I agree with what you are saying, I don't think it contradicts what I intended to articulate. I was trying to get across that dropping a modular piece of code such as say a Database system(Like MySQL) into a project gives you a huge chunk of functionality which you can then build on top of. I can't think of the equivalent for Art, except for widget sets or something along those lines. Or a grid/layout template that doesn't require you to then go and have to update any existing art to mesh well with the new art.
Now to be fair: you can come up with the equivalent of the MySQL situation where say you start the project with say a widget set and just match it's style moving forward.
I could probably match all my concrete coding examples with a modular art project but I think there are two issues that in general going to come up:
1) A lot Graphic Designers are not to strong at building modular art as it requires a more rigid process. There are exceptions of course, but we are talking about in general why there aren't as many Graphic Designers contributing to Open Source projects. (Wordpress though is a good example of where there are tonnes of Themes provided by Designers).
2) Reusing a popular Design can make your project look more derivate than unique. Where as with code this is less the case. Though with popular Widget sets such as the design by Sofa for Cappuccino (http://ajaxian.com/archives/cappuccino-07-aristo-ui-theme-en...) is a good example of Great design that maybe benefits from this familiarity as it's easier to grasp what widgets do when you've used other Apps using them.
I agree with what you are saying, I don't think it contradicts what I intended to articulate. I was trying to get across that dropping a modular piece of code such as say a Database system(Like MySQL) into a project gives you a huge chunk of functionality which you can then build on top of. I can't think of the equivalent for Art, except for widget sets or something along those lines. Or a grid/layout template that doesn't require you to then go and have to update any existing art to mesh well with the new art.
Now to be fair: you can come up with the equivalent of the MySQL situation where say you start the project with say a widget set and just match it's style moving forward.
I could probably match all my concrete coding examples with a modular art project but I think there are two issues that in general going to come up:
1) A lot Graphic Designers are not to strong at building modular art as it requires a more rigid process. There are exceptions of course, but we are talking about in general why there aren't as many Graphic Designers contributing to Open Source projects. (Wordpress though is a good example of where there are tonnes of Themes provided by Designers).
2) Reusing a popular Design can make your project look more derivate than unique. Where as with code this is less the case. Though with popular Widget sets such as the design by Sofa for Cappuccino (http://ajaxian.com/archives/cappuccino-07-aristo-ui-theme-en...) is a good example of Great design that maybe benefits from this familiarity as it's easier to grasp what widgets do when you've used other Apps using them.