From my Logo Portfolio – Mack Camera Logo Design Process
The Brief
To re-design a logo that is bold, different to the many other camera and video on line-shops – something that grabs your attention, will work in myriads of advert sizes, to be able to compete for attention in busy online websites.
The logo needed to be versatile for pretty much any and all media including web, digital, print, large format, signs etc. There was a chance this logo was going to be placed on the outside of a building, so this was an important factor in the design.
Other than that, it was left by the client for me to choose the path – so plenty of artistic license so to speak.
The Initial Thoughts
This was a clear case of focusing on type treatment, focusing on the name, setting the scene with out giving valuable space to space sucking logomarks. Compact came to mind, helpful in that the name is short, so fortunate there.
The client did request all cap’s but I resisted this from the get-go, and glad I did. Of course I did show a logo version with all-caps, but I pushed for the friendlier, soft but bold lowercase version.
I had ideas from reading the brief, so was pretty clear in my head the direction I wanted to take. I wasn’t too interested in exploring alternatives at this point, as the ‘gut feeling’ was strong. I have learnt to trust my ‘gut’, and if I get a first idea epiphany, it’s hard for me to then create ‘other’ versions. My way of thinking is that if the first idea is strong, why create a choice? Focus on the strong idea.
Fonts
Font choice is always my first stop in a logo design. For me the font sets the scene, the atmosphere, the emotion. Choose the wrong font and you stand little chance of a logo doing what it’s meant to do. Communication. The wrong font can shatter an otherwise decent logo idea.
A few font choices came to mind here, and there was only one clear winner after seeing several of them side by side. It’s slightly ‘bastardised’, in that the ‘k’ has been ‘low chopped’. Thats my technical term by the way.
Avenir Black was used. A true logo font. I love it. Although Museo Sans is now a close contender for my heart.
I opted for ultra tight kerning to create a compact mark. Too much and you would lose character shape, too open and well, it loses the compactness being aimed for.
The quick way to see if the kerning was too tight was to colour all the letters in one colour and see if it was still readable. Glad to say it works a treat. This further adds to the flexibility and usability of the logo – it works well in shades, one colour, reversed out, on dark or light background.
Tag line
The logo needed to be designed with a tag line in mind, as this states the purpose of what Mack is all about. So it needed to be legible and not so much of an after thought. Finding the right balance here – so it didn’t fight with ‘Mack’ and lose – meant trying variations of font weight, spacing and size.
Also, the tag line needed to be changeable and versatile, so other key phrases could be added without the logo collapsing.
Small details like there being no descenders makes for adding a tag line a joy. Add a ‘y’ or ‘g’, and well, I don’t like it when that happens.
A quick chop of the ‘k’ meant I could create a more compact visual, plus better fitment into the eclipse icon.
Colours
Only explored a few options, before quickly settling on a range of blues. Seemed to offer the most versatility on light and dark backgrounds, as you can see from the white and black background. As I previously mentioned, the logo works really well when only seen in one colour which was crucial to the overall design.
Icon
The icon, the ‘arc/eclipse’ proved to be the trickiest to get right. Too fine, too chunky, too wide, too tall, too thin, too tall or just plain wrong.
Really wanted to avoid cliche camera type icons that you come to expect and usually see. I didn’t want to go the plain Jane generic route either. I needed to find a icon that represented the ‘photography lens feeling’ in some way without looking like the millions of other camera logos.
I did go through many ideas, and I did start with cliche ideas to see how I could develop them into something more unsual.
The result was the eclipse, which signifies the lens and is versatile as it is not tied to just photography, but equally at home with the video aspect. So it didn’t alienate one or the other, but in fact complimented them both perfectly and also applies to accessories and what not.
Finding the right balance of size and thickness proved to be tricky, finding that balance was a little time intensive. I tried many many variations of eclipse and positions before settling on this.
The result
Happy to say the client loved it, which is always a bonus. It achieves the brief and more. This was a logo design that came out way better than I had actually hoped for. Certainly not going the cliché route with the logomark was the key here, as well as the font and colour choice.
All elements here combined to make the logo work in a variety of formats, situations and environments.
Colophon
I have many other logos and designs on display in my portfolio. If you are looking for a logo designer, then look at my quote form. If you just want to ask me some questions then contact me and don’t forget you can find me on Twitter every day.
Article Posted On: March 7, 2009 at 8.49 pm
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In Categories: Branding, Featured, Identity, Logo design, Portfolio
A FEW OPTIONAL EXTRAS
If you enjoyed this post or website in general, then please consider signing up to the free ImJustCreative Newsletter (the bright orange icon). You can also find me on Twitter, Redux, FriendFeed and FaceBook daily, dispensing the latest in design, logo and typography news. If your choice of blog platforms include Tumblr or Posterous, then you can also follow my breadcrumb trails there. And the neat looking 'lightning bolt' icon is for my CargoCollective portfolio and the pink heart is for FFFFound.
13 Comments
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This looks really nice Graham! Nice work on it.
http://twitter.com/Colorburned
great job and great thought process
That is a great looking logo – congrats!
Fantastic looking logo, sir. I was working on a freelance project for a small photography studio recently and was also striving to include camera iconography in a way that wasn’t cliched, since the clients insisted something like that be present, but ultimately we failed to get it right. Nice to see that it is a solvable problem though :)
Hi Graham,
Really enjoyed reading your blog. The logo design tips are timely for me as I am starting a new business and will be a one man shop until the funds allow for growth.
Hopefully when that day arrives I can use your services.
Thanks for the props. I have more posts like this on the way, just don’t want to duplicate the many number of posts on logo design, hard to be unique nowadays.
Alan–> Thanks, hope you get some use out of it. I would say the most important is brushing up on the commercial print aspect, as this can be the biggest downfall for any designer who is more atuned to web design etc.
Love the finished logo. Your post is informative and easy to follow. Great information.
Really nice logo, well done.
What font did you use for MACK?
Very nice, looks great in solid color as well as the blue ranges, and nicely avoided the obvious.
It’s always nice to have insight to another designer’s process and method, thx.
DP, Aaron and Aaron : Appreciate the kind words. Often tricky to not do the obvious, when obvious is obvious for good reason. :)
Really enjoyed reading your thought process on the design. Nice job, Graham.
Thanks Kevin, I could always waffle on about this kind of thing, so hard for me to keep it to the point. Have more posts like this in the works for my other recent logos. Just takes time to put together.
I do like your thought process and the blog was a good read. Its interesting to read how you do, what you do.
More often than not, I try and get the cack ideas out of my head first before I hone in on the eureka moment. I think i better start thinking of what my process is too!