My Process for Icons
My process will vary depending on the style of icon. As an example, let's use the Barbershop token that I made for New World; an icon that is meant to represent a "real" or physical currency in the game world.
Step 1 - Sketch
​​​For any icon, I start with a rough drawing. In the case of our example, I first needed to determine the basic silhouette. These icons render very small, about 24px, so the shape is going to be very important for being distinguishable among the other currencies. I make sure to define those shapes as well for comparison.
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These drawings look poor, but my goal is not to make a pretty drawing, just to jot down my initial thoughts quickly, work through the bad ideas, and distill down to the ones that hold promise and are worth exploring further.
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Step 2 - Model
Next comes some quick modelling to check viability of the design. With Barbershop, I knew by this point that scissors were going to be our main focus, but the specifics of how they're represented needed exploration.
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Working off some reference images I could find online, I started with 16th century scissors, something that would line up historically with the timeline of New World.
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While these certainly didn't lack character, inner concave shapes from the handle and small width of the blades didn't translate well at small scale.
Step 3 - Iterate
This is where I start playing around. Different scissors, new backer. Adjust backer, add a trim color. Remove backer, add details, ask did I go too far?
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I use review cycles to gather outside perspectives, see what's working and more importantly isn't working for them. Sometimes the changes are minimal, other times they're drastic. Whatever it takes to get to the best result.
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This feedback loop is where I find working in 3D offers the greatest sustainability. If something as simple as the tilt of the object doesn't feel right, I can just adjust and re-render. Adding and removing elements also becomes simple to accomplish, enabling multiple iterations even within tight deadlines.
Final Polish and Result
Final polish for me typically involves some post-processing or cleanup in Photoshop. A lot of what I do in Blender is to get it at least 80-90% there and then I can cleanup the lighting or color after the render. In the case of our scissors, it was a push and pull, trying some different levels of detail before going back to something simpler, with a stronger silhouette.
What we were left with was a "sharp" visual that read at the small scale for our primary Barbershop flow, but also presented beautifully blown up for our MTX store.