Approaches in Designing the Graphic Mark

1. Approaches Approaches in Designing the Graphic Mark

2. Graphic Mark Design Rules • Simple & Clean • Intelligently Designed • Adaptable • Unique

3. Good Marks: Simple & Clean • Simple & Clean(KIS Rule: Keep it simple) • Simplicity allows easy recognition and memorability • Cleanness allows for easy reproduction – avoid gradients, filters, shadows and effects

4. Good Marks: Simple & Clean • Minimalist Illustrations • Avoid unnecessary details – eliminate anything you can • Strive for clean, non-complex edges • Use clean, simple, legible typefaces. • Unmistakable Visuals • Keep visuals clear (easy to understand) and unambiguous. Viewers should have no doubt about what they’re looking at. All viewers should see the same “big idea.” • Adhere to Production Standards • Avoid small shapes, type and negative spaces – they don’t scale well • Cleanness allows for easy reproduction – avoid gradients, filters, shadows and effects • Avoid using strokes - they don’t scale well. Use solid shapes instead. • Use vectors to design logos

5. Good Marks: Simple & Clean • Many new/upstart corporations begin with marks that don’t adhere to graphic mark design standards. As the corporation grows, they begin to understand the importance of proper branding – and the importance of designing good marks. Many corporations end up revising and simplifying their original marks to incorporate these best practices in mark design which enable powerful branding.

6. Good Marks: Simple & Clean

7. Good Marks: Intelligently Designed • Make smart use of an idea • Must be appropriate to the brand • Must convey meaning • Should be enduring (avoid using trending design styles for graphic mark design) • Successful marks are often witty or contain a conceptual visual that gives viewers the “ahhh” moment when they “get it”

8. Good Marks: Intelligently Designed

9. Good Marks: Intelligently Designed

10. Good Marks: Adaptable • Adaptable to Different Media, Sizes, Colors • Scalable – work at small and large sizes (use vectors) • Should work in color and black & white • Should work across a variety of media

11. Good Marks: Adaptable • Work well at small sizes- test your mark by zooming out in Illustrator until the size appears less than half-inch on screen. If you lose the details or text readability – if ur looking at a blurry smudge – simplify the design!

12. Good Marks: Adaptable • Work well in monochrome or black & white

13. Good Marks: Unique • Avoid visual clichés • (Light bulbs for 'ideas', mouse for ‘technology', globes for 'international‘). These are usually the first ideas you think of when brainstorming and too many other marks feature these clichés. Take it further and come up with something nobody else would think of. Make your mark something your client knows only you could have done! • Don’t copy/borrow ideas – it’s unethical and illegal

14. Good Marks: Unique • DO NOT: Use the obvious solutions/ clichés

15. Good Marks: Unique • DO:Take your ideas further, push the creative limit

16. Techniques in Graphic Mark Design • Use a grid • Use geometric shapes • Use negative space

17. Techniques in Graphic Mark Design • Active (not passive) visuals

18. Techniques in Graphic Mark Design DO: • Consider cultural differences – avoid offense • Make sure it works on dark backgrounds • Simplify – subtract unnecessary elements • Vet your designs with peers and colleagues – they might see something you don’t! DON’T:

19. Techniques in Graphic Mark Design • Define exclusion zones • Specify size and horizontal/ vertical arrangements • Create a style guide • Dictate color options

20. WORDMARKLettering and TypeformGraphic Marks

21. Creating Wordmarks • Adapt an existing typeface • Avoid gimmicky fonts • Maximum of 2 fonts • Legibility is mandatory (at all sizes) • See the negative space (turn your design upside down!)

22. Creating Wordmarks • Use strokes • Create ligatures • Use eliminations • Look for more tips and tricks in room 2016!!

23. SYMBOLS and ICONSGraphic Mark

24. Creating a Symbol or Icon • Active not passive • Be clever AND simple • Visual double entendre • Connect to the brand’s core values • Use negative space • Use a grid, proportion and symmetry

25. Wordmark + Symbol =Logo or Signature

26. Marrying Wordmark + Symbol • Type must match symbol • Avoid the easy solution of dropping the type below/next to the symbol. Try to marry them.

27. Brainstorming for Visual Identity Graphic Mark Concepts: Literal

28. Brainstorming for Visual Identity Graphic Mark Concepts: Figurative

29. Brainstorming for Visual Identity Graphic Mark Concepts: Figurative

30. Brainstorming for Visual Identity Graphic Mark Concepts:Make sure your concept isrelevant and identifiable • AVOID: • PRETTY + POINTLESS = pretty pointless • Confusing people

31. Brainstorming for Visual Identity Graphic Mark Concepts:Make sure your concept isrelevant and identifiable

32. Remember: First Things First • Base your design on the most important parts. • Start your graphic mark design with the name of the company, if the mark will include the name. • If your mark is going to be a graphic icon (that thematically represents the company – the company’s “big idea”) without the company name, then start with the icon. • These decisions will be made during your brainstorming and planning/sketching phase.

33. Brainstorming • Use this to find a concept or theme which will be translated into the Big Idea for your design. • 1. Start with a word or idea. Try to associate something else with it. And then something else with the second thing. For example: apple -> banana -> banana peel -> comedy -> funny -> clown -> circus -> lion.. and so on • 2. Assume that no word/phrase is self-explanatory. Continue to focus on one topic/word until you cannot describe it with any further detail. In other words, take a deeper look at an individual or minute part of a larger whole. • 3. Brainstorming is an uncensored practice. Don’t try to make “corrections” – there are no wrong answers. Don't be afraid to go crazy with your thoughts. • 4. Don't immediately dismiss an idea. Continue to write and seewhere your thoughts can take you. Keep going, even if you comeacross a good idea near the beginning of the brain storm session;as other ideas that are just as good - or even better - may comealong. • 5. Save your brainstorming papers, as you never know when youmay need them • 6. When you are finished brainstorming, re-organize your words andphrases into sequential categories.

34. Assignment 5 – Logo Design • PART 1: Scalable Design • Use a ruler and locate FIVE (5) well-known graphic marks that are sized at no more than half-inch wide or high, and FIVE (5) well-known marks that are taller than you. • Photograph both instances – with your ruler in the photos of the small marks, and with you in the photos of the large marks. Your photos should serve to indicate the size of the marks. • In a 2-page analysis paper (double spaced, TNR, 12 pts), with your photos attached: • Explain all the possible reasons the marks were printed so small or so large. • Also comment on the quality and resolution of the mark (eg. are the details in the small marks clear/readable; and are the larger marks pixelated? Explain how/why.) • PART 2: B&W Design • Locate FIVE (5) marks printed entirely in solid black (no shades or grays, no background colors. Hint: look at the back/underside of products, and at stationery) and write a 2-page paper explaining the possible reasons the designers used only black • DUE: Wed Sept 14, 2016