Here is a desktop icon of the next generation 3G iPhone, Apple’s beautiful, smartphone with a multi-touch screen, released today.

Did you get your iPhone? Well here is an iPhone icon you can put on your desktop whether or not you were able to get an iPhone.

For those of you who are interested in how the icon was created, I made it entirely in vectors. It was quite interesting to create the realistic look, especially the metal part, with vectors only.

I hope you enjoy it!

Tags: iPhone, Mac OS X, Leopard, Windows, Vista, Apple, realism, desktop customization

I am delighted to announce that my article about how to create 512x512 icons for Mac OS X Leopard has been published at Smashing Magazine!

Smashing Magazine delivers useful, inspirational and innovative information for designers and web-developers and it's a great pleasure for me to contribute to such a creative designer environment!

“In 2000 Apple released the visual theme Aqua, a stunning leap forward in graphical user interface design. At the same time Apple published the Human Interface Guidelines (HIG), a tool for developers and designers that gives a detailed breakdown of the design philosophy behind Aqua. Apple recently updated their Human Interface Guidelines (HIG), to include the way the visual theme Aqua has evolved in Apple's latest operating system, OS X 10.5 Leopard. This is the first update since 2006.”

Aqua: "Gorgeous, artistic icons are an important part of the Mac OS X user experience. Users expect beautiful icons that tell an application’s story in a clear and memorable way". Well, how do icon designers go about creating beautiful icons in 512x512 glory? Leopard and the Updated HIG: A Designer's Guide to Icons examines Aqua's interface. Realism, symbols, silhouettes, transparency, light source and perspective. We take a look at the Dock, Leopard's file browser Cover Flow and the icon sizes. Finally you will find some practical tips on how to scale your art work so that the smaller versions become crisp and clear.

Tags: Apple, Mac OS X, Leopard, usability, interface, gui, realism