Yesterday evening, while sitting with a relatively new client I was a little anxious to finally show off my concepts that my partner and I had created. Though the two of us had done a lot of brainstorming, ultimately it was me, "the designer" who had to interpret everything the client had said and create a logo and web presence that would ultimately serve her needs.

I go there early, so that the two of us would have time to go over the proposal one last time and prepare to make our pitch. As I pulled in, I parked right beside the client. SHE WAS HALF AN HOUR EARLY!!!! Since I had only met her once previously, I hoped against hope, that it was just someone with an uncanny resemblance to her. I hurriedly rushed inside, my nerves getting the best of me each moment. She walked in right behind me. After initial greetings, she mentioned running to the restroom quickly before the meeting began. Perfect! That gave me the chance I needed to allow my partner to double check everything.

I'm a firm believer in learning by example. Whether positive or negative. That being the case, I love to look at successful logos. Not to steal ideas, but to learn from the strategies and execution of an idea.

Recently, Interbrand, a international brand consultancy specializing in brand services and activities, including: analytics, brand engagement and brand strategy. Last week, they announced the top 100 global brands. I'll have to admit I was a little surprised at who did and who did not make the list.

While perusing the list of sites I follow and blogs I watch this morning. I stumbled across a gem on the Advertising Age Web site. After a summer consumer marketing campaign, during which, PEPSI got their followers involved in their marketing strategy by allowing consumers to submit designs for a new PEPSI can, which appeared very successful as cans began hitting the shelves at grocery stores, PEPSI has re-vamped their logo.

What does it cost for a national brand such as PEPSI or CocaCola to update their brand? Though the company won't confirm the cost, experts at Advertising Age estimate the logo development itself cost somewhere above $1 Million. Why so much? The firm contracted to do the re-design: Omnicom's Arnell Group, spent a solid 5 months to develop the new look. 5 months? On a logo?

A picture is worth a thousand words. So instead of talking some more about incredible Identity packages, I'm gonna show you!

I was recently asked to create an event logo for a Youth Conference that will be occurring in July of 2009. The collateral materials for the event will be limited to postcards, posters, brochures and web/tv spots. With all that in mind I was faced with quite a dilemma.

Knowing that ALL strong logo development that will endure over time should be created in a vector format for scaling purposes, such as Illustrator, I had a decision to make.  The direction I was getting from the client seemed to nullify that as an option.

Everybody, myself included, talks about what to DO with your logo. Perhaps we are leaving out the most important part: What NOT to DO.

While I would love to share some examples, I'll refrain, so as to not call anyone out. But when you are assessing your current logo or deciding if you need one, keep the following DON'Ts in mind as well!

DON'T try to add too many details. One of the worst things you can do is try to combine to many elements into the same logo. Working in a lot of ministries and Christian environments I see this occur way to often. So many times the client want to incorporate all the "standard" Christian icons. They want a sword and a dove and a cross and an open Bible. Rather than conveying the heart of the ministry, this often conveys confusion, chaos and screams "amateur".

DON't use a photograph as a logo. In it's truest sense, a logo is simply a "tease" of what the company is about. Think about some of the best brands out there. A logo can be something as simple as a wordmark, meaning words or letters arranged specifically. Let's look at Coca Cola. Their logo isn't a coke bottle. Their logo is simply the words.  As more and more brands are on the market it might prove difficult to create a logo that is solely a wordmark that will stand alone. If that is the case, the addition of a vector symbol, icon or simple graphic may be the best way to close the deal.

DON'T use a rasterized format like .PSD. Logos should be simple and created as vectors to ensure their ability to scale up or down as needed.  To be a flexible element that you can sink your money into, a logo should be fully scalable and able to reside in a variety of formats and pieces. To achieve this, good logos are created as vector images.

Creating a new identity for a brand that has been around for several years is much trickier than designing a fresh logo from scratch. Or is it? There are definite pros and cons to either project.

If the brand is already established, the designer has stronger options for research, before creating a new look. What should be considered at this stage?

1. What is the problem that needs to be solved with a new logo? Potentially, it could just be a facelift. The functionality could be intact but need a refreshing look to make it stand out once more.

2. Does the logo still convey what it did when it was first created? As markets grows, logos, just like companies must grow with them. As social norms change a strong logo may lose it's symbolism or meaning. The newer generations just may not "get it any more".

3. What does the logo say? More than an image, a logo must convey the differences between products or services. What sets this particular brand apart from the next? Without previous knowledge of the brand, what assumptions can be made based on the typography and graphics?

Recently, I had the opportunity to work on just such a project. An educational institution that offers 2 separate educational tracks. One, a traditional, on-campus experience. The second--a totally different educational path, taken through correspondence. Unlike most schools offering a correspondence option, these two tracks result in different degrees altogether.

Unfortunately, there is often confusion for the user as they try to determine which course of study is being advertised by the logo. What does it mean? What does it say?

Well, to solve this problem, I decided to do some new concepts. Rather than revising the current logo that has stood for nearly 15 years, I felt it was best in this case to start from scratch using the commonly known acronym, RCBS.

You can see the original and the fresh concepts belw. Vote for your favorite, but be sure to have a good reason to support it!

The Original Logo

The new/refreshed rough logo concepts. Still in the infancy stage until we get a new direction! Thoughts?

Translating a design from print to web is often a daunting task for designers. It's the age old question. Which came first: The chicken or the egg? Similarly, chances are your web design will be running behind a print design or pre-established branding. Interestingly enough often this can prove baffling to new designers.

Logos. Unfortunately some things will translate better than others. Lets think logos online. We already know that simplicity in logo design is fundamental. Now we will see why. Think for a minute about sites you see all the time. In most cases, the logo will be at the top left corner. Because "above the fold" issues are a big concern with many web designs a horizontal logo will often work better than a vertical logo that might actually take-up to much space.

Typography. The font that a company has established in print are often null and void when applied to sites online. Often a client will email me with “we only use such n such font” often I have to tell them that frankly that won’t be possible on the content area of their sites. Granted, strides are being made to improve the typography options available online in many cases. But we aren’t there yet. Web typography is still limited to your mist basic fonts. And this is something you might find yourself having to explain to a client.

Images. An image that might work at 5×7 on a print layout will not always translate good to a 72dpi 200pixel wide web image. In theses cases images may have to be simplified or replaced for a less detailed and simpler compositions. A web image must be able to pop and grab attention faster than it’s printed counterpart.

Layout. Quite possibly the biggest difference in translating a design from orient to web is trying to control the layout as you would on a page. Just stop. It can’t be done. The web has to be a fluid creature. With cross browser compatibility trying to achieve pixel perfection is just a oneway ticket to the nut house. It will drive you insane. You never know when a browser upgrade will totally wreck what you worked so hard to perfect. Ultimately web design is the process of controlling chaos. Think of it as changing the flow of a river.

As you approach your next print to web design challenge realize your not alone and that the techniques and decisions you make will likely have to be adjusted for optimization of your site design.

It seems everywhere we turn these days someone is preaching doom, despair and recession. I for one am not taking part in the recession as my business is busier than ever these days.

On a lighter note though, I recieved an email with the following logo images touting "How logos would change in a recession."

Enjoy!

Rarely do I use this blog to air my own personal opinions. But today a truly disturbing email came through my inbox. While I will refrain from naming any names this particular company has now decided to jump on the stock logo bandwagon that was recently stirring the design community thanks to iStockPhoto's attempts to open a logo branch of their royalty free images and graphics.

Unfortunately, today's company took it a step farther telling me that "The best part is you can sell the same logo many times over, so a single design could earn you income for years to come!" I was already disgusted by their email but when I got to that point I knew they had NO concept of what a LOGO even was, to think that a designer would  think it's OK to resell a logo to multiple companies by simply changing the name.