In the past, I had problems when I wanted to create icons quickly for my Windows Phone 7 apps before submitting them to the marketplace certification. A good set of consistent icons is a good way to give a good first impression on your future customers, but if you decide to create those icons yourself then it is a time-consuming task. I decided to fix this problem for good!
For your application and for marketplace submission you will need the following artwork:
- Application Icon (62 x 62)
- Application Tile Image (173 x 173)
- Marketplace catalog icon (small) (99 x 99)
- Marketplace catalog icon (large) (173 x 173)
- Desktop application icon (200 x 200)
To create an icon and resize it correctly and export it is always a lot of repetitive work, the one I do not enjoy. So in my favorite design tool – Expression Design 4 – created a file, where all you need is to replace the shape in each icon and select File | Export and you are done. All the icons will be ready for your project.
I created a git repository for it called WP7ExpressionIcons. I used this to articles as my starting point: