Many websites require that you create a profile to take advantage of their services. Some of those sites give you the option to upload a picture of yourself. Depending on the norms of the that particular site, the image you upload can either be a real picture or an avatar (an avatar is a graphical representation of something).
Twitter lets you upload an image representing yourself. LinkedIn does it. Automattic has created the Gravatar service to let you leave your avatar wherever you leave comments on a wordpress.com blog or a wordpress.org blog that supports avatars. It’s a great service that’s very simple to use.
My good friend, Shane Lewis, is an awesome illustrator. I asked him a few months ago if he would take some time out of his busy schedule to draw me an avatar. I think he did a great job.
Shane says that whenever he draws somebody, that person usually complains because there is something wrong with the drawing. For example, you’ll notice that my avatar has more hair than the real me. I’ll take it. It’s a cartoon. Aren’t obvious things like baldness and big noses supposed to be accentuated in cartoons, avatars, etc. It’s not a portrait.
I’m using my avatar in lots of places. I can’t decide if I should replace the picture on my home page with my avatar. What do you think? I even took the liberty to make it my favicon (look at the url in the browser).
Everybody let me know what you think. And, Shane, thanks for your help. I might be coming to you soon for another drawing.
I'm Josh Harrison, a WordPress developer for
I think that you should replace your picture with the avatar. The only place that I try to use a “real” image of myself is on LinkedIn because that’s more for business purposes. Of course, the gallery on my website is an exception. How cool would it be though if every picture I had in my gallery was a cartoon?
I think your illustrator friend is veri professional. I liked it so much.
Sorry, for my bad English. I am a Turk.