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Ok, so I have been playing around with my BlackBerry recently and I have been looking at ways to customize it a bit. Until now I have stayed away from adding new themes to my BlackBerry. I have always liked the default option and have been focussed on adding cool new apps and games instead. It is not like I have been unaware of the vast quantity of themes available for my BlackBerry , after all, I wrote an article showing you hundreds of free themes that you can download. While I hope you have all found themes in that list that have made it onto your devices, it is now my turn to play around with them and give you my impressions =)

The good folks over at BlueroomSolution.com have a bunch of free themes for your BlackBerry available and have shown BBGeeks a little bit of love. I have therefore decided to start my theme hunt with a trip to their forums. Instantly I am greeted with some pretty cool looking, vivid, well designed themes on the home page. This should be an easy search.

My First BlackBerry Theme

For my first theme download I have chosen to go with the L Elemental theme which was created and posted by a user named EVO.

The thing that caught my eye about this theme is the vivid greens of the grassy background image. The L Elemental theme for the BlackBerry is a little slice of nature in my world which is ever increasingly dominated by technology and straight lines. I have always been a big fan of using natural textures to soften up industrial design so this theme is right up my alley.

The download and installation of the L Elemental theme from Blueroom Solution was quick and easy, performed OTA (Over The Air). Unfortunately, there is no option available to download this theme to your desktop and install via the BlackBerry Desktop Manager.

My Impressions

The theme itself is rather basic, which is not to be mistaken as a bad thing. With the limited viewing area of most BlackBerry devices, a proper theme has to maintain its visual appeal, while at the same time keeping icons visible and clearly defined. The L Elemental theme does just this. The slightly blurred elements of the background image create just enough separation between it and the icons, making them clear and easily identifiable.

Managing the clutter of a theme is always a challenge. Where do you put all the battery indicators, badges, BlueTooth symbols etc.? Well, if you are the individual who designed the L Elemental theme then you tuck them away in the upper left corner of the device and sit them on a nice translucent black bar that blends in nicely.

Similarly, the icons can also cause a problem if they are too large, misshapen, pixelated, or just plain ugly. The L Elemental design combines a great aesthetic layout with non-obtrusive icons that work well with the background and easy to read font styling. Having nine icons on the main screen is also a bonus as I often have to dig into my apps to find the icon I am looking for. This should save me a few clicks throughout the day.

Overall, the L Elemental theme scores high points with me and I am sure it will make a great theme for anyone else out there who lays eyes on it.

The L Elemental theme can be downloaded from the Blueroom Solutions forum at this location:
http://blueroomsolution.com/showthread.php?t=1079

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