Apple’s iCloud Icon Uses The Golden Ratio

Apple's design reputation is so established at this point that, if they hadn't used the Golden Ratio, I suspect there would be articles titled "Why does Apple's iCloud Icon deliberately ignore the Golden Ratio?"

As far as I know there is no scientific evidence which would prove that people prefer artworks that are aligned to golden ratio proportions. In other words - golden ratio is pure pseudoscience when used in context of design: <a href="http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/pseudo/fibonacc.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/pseudo/fibonacc.htm</a>

It may use the golden ration, but I don't find the iCloud logo that nice or that memorable.

The interesting stuff its the images, unless you know japanese of course.<p>Here is the google translate: <a href="http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&#38;prev=_t&#38;hl=es&#38;ie=UTF-8&#38;layout=2&#38;eotf=1&#38;sl=auto&#38;tl=en&#38;u=http%3A%2F%2Fstam-design-stam.blogspot.com%2F2011%2F06%2Ficloud.html" rel="nofollow">http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&#38;prev=_t&#38;h...</a>

Nice find, but for me that's just basic design principles applied to an icon design. The golden ratio isn't really something that's new or anything...

What's the ratio between the two 1.6 circles?

I just happened to wonder yesterday whether there actually was any scientific data on whether the golden ratio is actually significantly more pleasing than other ratios.<p>Turns out there isn't much data, and of what there is, it doesn't always point at a significant preference for certain ratios. And even where it does, and then where it actually points near the golden ratio, it's inconclusive whether people prefer 1.5, 1.618 or 1.666.<p>But yeah they do turn up in nature over and over again.<p>The "aesthetically pleasing" bit is just something that's been repeated for centuries, swallowed without thinking.<p>So if there actually <i>were</i> a preference, that sounds like a good explanation. Doesn't really mean it works the other way around, though.<p>also see: <a href="http://plus.maths.org/content/os/issue22/features/golden/index" rel="nofollow">http://plus.maths.org/content/os/issue22/features/golden/ind...</a>

Artists Komar and Melamid demonstrated the how artistic preferences vary around the world with a 1995 project called "Most Wanted and Least Wanted Paintings".<p>Komar and Melamid's paintings <i>"reflect the artists' interpretation of a professional market research survey about aesthetic preferences and taste in painting. Intending to discover what a true "people's art" would look like, the artists ... expanded their market research to more than a dozen countries around the globe and in turn, created Most Wanted and Least Wanted paintings for each country."</i><p>Curiously, Holland's most and least wanted preferences are nearly the reverse of the other countries!<p>* Survey results: <a href="http://awp.diaart.org/km/" rel="nofollow">http://awp.diaart.org/km/</a><p>* The resulting paintings: <a href="http://awp.diaart.org/km/painting.html" rel="nofollow">http://awp.diaart.org/km/painting.html</a>

This site seems to be filled with wonderful design goodies.<p><pre><code> I wish two things: 1. That I could read Japanese 2. The site was in English.</code></pre>

I get the impression that designers just use the golden ratio as a very quick way to choose different sizes for objects and layouts. It's really not that interesting.

<a href="http://www.macrumors.com/2011/06/16/icloud-logo-infused-with-golden-ratio/" rel="nofollow">http://www.macrumors.com/2011/06/16/icloud-logo-infused-with...</a><p>BS is called in the comments section of this article

Hey Apple, hows about you come back out of your own asshole?