Hello everyone! This post is the second in a series about thumbnail images. Check out the first installment here if you missed it. Basically, this is all about my "graphic design journey" (to use the term lightly, for an amateur like myself) in experimenting and attempting to find a solid method for creating thumbnail images for my content that are — well, better than those I had in the past. Given the atrocious quality of many of my old thumbnails, this oughtn't be so difficult of a task. Also, it's about inviting anyone who would like to be involved to come along for the ride via these posts and live streams.

Yesterday, I re-did 16 of my old thumbnail images, and about 6 of them were done on a live stream. I do apologize for changing the schedule of the stream so many times, as I was dealing with extenuating circumstances due to severe cold weather which led to extended power outages in my area. Though to be fair, I am generally quite terrible at sticking to schedules... however, if you click "set reminder" on the embedded video at the bottom of this post, you will receive a YT notification whenever the stream goes live.

In this second installment of the live stream, we will be going all the way back to the earliest videos I uploaded 10+ years ago and attempting to make something halfway decent out of screenshots of the 480p footage! I'd imagine we will be heavily relying on Deep Dream Generator for these as the screenshots themselves will look quite grainy and dated.

As I did in my last post, I am going to upload comparison images below for all of the old and new versions of the thumbnails that were worked on in the last episode.

First of all, thumbnails will often appear quite small where they are displayed, often on a mobile device. Due to this, simple is best. I initially disliked the guidance of some to not add any text, but have come to agree with this. It can be VERY difficult to read text on thumbnail images even if it is large and bold. The style I am going for right now is quite simplistic and hinges on the use of a DPEND logo.

Here are a few general principles based on my current understanding of what makes a good thumbnail image:

1) Aesthetically pleasing — very simply, it "looks nice." It entices a click just by virtue of this.
2) Simple — there are only one or two main focal points of the image.
3) Stylistic — it does a good job of representing the style or "brand" of the content.
4) Colorful — with a thumbnail, contrast and saturation are your friend. Makes it stand out.
5) Familiar — the object(s) in the image are recognizable.
6) Bold — the object(s) in the image stand out from one another, as well as from the background.
7) Cohesive — the overall image looks professional and "makes sense."