We are in the final stretch folks.  This Friday, December 5th is the deadline to submit Icons and WB Skins for the Most Usable & Most Unique events in both categories.  At 11:59pm EST on the 5th, we will lock the ability to upload new skins/icons, as well as the ability to modify already posted ones, so if you have any last-minute updates, get them in soon.

Judging will happen next Monday, and user voting will begin on Tuesday. 

The IconPackager event is absolutely insane this year!  Island Dog just did a quick round-up on some of the latest GUIC Icon Entries and there's no doubt that the competition will be fierce.  Judging these is going to be really tough.

For WindowBlinds, I know a lot of you are putting the finishing touches on your work, but don't wait too long to submit!  I know some of the biggest WB skinning names in the community are furiously working on their entries, so by the end of the week we should have some awesome skins to pick from too.

Results for the Dream events will be announced Tuesday (Usable) and Thursday (Original).

After a short break, we have a bunch of new submissions in the 2008 GUI Champs.  I am  especially amazed at the level of detail that is going into some of these icon packs.  I’d really be interested in finding out how long it’s taking some of these artists to make these icons.

Here are a few of the latest additions, and you can see more icons, along with .dreams and WindowBlinds skins at www.guichamps.com.

Zubaz has labored over the holiday weekend to come up with a tutorials on the rrecently  updated Theme Manager 3.  This tutorial covers one of the coolest aspects of this application, which is the ability to create suites that are compiled via “links” to the skins on WinCustomize.

You can get Theme Manager 3 now by becoming an Object Desktop subscriber.

Link: A call to the ScreenShotters

The latest Master Skin on WinCustomize is Nightlit by Master skinner starone.  This WindowBlinds skin has a darker touch to it, with beautiful color accents throughout.  There is also an XP and Vista version available, and matching icons and cursor themes as well.

WinCustomize subscribers get a 20% discount on Master skins, so don’t miss out on another fantastic work from one of our highly experienced master skinners.

Link: Nightlit by starone

I hope everyone had a good holiday, and at least spent some time with family and friends, and maybe got a little rest in.  Not much longer and it will be back to “business as usual”, but I wanted to post a few skins that I have seen come in over the holiday break.

From all of us here at WinCustomize and Stardock, we want to wish you a Happy Thanksgiving!  For those of you celebrating, have a great holiday and a fun time with family and friends.

This is a short week for most of us, so I wanted to just give a quick re-cap of some news we had this week.  Although it was a short week, we had a lot going on in the world of skinning.  Have a great Thanksgiving!

News of interest: 

• GUI Champs – Dream Voting
• Christmas/Winter Holiday Winky Challenge
• Thanksgiving Skins
• BootSkin Pro Walkthrough
• Popular WB Skins in November
• Thanksgiving vacation for support
• Nightlit Master Skin

BootSkin Pro is the newest gallery on WinCustomize, and with that obviously comes with a new piece of software to create and use them.  BootSkin Pro is available now for Object Desktop Ultimate subscribers, and allows users to create and use custom Vista BootSkins.

Creating and/or applying Vista bootskins is a relatively simple process, but I did write a quick tutorial on how to do both, just so users won’t run into any issues.

Link: BootSkin Pro – Changing and Using Vista Bootskins

The time has come, and the first voting event for the 2008 GUI Champs is here!  Voting for Most Usable and Most Original Animated Wallpaper (.dreams) are now ready.  We had 32 .dreams submitted and the judges have narrowed it down to 10 finalists which are now voted upon by the public.

Voting this year works a little bit differently than in years past.  This year you have three points to distribute in any combination you like to the finalist skins.  You must distribute all three points before submitting your vote however.  You must also be logged into the site.

Voting goes through Sunday, November 30th, 2008.  Up for grabs are Sapphire Radeon HD 4850 Video Cards, software from Corel, Techsmith & Stardock as well as site subscriptions from DeviantArt and WinCustomize.

Read more here: GUI Champs: Vote for Most Usable & Original Dreams!

The Thanksgiving holiday is approaching for many of us here, and although Thanksgiving is not a “big” skinning holiday, there are still plenty of skinners who contribute some holiday inspired works.

So if you are looking to Turkify your desktop, take a look at some of the skins below.  They will certainly get you started.