Fifteen Instants, One Sport

Fifteen Instants, One Sport

Produce ONE image: a sheet of pictograms for one activity. Follow every line below. Replace only the FIELDS block; everything after it is fixed.

First — do you have the fields?

If any field below still has braces around it, stop and ask. Put all the questions in one short message, and show the example under each one so they can see the shape of a useful answer. Wait for the replies, then draw. Never fill a brace yourself: a value you invented is a value nobody asked for, and it will look exactly as considered as the ones they did give you.

Ask in whatever language they are writing to you in. Translate the questions and the examples; do not make someone read English to tell you what they want.

The examples are only examples. If someone answers a question, use their answer; never fall back to the example because you prefer it.

If the fields are already filled in, ignore this and carry on.

Fields — replace these five lines only

• The activity: {a sport, a craft, or a working loop} e.g. building an interface by describing it, the Vibary loop
• The moves, named: {the moves, dot-separated} e.g. describe · generate · scrub · trim · tweak the curve · compare two · reject one · copy · paste · run it · catch a jank · fix it · publish · share · start again
• The identifying instant for each: {when each is recognisable} e.g. the instant that names the move — describe: mid-gesture at a screen · scrub: hand dragging along a horizontal · reject: one arm sweeping a shape away · publish: both arms pushing a shape out and up
• The equipment, and where it sits: {one prop, and its positions} e.g. a rectangle standing for a panel — beside the figure when working, under the hands when dragging, above the head when publishing
• The colour zones: {which body zones carry which colour} e.g. torso #5B5BD6 indigo on every figure · legs a deep navy · one limb per figure in #E8C468 ochre to mark the acting limb · heads always a plain circle in indigo

The instant law

A pictogram's job is to be named without a caption, and that is not the same thing as looking different from its neighbours.

Every move is drawn at the single instant it is recognised by. Not the start, not a random frame — the one moment somebody who knows the activity would point at and say the word. A jump is unrecognisable at the crouch and unmistakable at the apex. A throw is nothing at the wind-up and obvious at the release.

That instant is what the fields supply, and it is the design. Two moves drawn at instants that look alike are one move: the sheet has discovered that two names describe the same thing, and the answer is to cut one, not to redraw it at a different angle.

Test the finished sheet by covering the list of names and naming each figure. Anything unnameable has failed, however handsome it is.

The figures

• Built from flat geometric parts: acute triangles, sliced trapezoids, bars, wedges, arc slices, a plain circle for the head. No realistic anatomy, no faces, no muscles, no clothing detail.
• Highly abbreviated but structurally clear — a viewer should read the centre of gravity, the direction of the limbs and the line of the spine at a glance.
• Sharp, clean edges. Whole shapes, never fragmented into confetti.
• Motion comes from posture alone: the angle of the body, the spread of the limbs, where the weight sits. No speed lines, no motion arcs, no trailing dots, no ground lines, no decorative marks of any kind.

The equipment rule

One prop, drawn as simply as the body is.

For a large share of these moves, the prop's position relative to the body is the entire distinction — the same crouch reads as one move with the board underfoot and another with it out at arm's length. So the prop is present in every figure that uses it, at a consistent size, in the position the fields state for that move.

Never let it vanish because the pose is busy.

The colour system

Colour is a system here, not decoration.

• The same body zones carry the same colours on every figure. Torso one colour throughout the sheet, legs another, heads always the same. A viewer should be able to see the scheme in one figure and predict it in the rest.
• One limb per figure in the accent — the limb doing the work. This is the only place the colour moves, and it moves for a reason: the eye lands on the action before it reads the pose.
• Flat fills. No gradient, no shading, no texture, no outline.

The sheet

• White ground, no title, no numbers, no captions, no logo, no watermark.
• An even grid sized to the count — fifteen as five by three, twelve as four by three, eighteen as six by three. Equal cell sizes, even gutters, generous margins.
• Every figure at the same optical weight. No figure crowds its cell or floats lost in it, and none overlap.

Never

• ✕ speed lines, trajectory arcs, ground lines, stray dots, any mark added to suggest movement
• ✕ realistic or cartoon figures, faces, muscle definition, fabric
• ✕ backgrounds, scenery, shadows, gradients, 3D
• ✕ text of any kind on the sheet
• ✕ a prop that appears in some figures and not others
• ✕ two figures a viewer would name the same word

The result

A symbol system rather than a set of drawings: fifteen instants a stranger can name unaided, in one palette that behaves the same way every time — and an honest count of how many distinct moves the activity actually has.