Graphics Challenge #26

Personal Logo
(a symbolic graphic you would print on your business card which should represent you as individual)

colonel lynx

 

Deekman

 

dhama

 

DrkSnpr14

 

Laramaniac

 

staticon

 

Xcom

I couldn't resist placing the observations of the caller of this challenge here - so here they are:

04-01-2004, 04:53 PM
Xcom
Moderator



Join Date: Nov 1999
Location: Lost in Space
Posts: 3,669


Hehe.. Very interesting entries, guys.

<DISCLAIMER>
All of the below is solely my subjective opinion and is not meant to offend anyone.
Just pointless ramblings.
</DISCLAIMER>

The key to good logo is simplicity. The more complicated design is, the more difficult it is to adapt to new purposes and media. In order to help me decide which entry to vote for, I performed two little tests (in addition to just look & feel).

Test 1 - scale down to about 1/3 of the original size.
Test 2 - convert to 2 colors (black and white) with no dithering (see here)

Another important aspect of a good logo is that it keeps its design intact when converted to b&w. When a logo is printed on a paper in color, and say.. that paper gets faxed, it will lose color, but it would still be desireable for a company to keep its logo recognizable.

Now for the entries:

Dhama,
I can see you in it (at least from where *I* am standing). That is, I think you managed to make the best "translation" from personality. But I get the imperession that the image is too complex, which results in sacrificing of its symbolic meaning. There are some (IMO) unnecessary graphical effects there(like soft glows, shadows, transparencies). And, unfortunately, when my b&w test removed them, your design suffered greatly. To sum up, nice composition for a signature (for example), but a little bit complicated for a logo.

Staticon,
your work was somewhat of a puzzle for me. To be honest, I didn't like the color scheme, and again, I don't really see the need for extra decoration such background noise, bevels, shadows. However... however... my b&w test gave your logo extra dimension. All that stuff I didn't see fit was gone, and your logo suddenly appeared to look very cool (like a stamp from old Staticon's honorary seal). You get my vote for this.

Deekman,
if not for b&w test, you would have gotten my vote. I really like your style, but I think your logo turned out to be a little bit too packed, compressed. If you scale it down to say.. business card format, you can barely see what's in there, especially on the left side. I think if you'd cut it in half (vertically) and left only the right part intact (with Deekman text and city silhouette), you would have a killer logo.

LM,
You need to think more about composition and coloring. The text just hangs there and doesn't form "whole" with the rest. And there is very little contrast in the center circle. I noticed only after some time that there is some symbol drawn over the dove. Usually, people spend only a few seconds to "process" the logo visually and nobody is going to "study" it in detail (unlike say photograph or painting). In other words, if an element is virtually undetectable, there is no point for it to be there.

lynx,
heheh.. inspired by Soviet Avant-Garde, eh? Groovy. But.. this is not a logo (all things considered), but more of a poster or a book cover.

DrkSnpr
Actually, I like your concept. You kept it simple which is good. The color also seems to be fitting, but the end result somehow lacks certain cohesion.. and symmetry as if you just placed those elements at random (I don't know, I just get that idea). Ying-Yang generally suggests balance, but the composition itself is somewhat chaotic. And if you have text in the design, it must be a part of the composition and not something you just typed above, using most common font there is. See Deekman's entry where text is nicely integrated into the design.


Last edited by Xcom : 04-01-2004 at 06:19 PM.