Archive for the 'Logos' Category
Recommended Design Resources Saturday, October 7th, 2006 by Mike
Our crew has been very busy this year, helping customers with the corporate identities, application icons, websites, and back-end systems — which is why it’s been quiet here at the Summit blog. In an effort to get back into blogging, I’ve decided to share links to design resources we use in the development of our work here at MakaluMedia.
MyFonts: WhatTheFont?
This very slick online tool lets you upload an image of your font in question and get details on what font it might be. Alex shared this one with me and I was impressed with how accurate it was!
Fontshop Type Navigator
An online tool that can help you visually identify fonts you are clueless about through process of elimination. Use the selections on the left side to narrow down your font until you find just what you’re looking for.
LinoType Font Explorer X
This free tool from LinoType provides very nice font management features for Mac OS X which supplement Apple’s stock Font Book application. You can also buy fonts directly from LinoType from Font Explorer X, making it the iTunes for fonts.
LogoPond
This is an excellent site with cataloged identities you can search by various features, including by color or by rating. This is a nice place to go for inspiration. I really need to submit some of our logos here!
PrintingForLess.com
This printer in Livingston, Montana (Big Sky Country) has very smart people, great pricing and does really nice 4 color print work. We’ve seen good stuff come from PFL for several clients and like their approach to business. Robert Scoble did a video walkthrough of their plant which is well worth watching.
Apple Developer Connection: Icon Genres and Families
This simple document has all sorts of good stuff for the Mac OS X icon designer, including appearance, lighting, design and technical details to help you get your icons spot on.
Design Observer
An excellent resource for the latest in design thought and commentary by founding writers Michael Bierut, William Drenttel, Jessica Helfand, Rick Poynor and many more contributing writers to boot. More than just pretty pictures, Design Observer always gives me something to think about.
I hope these links provide inspiration in your work or your thinking. If you have links to share with our team, please do! We always love finding new, useful resources.
The Building of Fincalena Saturday, June 3rd, 2006 by Matt
Fincalena, a Belgian-owned builder and property agent working locally here on the Spanish Costa del Sol, contacted MakaluMedia for the development of a website which would give them an edge in the highly competitive Spanish property market. We met with the company, discussed their objectives and concluded that the site would attempt to achieve the following end results:
Project a corporate identity combining Fincalena’s northern European roots with the essence of the southern Mediterranean market in which it operates.
Improve the visitor process of finding a desired property.
Introduce features and services which set Fincalena apart in the market.
Allow collaboration with other agent partners in the area.
Optimize for the Google search engine.
Minimize the cost and effort associated with managing and maintaining the site.
Faced with these challenges, we set off to work. We’re quite pleased with the results, as are Fincalena, and this article describes the process.
Phase 1: Corporate Identity
Fincalena worked with our Design Director, Mike Rohde, in the iterative process of identifying and designing a corporate identity. Our collaborative approach, which you can read more about here and here resulted in a set of outputs including color palette definition, typeface specifications, and a logo mark. In addition to the website, Mike produced a number of supporting print products, including property signage, based on the corporate ID.
Phase 2: System Specifications
After conducting a review of the competitor sites in the context our defined objectives, we felt that we could improve in a number of areas, through both enhancement of “typical” services (like searching for property) and through the introduction of some innovative new features.
We decided to reduce the number of search criteria to three: location, type, and price range. We felt that the tendency to overwhelm the visitor with selection criteria is often counterproductive.
We decided to make use of modern interface technologies such as AJAX, to enhance the user experience.
Realizing that many visitors appreciate a printed version of a property profile, we decided to implement on-the-fly generation of downloadable PDF files.
We decided to develop a mechanism to ease the process of publishing frequent and timely real estate news.
We decided to develop a mechanism whereby Fincalena can collaborate in real-time with partner sites.
We decided to leverage the Content Management System (CMS) framework that we’ve been independently working on as a standalone product.
Phase 3: Implementation
For the past year or so, we’ve been making a gradual migration from development in PHP, to development using the Ruby-on-Rails web application framework. Rails is a highly productive environment, both in terms of the well thought-out MVC model (specific to web applications), and in terms of the underlying language, Ruby. It’s this technology on which we based the generalized CMS product we are internally developing, and to be used in the Fincalena project.
As with most projects (especially those involving customers willing to work in an agile process), we began by developing the core system screens, and expanding outward, including iterative reviews, until we had a full set of site screens. This set of screens represents a nearly complete specification of data (content), services (features) and general layout.
From there, we began the parallel processes of visually designing the site, and implementing the back-end software.
On the home page, we wanted to immediately set the tone for the quality that can be expected from Fincalena properties, the lifestyle available to residents of this privileged region, and to provide the shortest path possible to property identification.
In the interior of the site, we focused on simplicity and removed, as far as possible, distractions that would take focus away from the properties. We spent a great amount of time on the organization and presentation of property metadata (such as price, features, etc.) and tried to subtly integrate features such as the downloadable PDF, and the AJAX-based filtering mechanism, which provides live updates of search results without a page refresh. We decided to use a Flash-based solution for the seamless presentation of the property imagery.
On the content management side, we extended our Rails-based CMS framework to the management of properties. This system reflects everything our organization has come to learn over the years about the design of human interface systems, and may be the focus of a future article. (And special thanks to FamFamFam for their icons released under Creative Commons.)
Fincalena have reported to us that after using nearly every property management system on the market, ours is (in their words), “by far the best in terms of ease-of-use and efficiency.”
Advanced Functionality
We proposed to Fincalena a mechanism to allow the automatic re-publication of real-estate news on their site. The result is a sub-system whereby Fincalena can subscribe to the RSS feeds of partner news organizations, and then selectively publish individual articles on their own site, and via a synthesis RSS feed for subscribers. In other words, we implemented an embedded aggregator.
Fincalena also wanted to collaborate with other local partners, for both strategic and technical purposes. To this end, we designed the architecture of the back-end system to allow seamless integration into partner sites, allowing for the coordinated management of properties, while providing the source traceability required by the individual partners.
We have just recently completed the first such integration, with Fincalena partner Bright SL:
In terms of Google friendliness, we applied a number of techniques, especially in the design of URL structures, to help optimize the site’s representation in the world’s most important search engine.
Concluding Notes
Both Fincalena and MakaluMedia are highly satisfied with the results of this project. Fincalena have a powerful, innovative and future-safe platform on which to build and grow its business. For MakaluMedia, this project represented an opportunity to apply a broad range of cross-discipline skills and experience to a new business area for us.
MakaluMedia Corporate Identity Portfolio Monday, May 15th, 2006 by Mike
Since the end of 2004, I’ve been actively pursuing corporate identity design through the company I work for, MakaluMedia.
The first in a long line of logos was created for Ian Landsman, his firm UserScape and his first product, HelpSpot. In fact, Ian wrote the post Creating a Business Logo back in January 2005, describing the logo design experience from his perspective.
Since the that first web 2.0 logo project, and having been featured in Bob Walsh’s Micro-ISV book, I’ve been receiving many requests to help companies and individuals design their corporate identities. It’s been wonderful helping create clean, clear and effective logos for each one of our clients.
Last week I realized we had no central page on the MakaluMedia site, where logo or related information could be viewed. This week I’ve created a new page where you can view a select collection of logos case studies:
MakaluMedia Group Design Portfolio: Corporate Identity
The portfolio explains why Makalu’s logo design process is different, along with 4 case studies and images of completed logos. My goal is to continually expand this portfolio page, making it a handy reference for anyone seeking to learn more about our logo design services before they hire us.
I still intend on going in in depth on the design process for logos I create on the Rohdesign Weblog, as I’ve done for the Outer Level and LiquidFitness logos. I enjoy sharing my thought process and more detailed sketches on the weblog. From the comments I’ve received, readers enjoy it as well.
I’m hoping the two pages will compliment each other nicely, with the MakaluMedia Corporate Identity page providing the overview of each logo design, while the weblog can offer richer details, sketches and the thinking behind each design.
MakaluMedia Book Appearance: Micro-ISV: From Vision to Reality Monday, January 30th, 2006 by Mike
Today I received a wonderful gift from the UPS delivery-man: 
a crisp edged, brand-spankin’ new copy of Bob Walsh’s Micro-ISV: From Vision to Reality softcover book. Why is it so special? Well, it’s the first book in which I’ve been featured as an interviewee! (see pp 58-59)
Bob emailed me last summer, asking if I’d be willing to offer quotes on logo and graphic design for his new book, to which I heartily agreed. After all, I’d been collaborating with Ian Landsman and several other micro-ISV owners on logo and web design work, so it only made sense to share that experience with Bob and other Micro-ISV owners. (Micro-ISV stands for micro-Independent Software Vendor; in other words a small software developer, often one person.)
Bob called a few days later to ask his questions and discuss the details. We had a great phone conversation, which eventually turned into a post on his ToDoOrElse weblog, as Micro-ISV Tip #6: Visual Integrity.
Here’s a snippet from the article, which ended up in the book as well:
Q. Why should a micro-ISV get a professional in to do their logo?
A. There are certainly ways of doing it yourself, or buying an off-the-shelf stock logo for fifty bucks, with exclusive rights in the 200 dollar range. Problem is, if you have a very specific company and you’re looking to portray what your company stands for, you’re already adapting to an existing logo that may not fit what you do. You’re already starting off with a compromise.
It’s subtle, but because it’s important to get the idea of your company or product across quickly and fully. Any confusion or lack of clarity can delay the first good impression. Design is becoming more and more critical for businesses, particularly on the Internet where you see the identity long before connecting with a person.
In a nutshell, you should hire a design professional because is it’s not your specialty. If you’re a micro-ISV, you’re always trying to be very effective with your limited time and energy. By doing it yourself you may actually spend more time and energy than you want and yet may not be happy with the end results.
All those months ago, I hadn’t considered the reality of my words and name being captured in print. I’m quite used to seeing my words appear online — on my own blog and even on other websites — but there is something special about appearing in print. it’s so… permanent.
Many thanks to Ian Landsman, and his UserScape and HelpSpot logo blog post which opened which the door for this opportunity, and to Bob Walsh for giving me the opportunity to contribute. I hope my words help many more Micro-ISVs out there establish businesses with great design as one of the pillars of their success.
Outer Level Logo Design Tuesday, January 17th, 2006 by Mike
I thoroughly enjoy logo design work, so when MakaluMedia clients talk about their experience in the logo design process I’m always interested. Just yesterday, Jon Trainer of Outer Level, posted a detailed article describing his experiences of collaborating on a logo design with me. Jon develops applications, including the game Bullfrog and the utility License Keeper for Mac OS as well as software development consulting.
I thought it would be interesting to quote some of Jon’s post here and provide my own thoughts.
Keywords and Goals:
Thankfully, this is where Mike comes in. Something I didn’t think about prior to hiring Mike, but would recommend to anyone looking for a graphic designer, is that you look for someone who can “consult” with you on your image. Instead of just asking what I wanted my logo to look like, Mike sent a short list of questions to solidify his feel for my tastes, personality, and desired company image.
One thing I’ve found helpful is to describe goals you’re shooting for when designing a logo. What kinds of feelings should it evoke in a viewer? Should it convey strength, warmth, honesty? While these might seem to be nebulous words, I think setting goals in words helps clients and myself get focus before the sketch process even begins.
Dead End Ideas:
A little over a week later, Mike sent me two full pages of pencil sketches incorporating my descriptors and his own feelings from the Outer Level name. Some of his ideas reflected ones I have had in mind for years — probably the more obvious and common images that Outer Level brings to mind. These are precisely the ones I didn’t want. I was looking to avoid the common and the obvious. Also in the sketches were some ideas that immediately captured my imagination.
Lately I’ve found it good to go down the ‘obvious’ paths to prove that the idea either has some potential — or that it’s a complete dead end.
Leaving ‘dead end’ ideas right in my sketches, while clearly explaining why they are dead ends to my clients helps cleanse the dead end idea out of the system, allowing me to try other areas of exploration and “let go” of the dead end idea.
There is of course, a risk a client will like a dead end idea. However, because I always provide comprehensive explanations with my sketches, I’ve found clients trust my judgement when I call out a dead end.
Client Collaboration
There were many bits in these sketches that I really liked. So I sent back my comments along with my own sketches because I tend to think better in pictures than in words.
When Jon sent me his sketches I was very excited to see him getting into the process so deeply! I’m a proponent of visual thinking, so seeing my sketches encourage a client to sketch was wonderful to see.
Color
To this point, the process had been quite fun, though challenging. I had no idea what was in store now that it was time for color. I envisioned blue, red, and even green as potential main colors and wasn’t surprised that I wasn’t alone in this train of thought.
Color is maybe the toughest part of the logo process in my opinion. Colors carry have emotional impact, which is why I like to leave color to the end of the process — this helps void choosing a logo based on the color rather than a great concept.
Unfortunately, once I saw these colors applied to the logo design they didn’t project the feel I was looking for. But, I really liked the warm red-orange sunrise-like background Mike had incorporated. So I searched out some photos of planets, nebulas, etc. and sent them to Mike as a sample of colors that appeared in space. Maybe, these would help change the feel of the logo.
As it turns out, these “space colors” lead us in the right direction.
It’s rare to nail down final color selections on the first round because color is so complex. This is why it’s so important to collaborate with clients. In this case, Jon sent some reference to give me an idea of his tastes, from which I was able to draw out some new options.
The entire process really is a back and forth; client feedback and my expertise, combined to arrive at a final logomark that’s attractive, practical and pleases both the client and designer.
What intrigues me is how fun this process can be, particularly for clients. All of the clients who have collaborated in their own logo process have commented on how much they enjoyed it. Knowing clients get a logo they love and a process that’s fun makes for a very satisfying experience for everyone.
If you need of a logo and are intrigued by this design process, drop me a line.
World-Wired: Beyond MATC Article Wednesday, January 11th, 2006 by Mike
At the very tail end of 2005, I happened to stop by my alma mater, Milwaukee Area Technical College to see 
instructors and friends. While there, I was introduced to the PR department (which is very near the place I used to work as a student). Somehow, I managed to get an invitation to be the topic of an article for a new online magazine at the MATC website, Beyond MATC.
In December, I received a call from Julie at MATC’s PR department, where I shared stories and insights from my years as a design student, about my work now and remote working in general. It was a great discussion — touching on globalism, distributed teamwork, creativity, blogging and more. Unfortunately, much of our discussions had to be trimmed from the final article (seems like a great reason for an MATC PR Weblog).
This week, Sue, the MATC staff photographer stopped by to take a few photos to accompany the article, to complete the process. Sue and I had a great time on the shoot, with a side benefit that my office is all clean and tidy. ;-)
Today, I was notified by Julie that the article was online:
World-Wired: Mike Rohde Serves Global Clientele
Here’s an excerpt:
You never know where on earth an MATC degree might lead. For 1989 Commercial Art (Graphic Design) graduate Mike Rohde, it led to colleagues and clients in Germany, Spain, France and Ireland. Rohde creates corporate logos, Web sites, Web applications and business blogs for firms around the world, working from his home office in Wauwatosa.
Privileged to be able to combine his passions for design, technology and new ways of working, he is, simply, an artist at heart. “I had always loved art and wanted to be an artist, but my dad warned me about ’starving artists’ and how hard it could be for me to make a living,” he says. So Rohde came to MATC for a night class in photography, which led him to the Printing associate degree program.
That program required classes in commercial art, and from there he found his calling. “The other students in printing said, “What are you doing here? You should be an artist.’ One great thing about MATC is that you are required to be exposed to other areas. I got good cross training between printing, commercial art and photography.”
His cross training also included working as art director for two years at MATC’s student newspaper, The Times, and a part-time job in the college’s Design Centre as a student graphic artist.
On the article page you’ll not only see a few shots of me in my office and kitchen, the photographer took a few shots of my sketchbook, some with a recent logo done for Panoramio and a shot of our kitty Jasmine playing around with my Faber-Castell pencil. Gotta love the cat photo!
BTW, it’s funny to me that my Mac is not shown in the photo above, while the crusty old vanilla PC I use for testing websites is — someone might get the idea I’m a PC user or something! :-)
The entire experience was very positive, all the way from the phone discussion with Julie to the photo shoot with Sue. I’m very happy with the article. Thanks Julie, Sue and MATC for the opportunity!
Liquid Fitness Logo Design Thursday, September 22nd, 2005 by Mike
Having just completed a very fun and satisfying logo design for Liquid Fitness, I thought I’d share the process.
Liquid Fitness LLC, is the personal swim training consultancy of Roberta Challener who has spent years coaching in swimming — from children and adults to members of the USA Swim Team. Roberta had read Ian Landsman’s blog post on Creating a Business Logo, and inquired about logo design services at MakaluMedia. After a proposal and some email discussion, Roberta hired us for the project.
As with all logo projects, I began by sketching pen and pencil concepts in my trusty Miquelrius sketchbook. I ended up with two pages full of ideas, numbered them and forwarded the sketches to Roberta for her comments. Of the various sketches, one concept in particular stood out on both pages — that of a stylized swimmer:
I liked the feeling of these sketches, though there was something bothersome about the single arm. stylistically, it works, but I felt I ought to try a version with an entire swimmer as well. So, I tried a few more ideas (this time in pencil) exploring the full upper bodied swimmer:
These seemed just right — and Roberta agreed with my thoughts in her comments. From these sketches I began drawing in Illustrator, turning the pencil concept into a stylized, black and white logomark:
In the end I opted for a flat look rather than the “liquid” look for the mark, as it would be clean and sleek, as well as not trying too hard to convey the liquid theme with 3D styling.
Next was the challenge of finding a typeface and type treatment to compliment the logo mark. I wanted to show emphasis with bold and regular fonts, so explored several font variations with Roberta. She especially liked the modern-looking font, Futura, so we had our font:
Not how nicely the mark blends into the open spaces on top of the letter forms. I am always challenged with LLCs as they feel like add-ons to logos, so in this case I tucked the LLC in below the type, equally deep as the descender on the “q” of Liquid.
With the logo form settled on, we moved to color. I wanted to use cool blue and green colors for the mark, to help forward the idea of water, liquid and swimming. I created a set of color variations for Roberta, and she chose a two-toned blue as her favorite:
I liked this color version as well, as the dual blue tones seemed to add a bit of depth. The lighter blue helps equalize the bolder ‘Liquid’ part of the logotype and downplays the LLC as well, without letting it get lost in the shuffle.
Overall I was very pleased with the process and how well the logo turned out. Working with Roberta was great fun — she always knew what she wanted, which helped in decision making especially. I think Roberta was equally pleased with the logo, which always makes me feel great about a project.
I’ll try to be a bit more regular about showcasing logo work from MakaluMedia here, along with descriptions of the process — apparently these are popular with readers and those exploring logo work. And of course, should you need corporate identity services, drop me a line!
ComputerRepair.com Logo Contest Winner Friday, March 11th, 2005 by Mike
On Monday evening, was was informed by ComputerRepair.com that I’d been chosen as the winner of their logo design contest. First off, thanks go to Erik J. Barzeski, who told me of the contest.
This is the very same contest I spoke of last week, in my Just Good Business post. In the end, good was served, when the logo entry which used a pre-made logo was disqualified. I’m not sure how this impacted the voting, since I didn’t have access to internal voting forums, but I suspect it didn’t hurt my chances.
Whatever the case, I felt it would be interesting to show my sketches and final submissions to the contest here, to document my process of logo design for those curious about it. I hope to do more of this documentation of work, because it provides insight into a designer’s thought processes to the curious.
Sketches
First, I went to a Miquelrius sketchbook, my normal starting point for capturing ideas. I knew the logo ComputerRepair.com wanted should convey the idea of a network, service providers and clients, so I began playing with various ways of conceptualizing a network.
Here’s a scan of the concepts page:
Final Art
I wanted to keep effort minimal (not knowing if I’d win or not), so I went right from the best concept, to final art. Normally this would be a longer process, involving the client’s input on what they liked, and my explanations of why I drew what I did.
The two best concepts are circled on the sketches page, though in the end I preferred the more ‘galactic’ looking concept for its simplicity and feeling of movement.
At the center of this logo is the client, around which everything revolves. Circling the client dot is the ComputerRepair.com network, which provides clients with service providers to solve their IT needs. The 4 outer dots are the service providers, connected to clients through the ComputerRepair.com network.
Here are the 4 color entries I submitted to the contest:
I wanted something bright (per the contest directions) yet business-like. I began with a blue/green palette (1), a variation with black logotype (2), then adding in warmer colors (3 & 4) to round out my submissions.
Number 4 was my favorite, because the orange ‘client’ ball at the center felt like a sun, the blue spiral arms of the galaxy representing the network, and green dots for the service providers. I also preferred the weight of black text on the ComputerRepair.com logotype.
I also took a chance by writing a new, simple tagline for the service: ‘IT Services Network’ which tied in with the galaxy concept. It also simplified and clarified the tagline being used with their current logo: “Manage the Process.â€?
ComputerRepair chose number 4 for entry into the contest:
I’m very pleased to have won, though there is a chance my logo won’t be used by ComputerRepair.com (declared in the rules). It depends on the company, and there may even be some competing work from other designers — I don’t know. If things go well, the logo will be used, if not, I have the satisfaction of winning and $750. :-)
More Logo Design Experiences
If this short post on my processes has interested you, I’d suggest reading Creating a Business Logo, a blog article written by Ian Landsman, founder of UserScape software.
Ian and I worked together on his company and product logos. When we finished, he used samples of my work and wrote out his thoughts on the process from a client’s point of view. His post was very enlightening, because I learned about his decisions and thoughts thoughts through the entire logo design journey.
Ian’s post was informational, but even better, his article has been directly responsible for bringing two new clients to the firm I work for, both in need of logo designs. So, not only did I enjoy the process with Ian, now I’m able to recreate the experiences for two other firms excited about new corporate identities. Blogging does pay off!
I hope this article was informative and interesting. If you have comments or thoughts, feel free to leave them here. If you’re in need of a logo for your business, I’d love to speak with you about it — just send me an email.