Chris’ Picks – (3D Animator & Designer, 80’s Rock Snob, Apocalypse enthusiast, closet pianist and muppet)
Shawn’s Picks – (Programmer, Rainman’s siamese twin, Ping Pong Champion, meatatarian, Rock Band/Guitar Hero Superstar, Poker shark)
AJ’s Picks – (Designer, Narcoleptic, Drum slave, Twilight fan, pizza relocation specialist)
Jennifer -(Multimedia Designer, bubbly taskmistress and den mother, music elitist, food network addict, Polymath)
The world has seen thousands of artists and millions of great pieces of art, but we chose just a handful of pieces of art from some of greatest masters of painting to show a little of how they were inspired by color… or perhaps, how they inspire us with color.
The Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci |
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 Painted between 1503 and 1506 in Florence, Italy. It is painted using the sfumato method, a term coined by Leonardo referring to a painting technique in which translucent layers of paint are applied so subtly that there is no perceptible transition. Her enigmatic smile has been both evocative and cause of speculation as to whom she might be. |
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Three Musicians by Pablo Picasso |
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 Painted in the summer of 1921 in a great constrast to his monumental sculptures that year. The seemingly cut-out paper painting evokes a bohemian period in life that was enjoyed even by Picasso, who is the diamond-covered figure in the centre. |
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Persistence of Memory by Salvador Dalí |
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 Painted in 1931, the surrealistic painting has also been popularly known as Soft Watches, Droopy Watches, or Melting Clocks, and the theme of the painting was later revisited by Dali in 1954 with ‘The Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory. |
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The Water Lily Pond by Claude Pierre Monet |
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The Water Lily Pond was in the collection of the Havemeyers, who considered Monet the greatest impresssionist landscape painter. At the turn of the twentieth century, Monet became the most popular impressionist painter in the United States, as well as the one best-represented in American collections. |
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Starry Night by Vincent van Gogh |
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 Painted in 1889 and embodies an inner, subjective expression of van Gogh’s response to nature. In thick sweeping brushstrokes, a flamelike cypress unites the churning sky and the quiet village below. The village was partly invented, and the church spire evokes van Gogh’s native land, the Netherlands. |
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The Birth of Venus by Sandro Botticelli |
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 The Birth of Venus depicts the goddess Venus, having emerged from the sea as a full grown woman, arriving at the sea-shore. It is suggested that the painting may have been created in 1483 for Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco. The inspirations Botticelli used where of second century art and history. |
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Harmony in Red by Henri Matisse |
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 One of Mattise’s most unusual color creations, with a history just as fascinating and complex. Created in 1908, the piece originally started out as Harmony in Green, and then Harmony in Blue. The predominantly blue canvas was then painted over in the bold red seen now. |
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Marilyn Monroe by Andy Warhol |
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 Warhol created several “mass-produced” images from photographs. Gracing his creative flair with things in heavily in the public eye, Warhol created prints during the 1960s featuring Jackie Onassis, and Elvis Presley. His most popular images during this time are of Marilyn Monroe and Cambell’s Tomato Soup. |
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La Promenade by Pierre-Auguste Renoir |
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 La Promenade depicts a young man helping a woman up a sloping path into the wood. In doing so, he backs into the trees and bushes and becomes a “green man.” He gestures into the trees; she looks away, as if wondering whether she really wants to surrender to the trees and his green embrace, to be tumbled and cradled beneath the dress the trees, soiling her radiant white dress. |
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The Scream by Edvard Munch |
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 Part of a seminal series of expressionist paintings by Norwegian artist Edvard Munch. It is said by some to symbolize the human species taken by an attack of existential angst. The landscape in the background is Oslofjord, viewed from the hill of Ekeberg. |
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Les Amants by René Magritte |
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 Painted in 1928, This is one of a small group of pictures painted by Magritte in Paris, in which the identity of the figures is mysteriously shrouded in white cloth. The origin of this disturbing image has been attributed to various sources, including… Magritte’s fascination by ‘Fantômas’, the shadowy hero of the thriller series which first appeared in novel form in 1913. And another source has been suggested as the memory of his mother’s apparent suicide. In 1912, when Magritte was only thirteen years of age, his mother was found drowned in the river Sambre; when her body was recovered from the river, her nightdress was supposedly wrapped around her head. |
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No. 5 by Jackson Pollock |
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 No. 5, 1948 is an abstract painting by Jackson Pollock, an American painter known for his contributions to the abstract expressionist movement. The painting was done on a 8 x 4 feet sheet of fiberboard, with thick amounts of brown and yellow paint drizzled on top of it, forming a nest-like appearance. It has become one of the most controversial paintings because of its sale to David Martinez for $140 million. |
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Courtesy of Dan Redding at Smashing Magazine
Logo design has been a controversial subject in the design press lately. One branding professional recently claimed that logo design is not that hard to do and another said that logos are dead; some rebutted while others concurred. Why all the fuss?
We live in a Brand Era, where branding is in, and for some, aspiring to the Paul Rand style of logo craftsmanship is about as hip and contemporary as writing your invoices with a quill. Yes, logo design is only one facet of the powerful force that we call brand identity. Yes, a branded design environment can communicate sophisticated brand meaning without much (any?) usage of logos. But some ‘brand gurus’ or ‘brand evangelists’ (translation: ‘bastions of corporate pretension’) seem to enjoy making hyperbolic pronouncements just to sound shocking or cutting-edge. Logo design is not dead. The technological advancements and tumultuous industries of our century are causing its role in our culture to evolve.
Perhaps this clamorous debate is cause for a look at where logo design comes from, what state it’s in currently, and where it’s headed in the future. Where does a logo ultimately derive its power from? If we’re so hung up on divining what this Brand Era means for our clients, can we envision a Post-Brand Era?
The history of logo design begins with the roots of human expression. In fact, the fundamental power of symbols remains most important element of logo design. A logo has meaning because it draws on centuries of signs and symbols (including the alphabet) in human literary and visual language. A logo designer who uses an image of an apple, for example, is drawing on centuries of potent symbolic usage. For most Western viewers, the image of an apple summons our associations with nature, food, the ‘forbidden fruit’ in the Garden of Eden, Snow White, Apple computers, et cetera. To design a logo with symbolic resonance is to participate in the lineage of social dialogue.
Fragment of a vase, third millennium B.C. The figures on this vase bear a striking similarity to the cave paintings of Lascaux and even to contemporary imagery like the Puma logo. These similarities reveal the harmony and union of human communication over great distances of time and geographic location.
To communicate effectively with design, it’s important to view the big picture of human communication and mythology. Logo design as we know it today is a strategy that rose to popularity with brands and corporations of the twentieth century. However, people and organizations have been identifying themselves with an enormous variety of marks, signatures, and emblems for centuries. In terms of visual communication, a modern company that represents itself with a logo, color scheme, and slogan is not very different from a 15th century royal court that invoked identity and unity through the use of family crests, uniforms, and religious symbolism.
In semiotics (the study of signs and symbols and their use or interpretation), human communication is discussed in terms of signs and signifiers. Signs can take the form of words, images, flavors, or even odors: things that have no intrinsic meaning until we invest it in them. We perceive, understand, and negotiate the world around us by investing meaning in all manner of signs and symbols. In the West, an image of a snake signifies evil. But without our Western cultural and mythological associations (many of which are rooted in the Bible), a serpent is just a serpent.
Greek signature seals, fifth century B.C. Affluent Greek citizens used these molded stamps to sign or endorse documents. Using an animal image to identify oneself has a long history predating famous animal logos like Lacoste and Penguin.
Symbols are highly subjective and dependent upon cultural reference. The swastika, for example, is a symbol that was used by various cultures across the globe for over 5,000 years to symbolize a variety of positive meanings including good luck, life, sun, power, and strength. In fact, the word swastika comes from the Sanskritsvastika, which means “good fortune” or “well-being.” Sadly, those meanings have all been usurped by the atrocities of the Nazi party. No symbol has inherent meaning of its own, but when maligned by indelible association with war and unspeakable tragedy, a simple symbol like the swastika can be transformed into a potent talisman capable of eliciting an intense reaction from the viewer. Our complex emotional responses to rudimentary images reveals the profound depth of our relationship with the visual world around us.
The meaning of a logo is often an elusive concept, and two top professionals may disagree about whether a particular logo is a masterpiece or an abomination. This subjective nature of meaning in logography is part of the beauty and wonder of the craft.
A wide variety of stamps, symbols, and signatures have been used to identify people over the centuries. Here are a few.
Printer’s marks, late fifteenth century
The printer’s marks above are variations on an ‘orb and cross’ theme, symbolizing the idea that “God shall reign over Earth.”
Aldus Manutius, printer’s trademark, c.1500.
This printer’s trademark symbolizes a beautiful paradox. It was used in conjunction with an epigram reading “Make haste slowly.” Swiftness is visually represented by the speedy sea animal and stillness is represented by the anchor.
Rembrandt ‘branded’ his authorship on his paintings with a variety of signatures during the course of his career, but the distinctive ‘R’ and unique personality of the letterforms provide unity to the marks.
The industrial revolution profoundly expanded the reach and power of mass production and the marketing used to promote it. Corporations now found that a simple identifying mark was insufficient for distinguishing themselves amongst growing competition in broadening markets. “The national and multinational scope of many corporations made it difficult for them to maintain a cohesive image, but by unifying all communications from a given organization into a consistent design system, such an image could be projected, and the design system enlisted to help accomplish specific corporate goals.” (Meggs’ History of Graphic Design, by Philip B. Meggs and Alston W. Purvis).
In other words, the logo was now being used as one element in a broader system of visual elements used to identify the entire output of a corporation — many of which were becoming larger and more powerful than any had every been before.
Here are some notable developments in the evolution of identity design.
The Wiener Werkstätte was a manufacturing and marketing enterprise founded in Vienna in 1903 — decades before graphic designers were doing work that was officially recognized as corporate identity. This group of craftsmen and designers were true trailblazers.
Marks of the Werkstätte, left to right: Werkstätte monogram, rose logo, logo for Galerie Miethke designed by Kolo Moser.
Wiener Werkstätte letterhead printed in ‘Wiener Werkstätte blue,’ 1914. The group’s obsession with squares and grids is evident here.
A trademark was proposed for the Werkstätte, but designer Josef Hoffman proposed a complete graphic identity. The appearance of the group’s letters and articles was unified by four elements: the Werkstätte’s red rose symbol plus the monogram marks of the Werkstätte, the designer, and the producer. These standard elements, along with the use of the square as a decorative motif, were used to design everything from invoices to wrapping paper.
Westinghouse logo and annual report designed by Paul Rand
Extraordinarily influential designers like Paul Rand, Milton Glaser, and Alan Fletcher helped shape the graphic identity of consumer culture during the second half of the twentieth century. Rand, for example, designed many ubiquitous logos and his varied identity work for IBM became a benchmark in the industry. These great designers have been covered in depth elsewhere (check out ‘The world’s best logo designers?’ by David Airey), so we won’t spend too much time on them here.
“The move of information from the printed page to other media has changed the nature of graphic identity. The MTV logo, which emerges from an unexpected metamorphosis, is probably the ultimate in animated identity.” -The New York Times, September 1996.
The MTV logo was designed by the now-defunct studio Manhattan Design in the early 1980’s. Former Manhattan Design member Frank Olinsky tells the story behind the creation of this logo here.
This logo was a revolution in corporate identity because it adapted to the language of television and shattered standing notions about the ‘rules’ of logo use. In the early 80’s, television had become a ubiquitous medium. The MTV logo adapted to the nature of this medium by exploiting the speed and motion of the moving image: it was regularly animated, shattered, decorated, erased, and reborn in the course of a brief station identification spot. This showed that logos could be adaptive vessels for graphic identity and demolished the notion that trademarks should always be presented in a consistent, static form. The logo had evolved to fit the culture of the television era.
“In order to be successful multinational corporations, you need to produce brands, not products.” -Naomi Klein
Lebron James is deified in a Nike desktop wallpaper ad. The Swoosh is tiny; the brand is huge. For some, Nike epitomizes successful branding. For others, it’s the poster child for deceptive marketing, sweatshop labor, and unethical business practices.
Now that the whole world has been branded, the Twentieth Century approach to branding is old school. I’ll call our present day in age the Brand Era. The logo has evolved from a mark of quality on a product to a visual distillation of a cultural ideal — one that’s capable of accruing or asserting brand equity in a variety of marketing environments and inspiring great allegiance among consumers. “In this corporate formula,” says Naomi Klein, “the brand has little to do with the life of the product. Rather, it is a free-standing idea. The goal of the successful brand has become nothing short of transcendence from the world of things.”
In this twenty-first century brand space, Nike is no longer a shoe company — it is a concept that represents transcendence through sports. Consider the Nike ad above: Lebron James is deified in a Christ-like pose and with religious language (‘witness,’ ‘believe’), both of which imply spiritual transcendence. In the case of Michael Jordan, the star was granted superhuman powers in Nike ads (picture him achieving flight, suspended midair en route to the hoop). In the corner floats the simple, austere Swoosh. In this context, the logo is a sponge, soaking up the ‘brand equity’ created by themes of transcendence and flight as well as the basketball star’s fame/endorsement/deification.
‘Brand evangelists’ now use all kinds of lofty language to describe ‘brand worlds’ and ‘branded landscapes.’ At best, this kind of language describes creative brand strategy that can provide organizations with an innovative approach to defining themselves in today’s corporate culture — a place where tumultuous economies and rapid technological change require constant adaptation. At worst, this kind of behavior is an attempt to pull the pretentious wool over the novice client’s eyes, using ostentatious language to leverage the sale of mediocre design and commonplace brand strategy. None of us entered this field to become snake oil salesmen, so don’t pitch like them.
Ask someone standing in Times Square if logo design is dead. Image: ‘Times Square Parade’ by Alexander Chen
In this era, the brand is bigger and more powerful than ever. Brands have become so big that some people have logo tattoos (physically branded with a brand) while celebrities like Martha Stewart and Oprah Winfrey have successfully developed themselves into personal mega brands. Brands like Nike have transformed themselves into lifestyle choices that consumers can integrate into their own identity. How much further can we go? What comes next?
Naomi Klein has noted that the many successful brands have already achieved “transcendence from the world of things,” meaning that the dissemination of a brand’s identity has become more valuable than its production of physical commodities. Technology will soon liberate brands from the visible world even further, as companies enter the fields of nanotechnology, synthetic life production, virtual space, and more. What will ‘brand identity’ mean for a person who has branded cells injected into their body to eradicate cancer? And you thought the favicon was small. Brands will occupy startling new environments (like the bloodstream) in the 21st Century.
The MTV logo famously introduced a logo that could undergo a costume change during every performance. How else can a logo break the rules to adapt? Is there a way to explode the logo, to decentralize it? What about a logo that consisted of separate elements that could be displayed on their own or joined together to create a unified whole? If branded products exist on a molecular level that’s invisible to the naked eye, could they project external holographic brand identity?
The role of brand identity in the future remains to be seen. But it appears as though — barring the apocalypse or some Naomi Klein-inspired activist revolution — brands will continue to expand into new areas. Just as most industries are dealing with abrupt transitional periods due to the disruptive effects of technology, so is ours. In fact, their transitional periods become our transitional periods, because they are our clients.
As brand identity designers, merely designing a logo for a client is not good enough. It is also unacceptable to stand on the cultural sidelines or design with our heads in the sand. We must be students of the changing cultures around us. We must take active roles in the use of design to strengthen and navigate the futures of the industries, people, and causes we believe in.
For now, brand identity design is thriving. Branded design environments (like a website with an integrated design strategy expressing brand qualities) can coexist with traditional logo design. In the future — as always — it’s creative thinking that will lead the way. One valuable asset will be the willingness to take a risk when it comes time to develop a strategy for a brand’s visual persona. The faster technology propels our culture, the more design risk-takers we’re going to need.
Whatever changes may come, one thing will remain. As graphic artists and designers, we possess the power (just as any two year-old with a crayon does) to ascribe meaning to the world around us. We put an expressive face on raw information. The fundamental desire of humans to understand the world in visual terms is a desire that we can understand and foster. Graphic design’s ability to provide meaning and useful information will prove more valuable than ever during uncertain and challenging times.
Per: Just Creative Design
Logo design in today’s world is totally under rated. People do not understand how important a good logo is and how valuable it is to their business and this is why I am going to outline some very important facts telling you exactly why logo design should not cost $5 and why your logo is not something you should take lightly.
In broad terms, I will do this by comparing “cheap logo design” to “professional logo design” and I will outline the reasons why professional logo designers do not charge such low fees and why you should invest in a professional logo design.
To understand what a logo is meant to do, we first must know what a logo is. A logo’s design is for immediate recognition, inspiring trust, admiration, loyalty and an implied superiority. The logo is one aspect of a company’s commercial brand, or economic entity, and its shapes, colours, fonts, and images usually are different from others in a similar market. Logos are also used to identify organisations and other non-commercial entities.
It makes me wonder why people have no logo or why they would even bother with a cheap logo design if a logo is meant to do all of these things?
Before I get onto comparing cheap VS professional logo design I want to talk to you a bit about SPEC work. “Spec” has become the short form for any work done on a speculative basis.
ie. You design this for me, and I will pay you if I like it. - This is not right.
To clarify, let’s create a scenario in another industry where SPEC work does NOT exist.
“I went for a dental check-up yesterday. After the dentist inspected my teeth, she suggested some work to prevent further tooth decay. I told her to go ahead, and if the dental work was satisfactory, I’d be more than happy to pay. She responded that she wouldn’t be able to do that, because she normally provides a service when a fee is agreed upon up-front. I said I’d let her know after I checked in with other local dentists.”
This scenario happens in the design industry every day and is seen as very unethical as it is ruining the design industry. A designer should not have to invest time and resources with no guarantee of payment much alike a dentist or any other professional.
I do not want to go into this any further as much has been written about it but I would like to say please avoid design contests and spec work at all costs. Logo Design Contests are bad for your business. Period.
For further reading on the damage of spec work I have written an in depth article outlining the “pros” and cons of spec work.
There have even been comics made about the damage of Spec Work:
Now that we have taken a look at the damage of Spec Work, let us now take a look at what quality you can expect from a logo in between the $5 to $200 bracket. The particular case I am looking at today is from a $35 logo design contest that was held on Digital Point Forums.
The “brief” for the logo design project was
“Make a logo for the site ‘Spela Piano’. The meaning of that is Play Piano. This is a site where our members can learn to play piano online.”
Below you can see the responses from the contest, which one do you think won?
You will notice that nearly all of the logos above use free standard issue fonts and don’t assign to the rules of what makes a good logo. Ie. describable, memorable, effective without colour and scalable.
Ask yourself these questions in regards to the logos above:
I will leave these questions for you to decide.
Now compare these professionally designed logos and answer the same questions as above….
See the difference?
Why are they so different? As outlined in the logo design process of top graphic designers, professional logo designers have an actual design process that involves research, sketching, conceptualising, and reflection and this is why they do not charge $5.00.
The design process of a professional logo designer usually consists of:
Do you believe doing all of that costs $5.00?
On that note, did you know that the software to make the logo is USD$700 in itself, let alone the computer that it has to be installed onto or the costs associated with the essentials… paper, ink and an internet connection.
Here are some more responses from other designers on reasons why logo design does not cost $5.00.
Tara from Graphic Design Blog outlines in her 6 reasons why a logo should cost more than your lunch that
Now look back at those $5.00 logo designs or your even own logo to see if adheres to the above points.
This is the single most frequently asked question, though it is the hardest one to answer without more details of the project.
The cost of a professional logo design is a question that cannot be easily answered as every company has different needs, however, the best way to approach this question is to draw up a customised quote for each individual.
A number of factors have to be taken into consideration when designing a logo, such as how many logo concepts need to be presented, how many revisions are required, how much research is needed, the size of the business and so on.
The best way to find out how much a logo design will cost is to get a quote from the designer them self.
Isn’t it about time you invested in a professional logo design? You can can get a free quote for a professional logo design by clicking here or you may like to look at mylogo design portfolio first. You may also like to read the article “how to choose a logo designer?”
Do you agree? Does logo design cost more than $5.00? What have you paid for a logo design?
This past Saturday (May 15th), Gimme Design had a great time volunteering at the Montgomery County SPCA in Perkiomenville! The rescue dogs had a great time running around and playing in the grass in the perfect sunny weather. Of course, we didn’t just play around all day… we got our hands dirty in the barn, mucking the stalls!! Just like the dogs and cats– the goats, horses, chickens, and the sheep just wanted to be loved—and although we couldn’t take them all home with us, we did what we could to show them we care. A specialthanks to everyone who donated blankets, food, toys, and even their own time to for these rescue animals!
