Black and White ship icons. In 2015.

[DarkGravity]

In the map and Tracking Station, it can be hard to pick out the ship you are looking for. So why are we using black and white icons? Is this a salute to the golden age of television or something? Seriously, a little color please!

[FishInferno]

Wouldn't it be cool if they could make the icons be little renderings of said craft, like the thumbnails in the VAB

[Robotengineer]

Wouldn't it be cool if they could make the icons be little renderings of said craft, like the thumbnails in the VAB

+1, great idea, use the ship thumbnails as the icons.

[DarkGravity]

Yeah, that would be cool. I generally try to keep my suggestions to ideas that seem profoundly simple to implement. At least as much as I can, given my limited understanding of coding.

[Wjolcz]

I don't actually mind icons being black and white. They stand out really nicely in the colorful background that is Kerbin's surface. They could be changed a tad, though. Especially the capsule one to something looking more like Apollo's CSM. Also a new icon for spaceplanes would be cool to have.

[DarkGravity]

You don't have a hard time finding the ship you're looking for when they are all the same color?

[Wjolcz]

You don't have a hard time finding the ship you're looking for when they are all the same color?

Nope!

[Murph]

I also think they are ok as-is. White gives good contrast against most of the possible backgrounds, coloured would greatly increase the instances of them blending into the background.

I don't think it's broken, and do not think it should be fixed. I don't think coloured icons would offer any improvement. If anything is changed, please include an option to use white-only icons.

[Kuu Lightwing]

I agree with Murph and Veeltch. I think they looks nice and clean while colored or craft icons would make it look messy.

[basic.syntax]

EVE:Online (10 years old) has been going through this same question. Over the last year they have been removing color from some icons, causing consternation among those used to the old icons. Their usability studies show that players are able to identify icons faster by shape alone, than when color is added. That's not to say color isn't helpful... it's just proven to be "less helpful" than distinctive shapes. (And so, they are also going back and forth with players over the shapes, lol.)

[Hobbes Novakoff]

I like the current icons, they look nice, clean, and finished. We need one for planes though. Re: thumbnails, I'm not sure how well the 128x128 (or whatever) ship thumbnails would translate to a 32x32 (at best) icon.