heh. I remember back in the mid/late 90s, a friend of mine (now my brother in law) spent 6 weeks or so contracting at Apple, and managed to pick me up a DogCow t-shirt that wasn't available except to Apple staff. My other Mac/Apple fanboy friends were _so_ jealous!

EricE 4y ago
I still have my Dogcow shirt - managed to nab it from a rare visit to the company store. I finally stopped wearing it when it started to develop holes :(

neilv 4y ago

1984 "Computer Chronicles" segment of Susan Kare demoing the Mac, for anyone who hasn't seen it already (or who wants to watch it again, which you well might): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmWOtf4Ziso https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmWOtf4Ziso

russellbeattie 4y ago

So I bought a big print of the famous Mac "hello" from Susan Kare's site [1]. It's very cool, she signed and numbered it. But after I got it and stared at it for a while, I realized it's not the exact same as in the original commercials [2], but it is the same as in some old magazine ads [3] and the one they used for the iMac anniversary edition [4]. Recently, Apple updated the original design in high rez with rainbow colors in their recent brand refresh [5]. You can easily see the difference in the "h", which has a loop on one and is straight in the other. I emailed Kare a few years ago and asked about the differences and she said she only remembers doing the one that's on her site and isn't sure where the other one came from. I think I discovered an unknown Mac mystery!! Here's my best guess at an Occam's Razor explanation: Susan created the original loopy hello. Later, some magazine artist was laying out the ad and decided to clean up the letters a little bit. Fast forward a decade and someone at Apple decides to use the hello for the iMac and grabs an old magazine to use as a template. Later still, Susan sets up her website and is collecting together her art and somehow ends up with the modified version, as around that time, that was the hello being advertised by Apple. Not noticing the subtle difference, she slapped it on the site without much thought. Even later, Apple decides to reintroduce the hello, but this time they did their research (or, more likely, the web exists now making it easier to find) and used the original as a template. 1. https://kareprints.com/products/hello-on-blue?_pos=2&_sid=2825faadd&_ss=r https://kareprints.com/products/hello-on-blue?_pos=2&_sid=28... 2. https://photos5.appleinsider.com/gallery/29370-47319-000-3x2-Apple-History-Mac-launch-xl.jpg https://photos5.appleinsider.com/gallery/29370-47319-000-3x2... 3. https://i.pinimg.com/originals/58/8a/9f/588a9fceb5a3b24cc5825b37664d1664.jpg https://i.pinimg.com/originals/58/8a/9f/588a9fceb5a3b24cc582... 4. https://media.techeblog.com/images/apple-imac-g3-anniversary.jpg https://media.techeblog.com/images/apple-imac-g3-anniversary... 5. https://9to5mac.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2021/04/Screen-Shot-2021-04-20-at-1.22.24-PM.jpg?quality=82&strip=all&w=1600 https://9to5mac.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2021/04/Scree...

bombcar 4y ago
I think I see at least three versions. At least to me the o looks different in the print and (3). The line coming in comes in at a tangent or kind of dead ends.

dewey 4y ago

She also has a nice online store with signed prints (https://kareprints.com https://kareprints.com). I bought two a while ago and I still enjoy them, framed in my living room, every day.

bombcar 4y ago
For all the howling about Apple it’s nice to see that these are “Used with permission”.
- nullcaution 4y ago
  Whos howling? There is only one sub comments here.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    Apple is generally considered “open copyright unfriendly”. It was nice to see they let her do this (even if they’re paid) as there was nothing demanding it.
- musicale 4y ago
  Agreed - Apple has certainly made its zillions so it's nice to see the artist/designer get the credit and print sales! A signed print by the original artist is a pretty cool artifact - and unlike an NFT you can actually hang it on your wall! The Happy Mac icon is such a welcoming bit of pixel art - a modern classic. It's also interesting to see Steve Jobs in icon form in the 1984 set.

mistrial9 4y ago

dangus 4y ago
- hombre_fatal 4y ago
  Well, if you picked an example for men as ostentatious as large diamonds, like a garish suit, maybe it wouldn’t sound so silly. Besides, people comment on Jobs’ clothing all the time not to mention the appearance of men in general so it’s unclear what double standard you think you’re demonstrating beyond the trope of it being bad to comment on someone’s looks only if they’re a woman.
  - CharlesW 4y ago
    It seems you missed the gist of the top-level comment, which was "Susan wasn't talented enough to have earned the right to wear ostentatious jewelry". There were certainly people who diminished Steve Jobs, but not one of them questioned his right to wear whatever he wanted.
- lostgame 4y ago
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- dang 4y ago
  "Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead." a.k.a. please don't feed the trolls https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
dang 4y ago
Please don't cross into personal attack in HN comments, and please don't post flamebait. We've had to ask you this more than once before. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

jbjbjbjb 4y ago

Am I right in thinking she created the icons which is the end product but would have built the process and a whole business around it through her firm? That is super impressive. I would like to read more on that part of her career.

rjsw 4y ago
There are several pages that mention her on Andy Hertzfeld's website [1], one page written by her. [1] https://www.folklore.org/ProjectView.py?project=Macintosh&characters=Susan%20Kare https://www.folklore.org/ProjectView.py?project=Macintosh&ch...

tinglymintyfrsh 4y ago

I assume then she also worked with Tog. Ah, the olden days when you made icons with hex constants and bitmap editors painting individual pixels.

musicale 4y ago

The Susan Kare icons, fonts, and visual design elements gave the original Macintosh a quirky visual charm that modern Apple systems and gadgets, slick as they may be, seem to lack. Their design was/is deceptively simple - subtle and brilliant with a sense of fun. All the original Mac bitmap fonts are beautiful. Monaco 9 is surprisingly legible at 1:1 resolution on my 4K monitor (though unfortunately Apple broke bitmap font rendering in Terminal on macOS Monterey.) I don't know whether the Chicago font is original to the Mac, but I still see examples of it everywhere.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

dirtyid 4y ago

I remember being very impressed by these in the school's computer lab and trying to replicate the pixel art in the paint app.