I don't want to sell it, I just want to enjoy it...

This is just a really long way of saying 'Don't be afraid to skin for yourself'.

I've seen it said that skinners are in decline, and so having pondered this and matched it with where I'm at and with what I'm seeing, I thought I'd post a few thoughts for consideration - mostly because I'm trying desperately myself to move past the 'good intentions' stage and like others before, I get to wondering what's stopping me.

Firstly, I'm not convinced that the proposition that skinners are in decline is the case. Some names we have gotten used to seeing regularly become less visible, partly because increasingly the range of options/roles available to experienced skinners have evolved and had an effect on their presence in the forums and even the galleries. It certainly doesn't mean that none of them are skinning or that new skinners aren't producing good work.

The ongoing 'professionalisation' of existing skinners has necessarily mirrored and fed the development of skinning itself. The depth & polish to which elements are now open for interpretation by the various authors continues to grow, equally amplified by the need now to skin for both XP and Vista user's. The expansion of opportunities being both daunting and exciting depending on your viewpoint. It does seem like a bigger challenge to create a WindowBlind than ever it was, while at the same time we are being offered what is described as an improved tool set.

Certainly, together with what feels to me like a protracted change over from SkinStudio5 to SkinStudio6, there have been a confluence of elements that made me feel like there's a waiting period to be gotten over. That since before Christmas I'd felt there was something on the way that was worth delaying starting for, something that would make that first attempt at a WindowBlind less daunting....

Am I the only one that's been waiting for this mysterious something? Will it really make a real difference to me when SkinStudio 6 goes gold and is finally accompanied by resource material that offers step by step help? Or is there something else that may be causing prospective skinners to pause for thought?

So here I am, increasingly guided towards creating a mindset for myself that wants to dispel this desire to wait for the perfect conditions that will likely never arrive. A mindset that in order to move on, needs to dismiss the need to create a skin that's not simply personally satisfying, but also meets the desire to be identifiable, as a professional looking skin that represents Stardock in a good light.

To explain further, it's great that Stardock does so much to promote skinning, I'm just not so convinced that skinning or skinners should necessarily feel a need to be positively representative of Stardock. Yet somehow, particularly as Stardock has sought to expand it's skinning audience away from the centre, along with developing expectations of how a professional looking suite should be presented, I've noticed that this has gradually begun to work it's way into my thinking. In itself it's by no means a bad thing to achieve, it just needn't be an aim that affects how you choose to express your design. Obviously some common sense is needed if you intend to upload it here, but that's a different issue.

I had I think to restate for myself, the value of the difference between customisation and dressing a machine. I began to feel as if the way I traditionally value a skin was in danger of becoming increasingly less important. That some of the factors I value, the personality of the skin and how it sometimes reflects the author, the degree to which that author has dared to be different, these things were increasingly in danger of not being a useful measure, even though for me they go to the very heart of customisation, the individual's expression of expression.

So as stated, It does seem to me that there is an increasing gap between the idea of creating a skin that's full of the authors personality and rejective of branding, and what I perceive as Stardock's increasing need to create a design type/standard that is universally recognisable as professional and commercially desirable and reflects positively on the product. These more universally saleable skins tend to have strong, but safe lines with well designed added value features, that necessarily for commercial reasons, speak to the valuing of the polish of a brand, more than the ability to bring something of the individual user to their machine.

I don't suggest there is any issue of fault, it's a natural part of the evolution, and has seen the creation of some great themes - and with the rolling out of 'My Colors' the expectation of how a suite should be defined from the point of view of quality of finish, will continue to be reinforced and compared to.

While the drive to create a skin that fits the 'commercially safe' design ethic is great for some skinners, particularly those with more experience who are seeking to be defined as 'professional' - I'm concerned that it shouldn't become the only yardstick or even the driving force, at least not here at Wincustomize. It certainly shouldn't become the measure that makes new skinners feel they shouldn't try, or that their early or less mainstream designs, which may even be a reaction against the more commercialised offerings, are any less worthwhile.

So after all that, I think that now is a great time to restate that there is a balance to be had, to recognise and reinforce that those who are driven first by the desire to create and express something of themselves, should be actively encouraged to do so in a way that works for them, regardless of any standard of commercial desirability - as long as the offering is built with care and respects the end user...

As it happens, I was in the process of creating a thread to invite any interested party to join with me in starting their own blind, when I noticed Po'Smedley had similarly decided it was time to stop waiting for that elusive 'something', and created a great thread that invites people to join him in a step by step approach.

Click Me to Build with Po'

I may still create a thread if there's enough interest from people who just need a kick start, but for now I encourage those that have an interest in skinning to take a look at Po's thread and take advantage of what has the potential to be another classic offering from the house of Smedley.