3 Key Guides For Your Logo Design

More often than not, companies approach us to “re-brand” them when in fact, they’re simply looking to have their logo updated.  Logos are just a small part of the brand experience – but often the first impression.

A memorable logo is a key element to the visual appeal of a product or service -  but it’s not an all-encompassing expression of the business personality and culture as a whole (the brand).  However brief and seemingly inconsequential, what you convey in those first seconds of contact has lasting effects throughout your brand’s relationship with your customers; perhaps for years to come.

Many companies simply undervalue the process of determining the element and style of the logo for their own brand – some making the easy mistake in believing that what they like personally, their market will embrace it just as enthusiastically.  This “I like it” approach is often myopic, and ultimately unsuccessful.

In a digital world that offers up a barrage of logos in a variety of media contexts every day, how do you develop a logo that uniquely represents your core values and personality?  It’s a daunting challenge… even for the most skilled of designers.

In the most myopic of examples, a “re-branding” client may have gone to their cousin’s friend (who “took-some-graphic-classes-in-college-and-is-pretty-good-at-that-stuff”) to design their brand image (logo). Or perhaps they’ve even purchased an inexpensive copy of an obscure graphics program to tackle it themselves.  Usually, these early mistakes are made by entrepreneurs who are concentrated on the fundamentals of running their business (and saving money) – with their brand’s imagery taking a distant last in their list of priorities.

This short-sighted approach to developing a strong graphic brand identity nearly always results in eventual failure.  I like to compare it to cutting your own hair.  It may look great when you look in the mirror, but don’t ask anyone to critique your expertise by the back of your head.

So what makes a great brand logo?  Many things – including taking the time to truly distill the essence of the product or service down to one or two very core values.  Color, of course, evokes a realm of options that can set moods and express silent meaning.  Typography, of course, can be a major factor in determining the culture and style of your look.  And certainly, thoughtful, simple, evocative design is always the foundation of expressing a great idea graphically.

How do you increase your chances of creating a truly great logo?  Keep these three easy factors in mind:

1. Hire A Professional

Sure…you might save money designing it yourself – or having your cousin’s friend do it for you for practically nothing.  Be forewarned: what you’re likely to get may not endure the test of time – let alone the test of technology.  Understanding the technical aspects of designing for your specific media takes years of successful practice and knowledge.  Spending your money on a professional designer who can show you widely varying styles that can be easily used in any media will be one of the best investments you’ll make in business.  Don’t forget – just because you have creative software and can type does not make you a designer.

2. Strip It Down

Everyone has a name (except brands we’ve helped name).  Everyone has competition (if you don’t yet…you may soon).  How are you going to express the difference in your product or service with a single, brief glance?  What visual values set you apart from your crowd?  What can you express in color, typography and design that is a simple, elegant statement of your brand’s core values?

It seems easy…but start by making a list of three words that explain you perfectly, and you’ll see how hard it is to decide on those words alone.  The best logos are usually the simplest in their expression of an innovative, memorable concept.  Start with as many concepts needed until you can combine, and possibly simply just one into the most elegant expression of them all.

3. Express Your Brand’s Emotion

Whether a complex concept from the technology sector, or simple line art in one color – your logo must strive to evoke emotions worth remembering.  If it doesn’t, it will likely get lost in a sea of other logos that may be suitable for stationary (for example, the hyper-generic logos above) – but lack the originality and ingenuity to make them truly memorable.  If your logo does nothing else, it should be memorable from others in the same category.  Uncover that unique value – then capitalize on it for yourself, and entertain your customers with your clever ingenuity.

Designing a great logo isn’t something everyone can do.  If you take the time to consider your brand’s core values well before you start to design – you’ll take the first important steps down your own path to the most effective expression of your unique brand.

Vectors and Bitmaps… Oh My!

Often when clients are providing us their materials for a project, the question of graphic quality and type becomes an important issue.

There’s often a good deal of confusion about what certain types of graphics are, and how they can be best utilized for professional quality collateral for printing and even web design.  Unless you have work in pre-press, or with printing often, you may need a good understanding of the advantages (and disadvantages) of specific graphic/data types.

Here’s a very basic review that might help:

• As a general rule, most digital pictures (and scanned images) are bitmap file types. These may also called “raster” images.
• Graphics designed or composed in applications like Adobe Illustrator or Corel Draw are often saved as “vector graphics”.

From a technical perspective, both formats are entirely different, with the end result looking nearly identical in either format.

In very general terms, bitmaps are often used to depict life-like images, while vector graphics are more frequently used to depict abstract images (such as logos).  There are many exceptions to this generality, and you may not be able to tell the difference between two image types simply by looking at them.

“Vexel art”, for example, are bitmap images that have been manipulated to appear as though they are vector data.  This can be used to create photo-realistic images that have an artificially sharpened appearance to them.

While you can easily convert a bitmap image into a vector file, you may conversely change a vector image into a bitmap.  And to add even more confusion, there are file formats that combine both types into a single file.

So how can you navigate all this technical jargon?  It’s fairly simple once you understand the basics:

Bitmap images

Bitmap images are exactly what their name implicates – a collection of bits that form an image. The image is a matrix of individual dots (or pixels) that all have their own color (described using “bits” – the smallest possible units of information for a computer).

As you can see in this example, the image consists of hundreds of rows and columns of small elements that each has its own color.  These are called a “pixels” – shorthand for picture element. The human eye is simply not capable of seeing each individual pixel, and so we perceive a picture with smooth gradations.

How many pixels do you need to see the image as a whole picture?  That depends on the way the image will be used.  The example of the mountain above with the insert enlargement shows one of the main disadvantages of bitmap images – once they are enlarged beyond their original size, they become “blocky” – and if they are reduced in size, they will also lose a bit of their sharpness.

There are literally hundreds of applications available that can be used to create/modify bitmap data. The industry leader is  Adobe Photoshop, although less expensive alternatives like Corel Photo-Paint shouldn’t be disregarded for their abilities

Bitmap data can be saved in a wide variety of file formats. Among these are:

• BMP: an outdated and limited file format that is not suitable for use in prepress.
• EPS: a flexible file format that can contain both bitmap and vector data. It is gradually being replaced by PDF.
• GIF: mainly used for internet graphics
• JPEG: or rather the JFIF file format, which is mainly used for internet graphics
• PDF: versatile file format that can contain just about any type of data including complete pages,it is not yet widely used to exchange just images
• PICT: file format that can contain both bitmap and vector data but that is mainly used on Macintosh computers and is not very suitable for prepress.
• PSD: the native file format of Adobe Photoshop (which can also contain vector data such as clipping paths)
• TIFF: a popular and versatile bitmap file format

Vector graphics

Vector graphics are images that are completely designed and composed of mathematical definitions. The cheesy image below illustrates the principle simply.

As you can see, each individual line is composed of either a collection of points with lines connecting them,  or just a few control points that are connected called “bezier curves”.

This drawing demonstrates the two principles. To the left a circle is formed by connecting a number of points using straight lines. To the right, you see the same circle that is now drawn using 4 points  only.

Vector drawings are typicall small in data size as they contain data about the bezier curves that form the drawing.  Vector drawings can typically be scaled without any loss in quality.  This is why they’re ideal for company logos or designs that need to be resized frequently.

Like bitmap programs, there  are hundreds of applications on the market that can be used to create or modify vector data. Adobe Illustrator is again, the industry

Bitmap data can be saved in a wide variety of file formats. Among these are:

• EPS: the most popular file format to exchange vector drawings although EPS-files can also contain bitmap data.
• PDF: versatile file format that can contain just about any type of data including complete pages, not typically used to exchange just images
• PICT: outdated file format that can contain both bitmap and vector data but that was mainly used on Macintosh computers before OS X came along.

Hopefully, this will give you some insight as to what type of file to provide your design professional, or better yet, an understanding of what type of file you need to have them create for you.

And of course, if you have any questions or experiences about this often confusing topic of file types and uses, we’d like to hear them!

What Values Does Your Logo Convey?

Great logo design is often very difficult to condense the brand’s values into a simple bit of artwork.  Even greater designs carry hidden meanings that, once you’ve seen it or been made aware of it, you’ll never see it again in the same way.

Here’s a few fun examples:

Look carefully at the center of this design and you can see two people enjoying a Tostito chip with a bowl of salsa. This logo does a good job conveying the idea of people connecting with each other – with chips!

See the number 1 in the negative space between the F and the red stripes?   It also does a good job conveying the feeling of speed.

The Milwaukee Brewers logo is actually made up of the letters M (on top) and B (below the m). These two letters also form the well known shape of baseball glove.

Certainly one of my personal favorites for its complex simplicity.   Beyond the clever use of the letters N and W, the first two letters of the brand’s name, what most people don’t see is the compass that points to the Northwest, another reference to the brand name.

Amazon wants to have the best customer satisfaction ratings – and so they’ve incorporated a welcoming smile. The swoosh also connects the letters a and z, illustrating that the store has everything from A to Z.

Toblerone is a chocolate-company from Bern , Switzerland .   Bern is sometimes called ‘The City Of Bears’.  They have incorporated this idea in the Toblerone logo, because if you look closely, you’ll see the silhouette of a bear.

Baskin Robbins’ new logo includes the number 31, a reference to the 31 flavors.

Did you know that the name Vaio logo also had a hidden meaning?  Well, the first two letters represent the basic analogue signal.  The last two letters are a 1 and 0, representing the digital signal.

Do you see any arrows on FedEx’s logo?  The clue is that the arrow is located in between the alphabet E and X, and the arrow is white, acting as a background.

What other examples of well designed, thoughtful logos have you seen?  We’d like to see them too!

Is Woolworths’ Logo Too Similar To Apple’s?

Most of us already know that Apple is famous for it’s aggressive defense of its brand image (or logo).  If they were willing to sue the Victoria School of Business and Technology for infringement, then certainly Austrailia’s Woolworths could have expected the same.  One key may be that Woolworth’s trademark is blanketed to extend to its entire range of products, including technology and electrical items.

Locally, Woolworths used to be a combination drug/convenience store, with a small counter style restaurant inside.  They served up some of the best milk shakes around, and a wicked ice cream sundae.  Today, the company sells a wide variety of products, including electronics.

A Woolworths spokesman put it this way: ”While we can’t rule anything out, we haven’t got any plans (when it comes to computers and gadgetry) at the moment.”

Looking at the example above, is their logo a stylized apple?  Woolworths say’s “no”.  It’s simply a stylized “W” with an “abstract leaf symbol”.  Some have gone as far to suggest that it’s a stylized consumer with outstretched arms, or even an apple being peeled.

I think you’ve got to admit to the similarities between the two logos, and in fact, Woolworths may be the seller of products that are similar to those of Apple’s.

But what do you think? Are the two logos too similar? Is Apple stepping over its bounds, and being too legally aggressive in protecting its brand image?

We’re interested to learn what you think – so please weigh in and comment.

Pepsi’s 5 Month Logo Revision

Pepsi Brand Image History

Remaking an icon take approximately 5 months in Pepsi terms.  Not a long time in my opinion for a major international brand that’s been in existence since 1898 which started out as “Brad’s Drink”.

I’m VERY interested to see which of the above you relate to.  I have a theory about which of these 6 brand image iterations resonate – and with whom.  So please, let me know if you prefer one over the other, and I’ll gladly combine and report the results.

According to Frank Cooper, Pepsi’s VP-portfolio brands: “We felt like, as we move out of this traditional mass marketing and mass distribution era into today’s culture, there’s an opportunity to bring humanity back, both in terms of the design but also in the way we engage consumers,” he said. “By making the logo more dynamic and more alive … [it is] absolutely a huge step in the right direction.”

Pepsi has not disclosed what the revamp has cost, however some have estimated the figure to be in excess of $1 million. A logo redesign is, as you can imagine, just the beginning. Consider the expense in removing the old logo version as it appears while creating and distributing a wide variety of new collateral.

Omnicom’s Arnell Group already had a working relationship with Pepsi, having spearheaded a majority of the company’s packaging design.

So which of these logos (including the new one) really resonate with you?  And what do you think of the new one?