[IC] GMK Iconographic: GB now live! Runs January 8th through February 5th

[i luv chuletas]

that mono hiragana kit is straight up hitting me in the feels.

This is looking great man! spacebar kit for my alice, yes? 

the green is looking rather bluish under that lighting, but i dig it. What would you say are your next steps on this?

[Lil]

What would you say are your next steps on this?

I have updated the OP now with renders of the set on the Bocc, but i'm hoping to get more board renders done, once I feel the IC is a little more comprehensive I'll post an IC on Reddit/Keebtalk and then contact vendors.

[Lil]

Hi all, fairly big update here. First of all, a change of name for the keyset (Formerly Ramona, now Iconographic)
- the reason being I think this one fits better with the Vaporwave inspiration of the set,
whereas the previous name was a bit obscure and seemingly unrelated
(being the real-life name of Vektroid; when people see 'Ramona' I think most peoples first association would be scott pilgrim instead though - hence the change)

I have changed the colour for the mods to a grey RAL -
for several reasons: because it will be easier for gmk to match, but also because I think there will be better contrast and it still fits the theme
I liked the 4240c but there wasn't any real RAL equivalent and I was also worried about colour matching,
as I was very picky with what beige colour I wanted,
and couldn't find a suitable analogous colour after trying several other alternative colours along the same theme in the interim i.e GMK colours and RALs

I have changed the Legend colour to a green RAL, as it seemed the most 'neon' in real life out of all the options between all the green Pantones and RALs and also close to the colour from the inspiration.
The other colours seemed to be a bit bland in comparison.

I have updated the OP with the new basekit which has changed with Traditional Icon mods, and new compatibility. There is an add-on kit for Hiragana Alphas, board renders by Abec13 and a RL picture of the colours in natural light
(I'm not sure how colour-accurate the photograph is due to my monitor- but it looks close to real life, seems more accurate than the renders when viewing on my monitor)

So what's next? I'm exploring the option of Novelties, and waiting for board renders for the Bocc.

As always, please let me know what you think, and thanks for supporting the set up until now. I'm thinking these will be the final colours.

[bd_slade]

Nice kit! Following!

[KEYGEM]

I really like the new name. Fits much better

[.Ryan]

I have a fullsize and a minivan, and could fill both with a base and hiragana kit. I am absolutely in for these!

[Lil]

[bukowski]

I think the hiragana legends should be the base kit since this is vaporwave themed. Also I'd love to see some accents (esc, enter?)

[Lil]

I think the hiragana legends should be the base kit since this is vaporwave themed. Also I'd love to see some accents (esc, enter?)

I'll definitely consider accents, but I think the set is quite colourful as it is and might not need them. Although it may as you said better fit the theme, I think the majority of people prefer Latin legends, and so I came to the compromise where you could buy just the alphas kit and fit a 60% board by adding Mods of your choice.

[mutthunt]

I'd almost forgotten about this set. I really appreciate the effort you've put into all these iterations and changes.

That being said, I think the contrast of the green and pink doesn't pop as nicely as your original renders. When you compare them its a bit muddier; I think with the hiragana legends its made a bit worse since these use a thinner line.

Still very much after this set, maybe the final colours will meld better but if there was a way to get a tad more green I'd have no doubts

[Jaltr]

I just found this ic! Is there a chance for desk mats to be a thing?

[dkFAKE]

Could you try a render where the mods are color swapped? Primarily mint with pink legends? Reminds me of Arizona Tea tbh

[Lil]

I just found this ic! Is there a chance for desk mats to be a thing?

Yes, the next step is looking into doing a deskmat and novelties

Could you try a render where the mods are color swapped? Primarily mint with pink legends? Reminds me of Arizona Tea tbh

I apologise, but I can't do this. There is already a keyset in IC based on Arizona Tea with vaporwave vibes, and although they use different colours I want to make sure there's enough room to clearly differentiate the sets without stepping on each others toes.

I'd almost forgotten about this set. I really appreciate the effort you've put into all these iterations and changes.

That being said, I think the contrast of the green and pink doesn't pop as nicely as your original renders. When you compare them its a bit muddier; I think with the hiragana legends its made a bit worse since these use a thinner line.

Still very much after this set, maybe the final colours will meld better but if there was a way to get a tad more green I'd have no doubts

The challenge is making a green plastic that neon!
During the colour matching phase I will do my best to get a green that matches the inspiration, but I can only ask the renderers for to go off real RALs and Pantones in order to be more representative, which aren't as bright as the colour I originally was going for.
This is where the difference you are seeing is coming from; GMK can't match Hex colours and need a colour reference to work off or towards.
As the real life colour reference illustrates, I don't think the green will be so pale, it is greener than the renders show I think.
[The picture was taken on a cloudy-day in natural light, is a bit dark because of that - i'm also not sure about the iso i was using]

[beresford]

I agree that gray isn't really a big part of the Vaporwave style. I assume it comes from the album cover which is only used on the edge and was not part of the cover art. Not sure why this is chosen over the light green for the mods.

[wil]

i rather dislike the change to icons, even if they are OG. vaporwave would embrace the odd contradiction of having hiragana alphas with traditional gmk icon + text mods. i'm glad you kept the beige though. it's amazing how so many people do not actually understand vaporwave's original aesthetic (including 90s pc/mac gui) and think it's only pink and neon green.

[georgethehuman]

seems like the hhkb backspace is missing from the base kit? other than that, no complaints - loving the 40s support in the base kit itself!
all the best with the keyset, looking forward to seeing the novelties

[nettoxx7]

Thats a nice pink, but the font color seems hard to distinguish imo

[i luv chuletas]

Man, super sad to see beige go

Any chance we can keep the alternate accent keys? Pink on green enter and esc?

Was one of the other factors of this set that stood out for me.

[Lil]

i rather dislike the change to icons, even if they are OG. vaporwave would embrace the odd contradiction of having hiragana alphas with traditional gmk icon + text mods. i'm glad you kept the beige though. it's amazing how so many people do not actually understand vaporwave's original aesthetic (including 90s pc/mac gui) and think it's only pink and neon green.

You could be right! I think my preferred Mod style is Icon+text, and it might've looked better. It's just I think the common consensus across keysets is that pairing hiragana mono-legends with Icon mods is the way to go and I think going against that trend might have turned people away if they were going for a j-legend only look. I realise that everyone has their preferred style of mods, so it's always going to be difficult decision to make and not always for everyone. My main motivation at this point is doing everything I can in getting this colourway to run successfully, which is why I settled on Icons this time.

I agree that gray isn't really a big part of the Vaporwave style. I assume it comes from the album cover which is only used on the edge and was not part of the cover art. Not sure why this is chosen over the light green for the mods.

Windows 95 and old computer graphical user interfaces are a key motif of vaporwave imagery as Wil has said, moreover if you search for vaporwave on google you will see it come up numerous times. Why did I want a neutral colour for the Mods? I feel like it balances the colour in the keyset - otherwise it can be too garish, that being said the grey might be a bit dark; RAL 000 70 00 might be a bit closer to the original inspiration. I went with 65 in the renders because it's easier to see the contrast. Here's an example:

RAL 000 70 00                                                                                                                                                                                                  RAL 000 65 00

Thats a nice pink, but the font color seems hard to distinguish imo

In my eyes the renders kind of represent how it would look in blaring direct sunlight, I think the difficulty in distinguishing it is just an artifact of the render in that sense. If you look at the photograph I've taken I don't think it would be lacking in contrast in real life and should be quite easy to see.

seems like the hhkb backspace is missing from the base kit? other than that, no complaints - loving the 40s support in the base kit itself!
all the best with the keyset, looking forward to seeing the novelties

Ah you're right, I think I might've accidentally deleted that - I'll make sure it's in there. Thanks, I'm hoping they'll be good!

Man, super sad to see beige go

Any chance we can keep the alternate accent keys? Pink on green enter and esc?

Was one of the other factors of this set that stood out for me.

I actually preferred the beige too but the lack of contrast in the renders meant I don't think others would appreciate it as much I was also worried about gmk being able to match it because there are no RALs that I could find that were similar enough.
I will definitely consider putting accents back into the keyset

[Almost]

Love this so much. Imo this direction is good (for me personally hh)))

Big on combining sets and right now the colours are perfect. Love the Windows grey and 3.0 colours SO much. Smash this, hyperfuse, analogue on a warez sun stained PS2 keyboard. Coil up a light cream rubberised cable with PS/2 connectors.

Beige Filco is screaming for this. Gonna order some 3d dolphin stickers ready.

Those worried about loosing beige.. get yourself a beige board! It's worth it, trust.

[!Q]

Can we get 1u convex? please? thank? appreciate it.

[wil]

GMK moq is such a pain because this set really deserves those beige modifiers. i'm pained but i get your need to make this ready for a groupbuy. i just wish people had the foresight to see what they're missing out on!

[Lil]

Hi everyone

I've had feedback from my preferred vendor that the chosen colours were lacking vibrancy, which upon reflection, I agree with. I was too focused on matching the colour tone of the colour inspiration and not concerned enough with the feeling and composition. I will be focusing more on the latter going forward, as I think it has to look good and evoke the right feeling.
This real life photograph is a good example of the colours being washed out


Good news is I have looked into good alpha/legend combinations and have an easy to understand visual comparison available



That being said, I think I prefer 190c alpha and 333c legend if keeping to the inspiration, otherwise 177c could be fun as an alpha colour if that wasn't emphasised. Feel free to tell me your preference though.

Final mod colour is next up on the chopping block, Once I have narrowed down on the options I will most likely allow everyone to vote on their preferred mod colour out of 2 or 3 options and the winner will be used. Reason being is that I understand some prefer beige and others grey, I want to be fair. Now that the alpha colours will have more vibrancy, the mods will affect the composition differently so everyone can be the judge.

Once that's done, final renders aren't far away and hopefully confirmation that the set is up to standard to be run with my first choice of vendor.

I realise the colour changes are a bit bewildering but I want to make the best final set when it gets into everyone's hands, rather than rush the designing stage. There is no good reason to do this with the current manufacturing delays we can expect. I'm not scared of making a change if it will better the end result.

Novelties are underway, there'll be an update for that soon i'm hoping and maybe a vote as to the best ones.

[Lil]

I've narrowed down the alpha colours, and created a poll if you want to vote on your preference https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSckuWwU0pl-HeSx-gDvg2oCuU2wWf6mtnrbJB2NyS9CM1Z3Mg/viewform

[mutthunt]

Really appreciate this update, I can see you're really putting in the work to get this set where it needs to be.
Definitely feel much happier about these new colours and the contrast they give and I agree the two you've got it down to are the best of the lot.
I did put my vote to 333C at first, but looking again I think 3385C matches the warmer pink tone better so it comes together a bit better; that being said I think i'd have a hard time seeing the difference without the direct comparison to help.

Great stuff, the upcoming modifiers will be interesting

[Almost]

333C looks close to any cyber-future cool colourways. The 3385C adds just enough green to make it more like some 1970's turquoise/pink bathroom which is what IIIIIII want for MEEEEE

Both of those colours are great. Either would look rad

[Lil]

It was a unanimous vote for 3385c, bar one but that might have been mutthunt's initial vote because I don't think I allowed for editing responses on the form.

Current novelty ideas are based around the idea of Iconography; the nostalgia for past days, old ways of life and forgotten gods. When we seemed closer to and yet less aware of the essence of being human.
I wanted to keep the feeling of vaporwave imagery but go in a novel direction. Thanks to Meatsmoothies for their help

1. Sacred Ibis novelty for backspace or shift, representing the Egyptian deity Thoth


2. Eye novelty perhaps for esc or other 1u keys


3. Four-winged serpent novelty, Ansi enter (maybe shift)


4. Ares, the decrepit god of war; ISO novelty


5. Feather novelty, representing a desire for freedom. R4 key: 1.25u/1u key? An alt version will be avail which will be mirrored in the other direction


There might be more but these are the initial assortment of novelties, I will probably try to get them rendered soon so it's easier to see what they will look like. My current idea is that the 'accents' will be novelty keys with a 3385 background, or 333c alternatively and 190c as the legend colour, but i'm open to suggestions.


In regards to mod colours, I have been looking for alternatives. It seems like the 4240c etc isn't viable due to a lack of contrast. Hopefully the attached render will illustrate it for you to see.


To explain the process, I started off with colours that looked good irl or that I thought would work well on the RAL book and Pantone colour guides, and then wanted to test the contrast to see if they would be viable.
The renders are depicted in direct sunlight conditions currently - in real life indoors during the daytime the colour references for the mod colours do look noticeably darker to me.
I'll try to work out the best way to do the renders going forward, whether that's with renders in different lighting environments or just showing a comparison like was done with Future Funk, i'm not sure at this point.
That being said, I will endeavour to make the renders as representative of the chosen colours as possible.


The last 3 make it easier to see how much of a difference contrast can make. 080 60 05 is probably best in terms of beige colours here.

[Ellen_Degenocide]

That 080 70 05 RAL beige is such a nice match with the pink, but hard to argue with the contrast on the 080 60 05.

[wil]

080 70 05 RAL reads to me as a grey and it seems to be called a "grey" (Goosewing Grey Aerosol)

080 60 05 and TGG are just the absolute best from all those comparisons on there, and both are beige! this was born to be a set with beige modifiers


really excellent stuff here on doing the work to keep this IC going. i am digging the novelties but i think i'd like some more vulgar stuff in there.

[Ellen_Degenocide]

080 70 05 RAL reads to me as a grey and it seems to be called a "grey" (Goosewing Grey Aerosol)

080 60 05 and TGG are just the absolute best from all those comparisons on there, and both are beige! this was born to be a set with beige modifiers


really excellent stuff here on doing the work to keep this IC going. i am digging the novelties but i think i'd like some more vulgar stuff in there.

Yeah -  I was looking at this on my phone when I posted that last night. When I open it up on my monitor I'm actually all about the 080 60 10. Agree 100% on the 'born to be beige'!

[Lil]

Updated OP with the Novelty kit - named 'Nostalgia 懐古'. Renders done by Pikku-allu, novelty design by Meatsmoothies and myself. There might be more keys added later but for now this is the current novelty kit.



Up next are board renders! Once the keyset composition has been finalised with the vendor the remaining kits will be re-rendered with updated colours!

[Lil]

I've updated the first post with board renders of the AKG OGR by Alchemist Keyboards, I have to say Pikku-Allu smashed it out of the park with these!
We were aiming for a variety of different lighting to show how the set might look like in different environments. There's also a colour comparison between the old and new colours for visual reference.

Here's one aiming to be colour accurate in neutral lighting, showing off the accent coloured-novelties



Some silver ano renders





Dappled shade on Vintage E-white





Vintage E-white



Old vs New colours

[LXVRGS]

love the new colors but i gotta be honest im not seeing the connection with the source material and these current novelties.

[Lil]

love the new colors but i gotta be honest im not seeing the connection with the source material and these current novelties.

Going back to the original theme of Vaporwave; it is critiquing or anti-capitalism - to me the music represents a nostalgia for a time before societal servitude to Corporate whims and profits. Where gods or ideals were worshipped and held in veneration instead of brands, idols and consumer products. The novelties are either trying to capture that feeling, represent the dilapidated/forgotten deities who have fallen out of memory, or go in an original direction with alternative Vaporwave imagery that could've replaced greek or roman Iconography with Egyptian ones. In my mind the cover of Floral Shoppe visually represents the sunset of the old world with Helios the sun god presented in a beheaded and defaced manner and the colours of Dusk behind him

Of course this is all a bit tongue in cheek because this is a keyset that I am advertising, but I hope the current theme of the novelties seems a bit more coherent now

[Lil]

The final AKB OGR Render, along with an unedited photograph of the pantones from real life - neutral lighting away from direct light source. Renders on the En-Dash will follow soon



I'd say whilst the tone is correct, the pink looks darker in person

[mutthunt]

That novelty ISO is my Achilles' heel alright. I like the simplicity of the feathers but not sure the other more specific icons are ones i'd be as invested in but thats just me.
Colours look superb, brilliant renders. Can't wait!

[i luv chuletas]

Just saw the new renders on the new colors.

...

I love you.

[grundlemere]

This is a weird set! (In a good way) I can't figure out what it has to do with Egypt but I think the colorway is stellar and will make for some nice matchy-matchy. Good work on color correction.

[syke]

I like either 190c, 204c, 211c with 333c combination.

Definitely waiting on these. Especially the hiragana set.

[quinnx]

This set caught my eyes. Really seeing the growth and how feedback of community can contribute to the final product. But I really don't see the connection between the novelties and vaporware concept, unless we talking about the shows American Gods ) . The word itself have different meaning than what you interpret, just my 5 cents. I totally adore this set and will join gb except for the mods icon 

[Jaxxstatic]

This set is definitely not for me.
BUT I just want to appreciate you for the resolution that you upload all your renders in.
Nicely done.

[FaKe_VirTual]

I really like the clash of the colours with the Egypt theme. It has a really modern touch to it.
The improvement of colours does also fit really good to the theme.

[Almost]

OOOO THE NOVELS YAAASE

egytian gods are perfect, it's exactly the theme wtf

the Egyptians were cooler than Romans anyway ancient rome sucks I hate roman

edit
NO IT REMInds me of when Harrods in London does Egypt themes with all the Gods and nobody complains because they're all dead. All that big boy history, culture and beliefs reduced to a wacky experience used to help peddle extortionate products to vapid nobodies. Seth besiege thee

[Lil]

Some updated Basekit + Alphas kit renders. These are what i'm hoping to go with, unless the quotes end up being unfeasible.

[lakeboredom]

Miss the old colors tbh. New green is alright, but I definitely miss the lighter grey which went better with the light green. Still like the set, but not sure if it'll work for me now.

[i luv chuletas]

Dude that set is going to look absolutely bonkers on a polycarb unit.

Colors work beautifully, and that new mods color is a nice inbetween of retro gray and beige.

Now for a 40's kit 

[chriszhu]

These renders are so good 👍

[kidviddy]

Thank you for including full JIS compatibility in the hiragana kit!  Looks great.

[parablol]

RIP Planck support

[futurecrime]

Really like this set now. Ticks a lot of boxes for me colourwise. I'm digging it.