Has anyone figured out how to get custom icons on Director projectors?

The toolset program download(http://www.microangelo.us).

C: \ Program Files (x86) \ Adobe \ Adobe Director 11 \ Projec32.skl change the icon by toolset program.

When you create an exe from adobe Director, then icon will change automatically.

Exe file  are generated by Projec32.skl files and project file.

If you are making custom icons for Windows projectors, the icon file needs to be in the .ICO format, typically with different icon sizes within the file. There are various software packages that can be used to do this, or you can find online services that convert bitmaps to .ICO.

On the Mac, the icon file needs to be in the .ICNS format. Unfortunately one icon file will not serve for both platforms. You have to use .ICO for Windows and .ICNS for Mac.

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/192/tn_19274.html

the search feature does work on this forum; I just used it to find a previous post where I had provided some solutions:
http://forums.adobe.com/message/4094398#4094398

... and the 'More Like This' section on the right-hand side also helpfully provides another post link about custom icons where I posted the same info:
http://forums.adobe.com/message/251486#251486

In short, searching the forum for a common topic like custom icons can be very beneficial - I know because it helps me find my previous posts when I'm responding to the same questions asked over and over again on this forum. :-)

I am trying to create a projector in Director 11.5 that will pick up a icon that I have already created. (will all proper formatting, .icon extension etc.)  In the publish option, where it asks for the location of the icon, I select this icon that  I used for my previous projector. All's okay, a projector is made but it will not pick up the icon.

I have done this a few times, clearly Director 11.5 projector making process for using a custom icon does not work.

Perhaps someone knows better here!

I've never encountered a problem with adding custom icons through Director 11.5's publishing options interface. I'm guessing there may be a problem with your icon. Could you post a link to your icon somewhere so I can check to see if it's been created properly? Thanks. Btw, what OS are you using? Vista, Mac, Win 7?...

I'm using the simple software "Greenfish Icon Editor Pro" for changing the icon of a projector. It's freeware. If you want to try, here's a quick tutorial: after starting the editor go to files and open your projector.exe. Click on the projector icon in the new window "library" and click the button "replace resources" (4. button from left). Choose your icon made by yourself and click the "save" button in the library window. That's it! The editor automatic overrides all types of icons packed in the projector.exe with the new  icon and resizes and resamples the new image to the needs of the included icons.

If you already have an icon that you just need to add to your projector and for some reason cannot through the Publish settings in Director's Authoring environment then take a look at my app called RiEditor to

1) add a custom icon to your projector (incl. Vista compatible icons)

2) add custom File version information to your Projector so you can brand the app with your version and company info.

It can be found (for free) here: http://www.director-online.com/dougwiki/index.php?title=Resource_and_Icon_Editor

*Note: RiEditor was made with Director, so try it and support a fellow developer :-)

vav_djjd wrote:

 

I'm using the simple software "Greenfish Icon Editor Pro" for changing the icon of a projector. It's freeware. If you want to try, here's a quick tutorial: after starting the editor go to files and open your projector.exe. Click on the projector icon in the new window "library" and click the button "replace resources" (4. button from left). Choose your icon made by yourself and click the "save" button in the library window. That's it! The editor automatic overrides all types of icons packed in the projector.exe with the new  icon and resizes and resamples the new image to the needs of the included icons.

I tried Greenfish.It appears starighforward and looks like it works immediately. You see the projector with the new icon. But It corrupts the original file. Spent a while to see if I can make it work. NO.

I also tried Icon Changer. Paid the $24.95 since it only lets you try three icon changes before it makes you pay. I was just poking around and could not even figure out if it works, it then stops working and want me to pay. Feeling desparate, I paid. Same here. Icon Changer also corrupted the Projector as well. I have asked for my money back, will see if they do!

Then I downloaded Microangelo. It has four components. I tried them all and found no easy way to change the icon of the projector. The program also kept crashing. Perhaps there is a way to do it in Microangelo, but I could not find it.

BTW, I am using System 7 with Direcotor 11.5,

I have yet to find a way to change the icon of my Windows projector.

Any help would be most welcome.

C. Lang

Try my RiEdtor (built using Director). It can be found here:

http://www.director-online.com/dougwiki/index.php?title=Resource_and_Icon_Editor

Josh

John,

I did try it and it won't do it for me. I even tried it by first logging in as an admin. But that did not work either. I also quitted Explorer as you suggest, and then restarted it. But that was also to no aviail. My Windows icons seems to be stuck on the file with superglue!

Any other ideas?

Thanks,

Charan

can you upload your file somewhere so I can test?... or a test file, if you're having this problem with all projectors.

Hi Josh,

Thanks for your help.

I have added the projector and the icon file on this link

http://www.readinglesson.com/data/trlcon.icon

http://www.readinglesson.com/data/testprojector.exe

Thanks so much for your help.

Charan

Thats

http://www.readinglesson.com/data/trlcon.ico

http://www.readinglesson.com/data/testprojector.exe

Thanks,

Charan

Based off the icon you sent I would tend to say you haven't been creating

the icon set at all... the icon should contain at least these in D11.5:

16x16, 4-bit (that's 16 colours)

32x32, 4-bit

48x48, 4-bit (actually, this size is not used so can be removed)

16x16, 8-bit (that's 256 colours, 1 colour alpha)

32x32, 8-bit

48x48, 8-bit

16x16, 32-bit (that's 16 mil. colours, 8-bit alpha)

32x32, 32-bit

48x48, 32-bit

256x256, 32-bit PNG image, compressed

You need to add more icon sizes into the icon resource file. The window

uses the 16x16, 32-bit icon on 24-bit monitors, the explorer window shows

the 48x48, 32-bit icon all the way up to the 256x256 icon when sliding the

display to 'extra large icons', and the taskbar uses the 32x32, 32-bit

icon, for instance.

After building an icon resource file with all those sizes and bit depths

you should be good to use the Publish option to add the icon to your

projector.

see (an old article) here:

http://helpx.adobe.com/director/kb/make-custom-icon-director-projectors.html

.. and here for PNGs in icon sets:

http://www.axialis.com/tutorials/tutorial-vistaicons.html

Josh

jOSH,

Thank you so much for taking the time to diagnose the problem. I have been using this same icon for projectors in the past without problem. But things have progressed I guess, so I need a full suite.

Thanks again. Will post my news after I create all these sizes.

Charan

What I've described above is the whole basis of icons and how Windows handles icons added to the resource section of your executable. It certainly would have worked in the past the same as it does now - only showing the 32x32, 8-bit resource in certain instances, but not in every situation such as the window titlebar. Using an icon editor or more appropriately, a resource editor you can see this for yourself. Director's Publishing options only takes that icon resource file specified and pulls each of the supplied icons from it to replace the corresponding 'Di' icons.

It's definitely worth reading up on icons and fooling around with a resource editor to see what I'm talking about. That's how I learned a good deal of how executables are structured. A good open source resource editor is Resource Hacker.

To add, the reason many of the editors previously mentioned in the thread would ruin the executable is because of the way Director "publishes" the executable. The specs for an executable allow for the attachment of arbitrary data onto the end of it. Director chose this route to create it's "standalone" executable where everything it needs, including the dependencies (ie. dlls, xtras, etc) are packaged into the executable; essentially appended to the end of the skeleton executable. You can find this skeleton executable in Director's application folder. It's called Projec32.skl. So, getting back to the editors in question, what they tend to do is only concern themselves with the skeleton executable since most applications store all that data and dependencies as separate files. The editors simple consider it extraneous garbage that can be removed.

You can build a non-standalone application simply using the Projec32.skl file, renaming it to whatever you want, such as myApplication.exe, making an ini file called "myApplication.ini" and adding this to it:

[Movies]

Movie01=myApp

Then in Director you create a basic project and save it as myApp.dir and put it in the same folder as myApplication.exe. When you run myApplication.exe it will look for and launch myApp.dir. Any Xtras you use can be put in a folder named "xtras" in the same folder as your executable too.

You are a gem of kindness. Thanks for helping me and want you to know I am most grateful.

My big mistake as you pointed out was assuming that a single icon would do the trick for all, when infact, I need a whole file.

Thanks again.

Charan

One additional question. How do I save the icon sets. Are they saved as library or one at a time. I tried to save them as .ico and see only one and then am not sucessful again in changing the projector icon. So clealry I am still off on the icon file format.

Charan

any icon editor can create an icon resource for you with all the icon

sizes/bit-depths in it. I even have some very unfinished Director code (big

thanks to Valentin) that will create a single icon resource file from a set

of images.

Try some open source icon editors like:

http://speckyboy.com/2008/05/03/top-5-free-icon-editors-for-the-pro-designer/

-- I know the first one, icoFX, is not free anymore unless you download an

older version from here:

http://www.crystalxp.net/news/en275-icofx-icon-editor-free-software.html

http://sourceforge.net/projects/variicons/ -- tried this one out but I

found it a bit quirky. Looks nice, though.

Josh

I was able to create a Windows projector with icon on Mac 10.8 with Director 11.5 using the projector's create icon command. The 2 key things seem to be as mentioned here that the icon needs to conform exactly to the expected format. Secondly, the icon needs to be named the shape as the projector but with an ".ico" extension.

The way I matched the format was to open the default Director projector icon in Axlias IconWorkshop and replicate all the formats displayed in my custom icon. These formats seem like they might vary with the versions of Director/operating systems, so its important to check it. Otherwise, your icon will fail.

IcoFX is an award winning professional icon and cursor editor. It is an all-in-one solution for icon creation, extraction and editing. It is designed to work with Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Macintosh icons supporting transparency. Create Windows icons up to 256x256 for Windows Vista/7 and Macintosh icons up to 1024x1024 for Macintosh OSX 10.7 Lion.

http://icofx.ro/

Versiown replaces the standard icon of a Adobe/Macromedia Flash, Director or Authorware projector into one that you choose yourself. Give your projects a more personal & professional touch!

http://www.goldshell.com/versiown/main.htm

Hi,

I have been using the process that Josh suggested, the whiole problem of projector not accepting the icon has to do with the icon file format. If you have the full set of required sizes in the icon file set, it works fine.

So just make sure you do that before attaching a icon file to the projector.

Charan

Basically I think you need an good icon set, and I think it must be PNG format. Seanau stock icons is good, thier icon is professional for your business.

http://www.seanau.com/icon_collections.htm

http://www.iconsfind.com is also good.