Avatars

[Flat32]

I'm looking for a specific image that I want to use for my avatar on this forum and need help finding it. In the old car magazines there was one advertiser that had a cartoon mechanic with a square face due to having a 4-way lug wrench in his mouth and I can't remember for the life of me who the company is. 

Unfortunately my car magazines from the 50's and 60's are in deep storage somewhere. I vaguely recall there was a story about how this character came to be.

This is driving me nuts.

[Flat32]

Hastings Piston Rings.  And I used my own feeble memory and Google to find it.

[peteski]

The forum modifies avatar images to fit into circular format.  Yours got squished!  If you cropped the head into a square format bitmap (and leave a bit more background around the head, that should nicely fit into a circle without any distortion, or the head being cropped by the circle.  Just leave the avatar image you are uploading square - the circle cropping will be done by the forum.

Edited April 6, 2020 by peteski

[Flat32]

I will be converting the image to vector.  Found it strange that the forum crop guide box is square and the image comes out round.

[peteski]

It is some sort of a mask the forum applies when it displays the image.  Converting it to vectors won't help - it needs to be a bitmap for the forum.   Bitmaps by definition have to be rectangular in shape.

Couple of forum software upgrades ago the avatars were displayed as squares.  But I guess the latest fad (in many social networking apps, and messaging apps) is to display round avatars, so they jumped on the same bandwagon here too.

Edited April 6, 2020 by peteski

[Flat32]

So would I be correct in assuming the final circular result has a diameter equal to the square mask side length??  

Fit the bitmap within the square mask anticipating an inscribed circle crop?

Would be helpful to know the dimensions of the forum mask.

Edited April 6, 2020 by Flat32

[Snake45]

14 hours ago, Flat32 said:

...a cartoon mechanic with a square face due to having a 4-way lug wrench in his mouth

Lug wrench? I'm not seeing a 4-way lug wrench. 

[Flat32]

You're not his dentist.?

[Snake45]

When you posted yesterday, just since I had about 20 minutes to kill before dinner, I tried google-imaging it, in various ways, based on your description. I looked at hundreds if not thousands of old hot rod decals, stickers, and logo, but didn't find anything that looked remotely like a "lug wrench mouth" or "wrench mouth." 

Now I know why. 

[Flat32]

I spent five hours doing my Google best before I posted the question and then another frantic five thereafter and immediately posted my finding of it.

Now that you've seen it do you remember seeing it before??? In car magazines??

Just found this: Hastings sticker  Apparently they aren't big on sponsoring anything these days.  Had an hour and a half to kill finding out why your,and mine, decal searches were fruitless.

And now I know. ?

[Snake45]

26 minutes ago, Flat32 said:

Now that you've seen it do you remember seeing it before??? In car magazines??

Not particularly, no. I don't have too many car magazines before about 1964 (fewer than a dozen) but I don't remember that ad or logo. 

[peteski]

9 hours ago, Flat32 said:

So would I be correct in assuming the final circular result has a diameter equal to the square mask side length??  

Fit the bitmap within the square mask anticipating an inscribed circle crop?

Would be helpful to know the dimensions of the forum mask.

No need.  All you need to do is upload (preferably square) bitmap avatar.  The resizing and circular mask are actually done live by the forum's software, as it displays it on your browser.  To see what I mean, right click on your circular avatar and select "view image".  What you will actually see is your original square photo. Computers are fun!