Leg up in logotype design
G’day Philiers,
I’m designing a logotype for a major organisation for the first time (well it’s the first time for a straight-faced kind of logo) and I’m a bit lost as to what steps to take. I’ve worked the idea up to a fairly high level on paper and I feel it’s getting close to the time where I take it into Illustrator and make the weights consistent and the curves even but this is where I’m a bit scared, my pen tool skills are a bit rudimentary and I tend to make things lumpy. Also I’m not aware of the conventions when it comes to what curves can be repeated, how curves should look and so on. If there any tricks or rules or ways of working that people could throw my way or links to good sites (I’m ordering Leslie Carbaga’s book soon but it won’t arrive in time to help me as I only have a week or so) or anything at all I would be very appreciative, I know the request is a bit vague but I’ve never really done this high detail formal kind of design before so I’m not even really sure what to ask. I’d love any help you can give me
thanks for reading
—N
20.Sep.2006 5.04pm
http://www.typeworkshop.com/index.php?id1=type-basics
http://briem.ismennt.is/
20.Sep.2006 8.27pm
If you can post a scan of your sketch you may get some better feedback and direction. It’s a bit of a broad question.
20.Sep.2006 9.16pm
Thanks for the sites David :) i had seen type workshop before and I had a quick look at briem, they seem both to be on the brief side but I realise such a general question doesn’t really do itself any favours, thanks again :)
i thought long and hard about whether or not to post this but I decided education was more important than pride
http://home.iprimus.com.au/nkgross/quakers_1.gif
This is very very very (very) early days. I realise the Q is wobbly and ALL the strokes are uneven. I guess at this stage I’m looking for comments on the structure and general shapes of the letters. I want the logo type to have a leg in both script and san-serif land. I’d also appreciate comments on what shape components I can repeat to add consistancy, the height and width of letters in relation to other letters and any other tricks to make things consistent and to get the proportions correct. I’m happiest with the ’u’, the ’a’ and the general form of the Q for what it’s worth,
thanks very much
—N
20.Sep.2006 10.54pm
Like the idea and the Q. The s doesn’t connect to the rest of the word, it’s currently “Quaker s” (makes me think about Racer X). Is the name of the client “Quakers” or “Quaker’s”?
The “r” feels like it doesn’t quite belong, seeming a little “tense” in relation to the freeflowing letters that precede it. To enhance the scriptlikequality, more “flow” between letters is called for. Like modifying some of the letterforms so that the word would be possible to write without lifting pen from paper or changing stroke direction too often. The letters can connect, but they don’t have to.
Tracing paper is a great tool for trying out variants of letters.
20.Sep.2006 11.06pm
Thanks Stefan,
yes the ’s’ is far too far out, I lessened the width of it and just didn’t pop it back nearly enough. Helpful thoughts about the scriptlike quality and esp. the ’r’, I’ve thought this myself, i’m thinking the top arm of the ’k’ should perhaps mimic the Right hand end of the ’Q’s tail and perhaps the arm of the ’r’ could be similar to the tail of the ’a’,
yes tracing paper :) and lots of it
I’m concious of not letting it stray too much into scriptland, I like some of the bluntness to it
thanks again
—N
22.Sep.2006 10.21am
Best advice I can give you is when you use the pen tool let the bezier handles go out on both sides and constrain them with the shift key, it will help avoid some of the lumpiness; use as few points as possible and try to keep them at the extreme points. I normally draw one version up roughly and then duplicate the layer before refining then duplicate again so you can go back to earlier versions without command zedding and losing bits you wanted to keep, I find that better than saving mulitple versions of the document. Outlining similar fonts can give you some good tips as well.
It does get easier (note I didn’t say easy) :)
Tim