Category: Creating letter logos

6 March 2023

Developing Illustrator Skills

Editing Letterforms

Design Process

For this task, I set myself a small set of vague briefs based on 3 companies, a children’s games company, a traditional accounting company and a modern design company. I did this with the purpose of developing a professional level process and practicing working to a brief like I would in the professional world.

Games Company

For the games company, I wanted to keep a playful fun feel. To do this, I had to alter letter forms and round the edges and corners of my fonts. The leaning letters also reinforces the idea of friendliness within the design.

Final design idea for the children’s games company

Accounting Company

The traditional accounting company needed a different feel. People look for an accounting company that they can trust to deal with their finances correctly. Therefore, a traditional and professional feel would be perfect for this company. I adjusted the width of the letterforms to increase the contrast and also used the J like a power in mathematics as another way of showing mathematical prowess.

Final idea for the traditional accounting business

Design Company

I began my process by researching design companies and the trends and styles their logos use. From my research, I found that design companies generally aim to represent their professionalism, skill and ability to keep up with trends within their logos. Companies that also typically aim to represent these things within their logos are technology and clothing companies.

Nasa logo https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:NASA_Worm_logo.svg

386-3866441_under-armour-logo-png-transparent-logo-under-armour.png

As you can see in the examples above, many of the logo designs are mainly comprised of simple geometric shapes which can be seen for many of the logos you know and love. The use of sans-serif typefaces also can be seen which is common for companies attempting to give a modern feeling to their logos.

After researching I began sketching out potential ideas for my design whilst baring in mind the skills I would have to use within illustrator. I used sets of triangle rulers and a protractor to ensure I used the geometric shapes in my designs. I first sketched a set of concepts and then sketched out different variations of the concept I felt encapsulated the idea of a design company the best.

Original set of sketches Advanced sketches

Final sketch

Whilst creating the design in Illustrator, I adjusted the sketch to change the circle in the letter j into a square to become more uniform with the rest of the design.

Illustrator process of the creation of the design

Finally, I added some logo text and experimented with different colour schemes that could fit the aims of my design. I settled with the colour brown as it adds a sense of reliability to the design using colour psychology.

Colour experiments Final design

Software Tutorials

The first tutorial that I used for this task was https://youtu.be/ymBosZVeRc8. A video tutorial explaining the basics of using illustrators varying tools to create specifically letter logos. The video demonstrated how to use the shape builder which was extremely helpful within this project. The use of various geometric shapes to create the logos rather than using drawing skills has been demonstrated and spoken about as a common practice within Logo design therefore learning this skill was essential.

Another tutorial I found was not completely relevant to my work as I did not use any overlapping letters within my Logo designs. However, this video was my first time learning about how and why you should change text into outlines. It is one of the most essential pieces of information I learnt for this task.

Finally, the last skill I would like to improve is my ability to use the pen tool. I would like to improve this skill as it is another essential for logo design. It can broaden my range of plausible ideas as I will be confident in my ability to create any style of logo and will eventually lead to an improvement in logo concept and create a cleaner look.

Design Resources and Articles

In this post, I have mentioned various sources previously that have both inspired my designs as well as helped me learn essential components within logo design. Another article that I used was https://www.designweek.co.uk/page/2/?s=logo. This article explains many famous rebrands and logos and breaks down the reasoning for many different design decisions. For example, the recent Peugeot logo uses more “elegant” and “streamlined” elements to mark the brands “upmarket growth” as well as being an attempt to “keep pace with its products”. I used ideas like these in an attempt to help each logo feel like they belong within their each independent sectors.

I also used the book Logo Design Love by David Airey which helped me understand brand identities and how logos should embody them. This helped me understand the above article and how the small elements of a logo that could be seen as unintentional or just unimportant can reshape a brand and the effect the logo gives on the viewer.

Learning Throughout the Module

I improved many skills during this module. Firstly, I improved my ability to use many different pieces of software a lot more efficiently as well as learning how to use different features within these softwares. This has overall improved me as a designer as it has allowed me to explore more interesting and thought provoking concepts whilst being confident that I can transform my ideas into professional standard designs.

Secondly, and most importantly, I have improved my process as a designer. The design process is unique to each designer and is the building block of your work. During this module, I have tapered my design process into a more efficient and effective method to ensure I produce my highest level of work. This improvement will be extremely beneficial for my time at the university as well as even going as far as benefiting my career.

9 March 2022

An Overview of my Letter Logo Designs:

Design ideas and design process:

With my early and brief experience with manipulating text in illustrator last submission during term A, and with the quick mini project that happened during DP1 last term exploring letter logos, I was excited to have the chance to return to creating further concepts of logo designs using illustrator. To start off the design process, I began drawing many different sketches in my sketch book to gage a quick understanding of what worked and what didn’t. This was further explored through my exploration of places like Pinterest, Instagram, and other various image searching locations online. My initial experiments during my sketching period helped me to design initial ideas in my notebook in order to render and test my ideas visually. The tutorials I found on how to use the pen tool and pathfinder tool really came in handy when connecting two letters and overlaying one on top of the other as one vector.

Initial drawing and inspirations

As shown in these initial drawings above, elements of my final designs can be found in these sketches. From experiments with geometric type to more calligraphic type, and with unique merging of terminals in the lettering, I found that the logos I rendered onto illustrator gave a good balance between professionalism and creativeness.

The design process of my final designs

The screen shot above shows the journey that took me from the original text – typed out into their individual text boxes – to the use of the object+expand tool to turn the text into vector paths and shaped – where I began to edit them individually – to the final edit merging the vectors to create one connected logo. One technique that I did not know of before, that became very handy in the creation of editing of vectors was the tutorial that I found to split vectors into two shapes in order to edit one area of a vector and merge them back together – this was done by the use of the ‘divide’ tool. As stated, this technique became very useful in the creating and editing of my logos, and even became and integral part of other designs I made following this discovery in other modules.

Software tutorials:

Even though I am relatively new to the use of Adobe programs such as illustrator, apart from photoshop that I dabbled with in the past, I feel like I was able to pick most of the techniques up quickly and without outside sources. I believe this came down to my knowledge in photoshop as they sometimes use similar tools and methods to get the job done – such as the pen tool to create paths. Still being new to the program itself however, I still had to use an array or resources to guide my way through the program when I faced problems that I couldn’t figure out on my own. Examples of this can be seen in my use of the ‘divide’ tool techniques found in the pathfinding area of illustrator. Another area that I was not well versed in where the pathfinding tools in general.

‘devide’ pathfinder tool tutorial https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4c4bEoT_mwE

From my research I was able to find many different ways in which to do different tasks, for example the overlapping of the letters in design 3 I found could be done in many different ways from the use of the stroke lines of the text and the knife tool to cut away areas, to the way in which letters could be edited by using the typeset tool instead of the expand tool. This knowledge gave me an understanding of the complexity of illustrator as I experiment with different techniques to get similar results.

Skills I improved upon:

A skill that I felt I may have improved upon were the development of my designs through the research and initial drawings I made before starting on illustrator. As I developed through this course, I have come to understand how important planning out rough ideas can be in the development process of my designs as I originally would jump straight into the program. To improve this however, I believe I still need to do more prior development into my designs – such as photoshop tasks – as I still sometimes fall into the trap of experimenting in the program before knowing my idea. Another skill I felt that I improved upon was the creation of vector and logo designs, and my ability to visualise the logo that I was trying to make on paper, and actually be able to render it onto illustrator. Previously, I would have gotten to a speed bump in the creation process on illustrator – usually down to my lack of knowledge in the program – and moved onto a more simple design instead of pushes through. To improve further in this, I feel that I should take on more complex design ideas and attempt to develop them into complete rendered designs.

Overall, I believe that I have improved my skills and knowledge in the use of adobe illustrator through my newly acquired knowledge of editing vectors, using tools such as a variation of pathfinder tools and pen tools, and through my design process beginning with drawings and research rather than going straight into the program.

9 March 2022

Exploring Illustrator

For this, I wanted to learn something completely new that I haven’t attempted before as I had experience with using illustrator for the film poster project and the pictogram project as well as some other things. I chose the creating a letter logo task because I felt this would be a good opportunity to enhance my typography skills whilst also improving my knowledge and illustrator.

Design ideas and design process

Final Idea 01

Final Idea 02

Final Idea 03

I started by drawing out a lot of sketches and rough drawings to help me brainstorm. I also played around with different ways of arranging the letters, before settling on the main idea.

Initially I was really interested in a monogram inspired logo design and I tried this out in illustrator. I wanted a traditional logo and for that I used a serif typeface to achieve the look I wanted. I originally used the font Bressay Devanagari. I tried a solid version with this font, but it felt too cluttered. I changed the font to Superclarendon and recreated the design thought this was successful but when I showed this design to others, the ‘G’ wasn’t easily identifiable to them. Because of this I tried a completely different design.

I felt the hexagon was somewhat successful, but I kept working on it as I didn’t feel having the ‘A’ facing the wrong way was any good, but I couldn’t work out how to turn the ‘A’ around and have it still look legible, so I changed to a circle. I followed a tutorial on setting letters within a shape and also learnt how to use the shape builder tool in illustrator. I made some sketches as well to work out how my particular letters would look within the shape. I chose to do a hexagon shape to better follow the tutorial.

The circle was very successful but I felt the hexagon looked better so I experimented with the guidelines from the video so that the ‘A’ would fit in better.

Process Images

Software tutorials

I was somewhat new to using illustrator for text related designs, so I used tutorials to help me understand how to warp and edit letters, add multiple strokes to letters. for this task I learn how to shape letters into an actual shape and how to use the shape builder tool with guidelines. I followed a YouTube tutorial as well as many articles. The YouTube tutorial was very helpful as a visual guide helped me to understand exactly what I had to do to create the logo that I needed. Due to a visual guide, I was then able to adapt the skill I had learned to fit my own logo and create different shapes as well as different styles of letters which allowed me to have a variety of options that I could choose from as my final design.

Another tutorial that was very helpful for me was on how to reshape a path using the direct selection tool. This tutorial was very helpful for me the monogram letter logos I had to create smooth lines for the ‘S’ and ‘G’ and then fit the two letters together in a smooth manner.

Additional tutorial – https://helpx.adobe.com/uk/illustrator/using/puppet-warp.html

Resources for research and inspiration

The additional resources that I found were the YouTube tutorial on creating Latin logo within a shape and the Adobe articles on using the direct selection tool as well as on puppet warp. these tutorials help me develop my design ideas as they allowed me to bring my design ideas to life as I originally wasn’t sure how to fit letters smoothly within a shape as well as how to fit letters within each other and not make them look like they’ve just been placed on but instead drawn as one.

I would still like to improve on my use of the shape builder tool because I’ve only used it in one way instead of experimenting with different ideas. Although, I was able to create a successful and legible design, I wish that I took the time to experiment and explore with the shape builder tool more as I feel it would have allowed me to create a more creative and unique design.

Additional tutorial

https://helpx.adobe.com/uk/illustrator/using/puppet-warp.html
https://helpx.adobe.com/uk/illustrator/using/tool-techniques/direct-selection-tool.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDNZURvGs9E

Learning across the module

The software skills and design skills I’ve learned across the module in Photoshop are how to transform images by using layers, the adjustment panel, removing backgrounds in Photoshop and moving them into new/separate layers as well as learning to use the magnetic lasso tool.

The software skills and design skills I’ve learned across the module in Illustrator are how to use the pathfinder tool and warping tools, in particular, how to use the puppet warp tool as well as the direct selection tool. Furthermore, I have also learnt how to use the shape builder tool.

The software skills and design skills I’ve learned across the module in Indesign are how to use the table function and table styles and use of paragraph rules and tabs.

9 March 2022

Experimenting with logo text

Design ideas and design processes:

Design 1

For my first logo design, I wanted to experiment with using shapes and practise using the path finder tool. As i wanted to create a simplistic first design, i started by choosing a thin typeface. This worked really well in the end because it meant that the logo didn’t look too cluttered. I then used the path finder tool which gave the logo its circular shape, i created this by first drawing the circle using the ‘shape’ tool then i used the ‘type on the path tool’ type tool. This was good for adding further information it didn’t take the attention away from the letter initials. The use of a more decorative serif font for the text within the path tool worked for the same reason and by mixing it with a simpler font help convey the different elements of design.

Design 2

In contrast to my first design, i wanted to create a more flamboyant logo that reflects the creativity of the brand. Even though the ‘L’ comes after the ‘N’ i decided to place the ‘N’ almost inside the other letter as it made the logo come together and it worked well with the shape that each letter provides. I then experimented with colour and filling in the initials. To go along side with the positioning of the initials, i filled the ‘N’ because it is the first initial of my name so it stands out more. I then tried to figure out where to out the word ‘design’, i started by placing it above the ‘N’ and below the ‘L’ but i thought that it it fit the logo well by going into the ‘L’.

Design 3

For my final design, in some ways i’ve combined elements from both of the previous designs. I mixed two different typefaces for the main initials, the ‘N’ matching my first design and the ‘L’ from my second design to again visually present the creativity of the brand. As well as to make the logo more visually interesting for viewers. I gave the ‘L’ the letter the font with the most curves because it create a mirror between the ‘N’ and ‘DESIGNS’.

8 March 2022

Banana Logo

Design ideas and design process

First logo design – starting point

At the beginning of my design process watching tutorials and exploring different levels of design were extremely helpful. However, the first of my designs that were created was not carefully thought about. Upon opening Illustrator, I went straight into it, without any inspiration at all. I mainly wanted to test out the certain tools that I had learned through watching tutorials and apply them to my design. The first tool learnt was called ‘type on path’. This was the tool that I had used for most of my three logos, and it helped them to have a clean and professional look. Despite my hatred for my first design, it really helped me to develop and think carefully about what I wanted to design next.

Second logo design – inspiration was used

My second design was a lot more successful and thought out. It was inspired by the KA drinks logo because the colours and typefaces that it had used really stuck out and caught my attention. This was the effect that I felt all logos needed to have. They needed to be eye-catching and interest the viewer when looking at it. This helped to develop my understanding even further and made my second design a more successful one. Instead of using the ‘type on path tool’, I used illustrations and large type instead. I drew a simple sun design and large type to create a simple and minimalistic design. However, despite its minimalism it still makes an impact.

Logo 3 – first stage, crescent moon drawing

Logo 3 – stage 2, adding text and dimension

Logo 3 – stage 3, adding stem and banana elements

Logo 3 – stage 4, adding outline to create more dimension and finalisation

My final design was definitely my favourite. Initially I wanted to design and draw a crescent moon logo, in contrast to my second one. However, while designing, it miraculously turned into a banana, due to elements that changed its appearance. Instead of starting my logo again, I wanted to just go with it and see how my design would progress further. Even though it didn’t go how I originally planned, I definitely think it was my most effective and interesting creation.

Final logo design – most developed design

Software tutorials

When learning how to use certain tools and looking for inspiration, the tutorials provided were extremely helpful. The adobe ones were mainly my favourite, purely because of how simple and easy they were to follow. Step-by-step tutorials are usually the ones I go for because I feel more comfortable when I see how things are done visually and what it takes to progress designs further. This tutorial: https://helpx.adobe.com/uk/illustrator/using/creating-text.html was the first one I had watched. It taught me how to use the ‘type on path’ tool, which assisted me in all of my designs. When starting the task, it was a little scary since I didn’t know my way around the software, things can seem quite daunting. However, when tutorials like this are made, it helped me to become more comfortable as well as understand more and apply it to my designs. By learning these skills, it will not only benefit me with this project, but with many more to come.

The next tutorial: https://helpx.adobe.com/uk/illustrator/how-to/change-font-typeface.html was a step-by-step written tutorial. This taught me how I can use the ‘selection’ tool to adjust type and create a unique typographic design. In all honesty, I really do wish I had used this effect in at least one of my three designs, but I think I got carried away with using the ‘type on path’ tool. Through learning this skill, it inspired me to design a more creative and colourful logo, hence why my second design was so different from my first. Other tutorials such as: https://helpx.adobe.com/uk/illustrator/how-to/combine-simple-shapes-to-make-complex-shapes.html also taught me new skills. The ‘shape builder’ tool taught me how to combine shapes easier and more effectively. Again, I wish I had used more of these skills in my designs, but they have definitely made me more comfortable with the software and understand more when creating simple designs.

Design resources and articles

Inspiration for logo 2

My design resources were mainly an article that I had found, and the KA drinks logo that I used for inspiration. The KA drinks were fairly simple, the designers had used a bright colour for the main text and a tropical background to make the name stand out. The sense of hierarchy and importance helped me to develop my own designs and think about the different levels within my design.

On the other hand, the article helped me to understand the significance of a logo and the meaning of what it stands for. The article I had used: https://sproutsocial.com/insights/how-to-design-a-logo/ was written by Michelle Grano. Her article stated so many different aspects and features that really made me think about my own design. From identifying what a logo is, to mentioning different fonts, design tools, emblems, symbols and so much more, her article was thorough in describing what logos are and the effects they can make on people. Not only did I gain knowledge and understating from this, but I applied the same comprehension to my own designs.

Learning across the module

Throughout the module I have definitely learned and achieved a wide range of knowledge. I have gained much more confidence and become a lot more comfortable with using the various different softwares. Compared to my quiz from last term, I have improved my skills a consistent amount and applied them to all my projects, not just this module. Software skills such as the ‘type on path’ tool, ‘selection’ tool, ‘shape builder’ tool and ‘type’ tool have all helped me to broaden my understanding of certain effects and also how to use them effectively.

My design skills have also improved vastly. From knowing how to develop certain designs and have a level of significance behind them. I have learnt that research really helps when going through the design process. It has helped to inspire me and spark ideas when I didn’t have any, and also helped me to understand the meanings behind certain designs as well as how they can affect people when they look at them. As a whole, both my software skills and my design skills have improved considerably, and I will continue to use the knowledge I have gained throughout my various other projects.

8 March 2022

LCH³

Design Ideas and Design Process

Design Idea 1

For my first design I decided to start off with the basics of Illustrator due to not having much experience using the software. Using the distort envelope tool, I was able to warp my initials to take the shape of an ellipsis. Once this had been done I wanted to experiment further with the design as it looked too simplistic. Using the direct selection tool, I was able to pull and push corners to manipulate the text.

Design Idea 2

My second design I decided to again use a tool that would allow for text to be wrapped around a shape, which I did for my name on the left of the circle. After this I simply placed my initials in the middle of the circle, again I have used the direct selection tool to be able to pull on the corners of the letters to create a more abstract looking final product.

Design Idea 3

For my final design, I wanted to create a 3D looking design I believe I have achieved quite well. I could have probably used perspective grid tool to aid me in creating this design, however I opted to use the polygon tool to create my grid lines, but I will get onto that a bit later on in this blog post.

For my final design I started off by using the rectangular grid tool to set up the letters that make up my initials. My reasoning for placing them in the rectangular grid is to make sure that they are all uniform.

This screenshot is to showcase how the initials looked when all at the same size.

Once I had my letters set out, I used the polygon tool to create my guidelines for my 3D box. To do this I would create the shape that I was happy with and then use the keyboard shortcut ‘ctrl 5’ to turn the shape into a locked grid.

I then started to fill in my guidelines with my letters that I had previously created.

As this was a 3D design I needed to make it look layered by using slightly darker tones on the L and the H but work still needed to be done for the C.

For the final touches of my design I added more depth to the C, while also adding shadow for that final piece of perspective.

Software Tutorials

To start I decided to use a ‘YouTube Tutorial’ to get me started in letter manipulation when using Adobe Illustrator. The tutorial showed me how to use the envelope distort tool to be able to transform my initials into different shapes such as an ellipsis or a triangle. This tutorial helped me figure out and experiment when using the direct selection tool as well as the distort envelope tool. For my second tutorial I followed an ‘Adobe Tutorial’ that explained how to create your own monogram. This tutorial helped me develop my text skills further as it showed me how to place text around a path. I followed this up by deleting a certain area on said path to create a gap for my text to sit nicely between it. The final software tutorial which is a ‘YouTube’ one I found myself shows me how to create a cube using custom letters, in this case it was my initials. This tutorial was extremely useful as it showed me how to create guidelines using shapes that I have drawn myself, the ability to create guidelines using my own drawn shapes was a new skill to me but I managed to grasp the concept rather quickly. For further development I would like to be able to create more realistic looking design this was due to me being unhappy with some of the elements on the final design such as the C, as it is not quite fully 3D.

Design Resources and Articles

When searching for design resources and articles on logo design – which this Illustrator task essentially was – I started by searching through and reading on some different articles that were online and I stumbled upon this article. The article itself pretty much runs through the steps needed to be able to create a successful logo, although parts of the article may not apply to me directly as it goes through the entire process but I can still take away certain aspects from it. The second article that I looked at was an ‘‘Adobe Tutorial’ that again looked at the essentials when it comes to designing a logo. The article took real life objects and turned them into illustrations which I could have used to influence some of my design choices.

Learning Across the Module

Using the quiz results from this term I definitely retained some skills and learnt some new ones along the way. My quiz results are very similar from last one but I believe my overall knowledge on certain topics has improved overall as I did guess some of the answers when completing the quiz back in the first term. To improve on my quiz results I need to look into the technicalities of certain software, an example of this is questions on the best dpi’s to be using on certain files.

The software tutorials that I have used throughout the module were very helpful as they acted as guides for taking me through the use of certain tools. Throughout the module I have learnt many skills, these include advanced work with the pen tool in Illustrator, being able to edit photos to a high level in Photoshop and formatting texts at a professional standard in InDesign. Skills that I would like to develop further are being able to work with curved lines at an effective standard and the ability to transform images in Photoshop with ease and efficiency.

8 March 2022

Expressing Through Monograms

Design Ideas and Process

Logos are something that helps users identify the brand’s or the individual’s identity, therefore, it is essential for it to be effective and reflective of the brand/individual. Through this task, I was able to create letter logos using my initials and thus, apply perhaps my interests as I took inspirations from my hobbies and interests to express myself through logos.

Firstly, I started off by looking at Behance for inspiration and made a moodboard containing all the designs I liked. Then I took screenshots of the typefaces used in those designs and used the adobe font visual search to find out the possible typefaces that has been used to give myself possible ideas for my own designs. Using these as inspirations, I drew up sketches for how I wanted my logos to look like, nothing down typefaces I would like to use as well as creating a colour palette I thought would best suit for these typefaces.

Inspiration Moodboard

Then I opened illustrator and made a list of how the possible typefaces look like in different weights and then chose ones that I liked and were closest to my designs.

Design 1

For my first design, I wanted to try a retro theme for the logo, so I chose bright and vibrant colours for them. I combined the typefaces ‘Chuck’ and ‘Bright’, which I downloaded from the website dafont.com. Typing up my initials (01), I explored how I would use my colour palette on the text, whether by using a gradient or contrasting fill and stroke colours (02). I messed around with the angles of the gradient but essentially settled in with a warm yellow as the fill and a gradient of reds and blue as my stroke colour (03). After this, I transformed the text into outlines (04) and experimented with the outlines of the letters to sort of create a graffiti effect on the text (05). I used the smooth tool to make the outlines look more rounded and smoother (06). I followed the same steps for my first name initial (07), but wasn’t quite satisfied with the results, therefore, I used the typeface ‘Bright’. I continued to follow the same steps I did for my other initial (08). I wanted to create a background for my logo, so I used the brush tool to ‘paint’ a background (09), but eventually scrapped the idea as it didn’t look nice in my opinion. I also tried warping the text but didn’t like the results of the finished outcomes (10 &11). Therefore, I decided to keep my logo with just the manipulated letters. Eventually, I got rid of the manipulation of my first initial to create contrast between the two letters.

01 – typing the text

02 – adding and experimenting with gradient

03 – choosing fill and stroke colour

04- creating outlines

05 – manipulating the outlines of the letters

06 – using the smooth tool

07 – applying the same steps on the other initial

08 – combing typefaces

09 – adding a painted background

10 – using the envelope distort tool

11 – results of using envelope distort

Design 2

For the second design, I combined the typefaces ‘Interstate’ and ‘Rama Gothic C’. Using my colour palette, I added colour to the text using the eyedropper tool. Then, I created the text into outlines (03) and using the direct selection tool, I dragged the bottom of the letters using the anchors in the vectors of the letters (04). Once I was satisfied with it, I used the pencil tool (05) to draw a swirl around the letter logo and increased the stroke and added a contrasting colour to it. I smoothed out the curves using the smooth tool (06). Then, I used the arrange option to keep the swirl behind the letter logo (07,08 & 09).

01 – choosing typefaces

02 – combining typefaces

03 – creating outlines

04 – manipulating with the text using direct selection tool

05 – using the pencil tool

06 – using the smooth tool

07 – arranging the position of the swirl

08 – bringing the swirl forward

09 – fixing the position

Design 3

For the third and final design, I wanted to create something a bit more elegant looking. Therefore, for my colour palette, I used different shades of pink and for the typeface, I used ‘Kepler Std’. I found that it is difficult to directly add a gradient to text and therefore, I got rid of the fill and stroke first (02) and then using the appearance tools, added a new fill, which allowed me to use a gradient as the fill of the text (03 & 04). Next, I looked at the glyphs that this typeface provided and took note of some of the tails of other letters for references. Then I created outlines of the text (05) and using the eraser tool (07), got rid of parts of the letters I didn’t need and tried to combine the tails of the other letters to my initial letters logo (06) , but it wasn’t going exactly how I wanted. Because of this, I challenged myself and decided to draw the tails and ascenders of the letters myself using the pencil tool (08, 10 & 13). After drawing them, I used the smooth tool to smooth out the wonky lines. Then, using the width tool, I adjusted the width of the strokes and tried my best to make it look optically balanced (11). Then, using the gradient tool, I changed the direction of the gradient starting point to blend it with the edges of the letter I drew the first point from. I did some finishing touches by decreasing the width of the stem of the letter ‘J’ and grouped the whole design together.

02 – getting rid of fill and stroke colour

06 – combining tails of the letters together

09 – manipulating the bow of the letter ‘R’

10 – using the pencil tool to draw the ascender

13 – drawing the tail using the pencil tool

Software Tutorials

From the tutorials provided, I learnt how to modify letterforms by creating outlines of them. Since I am fairly still very new to Illustrator, these tutorials helped me a lot doing the basic steps of creating monograms. Converting the letters into outlines was helpful as it allowed me to easily and quickly manipulate letters however I wanted, which I believe I would struggle with if I hadn’t known and would resort to using the anchor tool, which would result in me having to figure out the anchor points of the letter and would be difficult to use and also create inaccuracy. I also learnt how to use the envelope distort tool this was a very cool tool to learn about as I got to know another fun way to warp my text using any shapes, which would be helpful in future projects. Watching these tutorials, I further want to develop my overall design skills in Illustrator as it is a software I am interested in.

For my third design, I wanted to have a gradient as the fill colour for my initials and quickly learnt that Illustrator doesn’t allow gradients for that, so I found this tutorial on YouTube on how to achieve this effect and was able to use it in my design. This tutorial was short and straight to the point, which helped me grasp the skills quickly and apply it on my own. Using the appearance tool was the main element in achieving this effect as in order to do this effect, you would have to get rid of the fill and stroke colour of the text, and using the appearance tool, you would be able to add a new fill or stroke colour, and when doing so, choosing the gradient tool, applies the gradient you choose. This helped me give a seamless gradient without any harsh outlines around the edges of the letters.

Another tutorial I watched on YouTube was on manipulating and customising typography. This tutorial introduced me to the width tool and the pencil tool, which helped me add some flair to my design and I also got to learn how to open up the glyph tool to look at other variations of the typeface and use them in my design. I was particularly fascinated with the width tool as I really loved the fact how easy it was to change the width of a single stroke within varying points of the line/stroke.

Design Resources and Articles

Inspiration 1

Inspiration 2

Inspiration 3

Inspiration 4

Inspiration 5

The first two illustrations from Behance were the inspirations for my first design and the colour palette. I really liked the aesthetics of these illustrations as these have a very fun feel to them and therefore, I tried to create something similar to it in my own designs. The third and fourth designs were inspirations for my second design. I replicated the swirl from the third design, which i really liked and wanted to include in my own design. In terms of the typography, I tried to blend both styles and merged them into one in my own design. The fifth typography design was the inspiration for my third and final design. I really liked the manipulation of the typography in that design and was something I have never done before, so i decided to try it out myself. I chose all of these designs as inspirations as each of them used techniques and tools I have never used before and therefore, saw this as a way to move out of my comfort zone and try out and improve my skills. I hope to improve on these new found skills in future projects.

Learning Across the Module

In terms of using design softwares appropriately, I believe I have improved and learnt which software is suitable to use for a specific task. Through this module, I was able to learn certain facts in terms of printing, which I wasn’t aware of previously and it has helped me in understanding the softwares. I most definitely have grown more confident in using the softwares as compared to at the beginning of the module, when I was new to everything. In terms of design skills, I believe I have improved in using Photoshop and Illustrator specifically. I was able to improve my Illustrator skills through this module and learn new tools within the software. I believe I feel more flexible using Photoshop. Through Illustrator, I was able to improve my typography and drawing skills, in terms of drawing vectors and creating bezier curves.

17 August 2021

Logo the first impression

Design Ideas and process

I have always wanted to design a logo of my own. A logo is usually the first thing that catches the eye and it is important to give a strong first impression. A good logo is memorable, giving people a sense of comfort because it is representative.

Imperfect and accepting.

The first one was one of my earliest designs and the whole logo was hand-drawn. I used a semicircle around the letter S. The letter S stands for my name and the semicircle means I am not perfect and I still have a lot to learn. The open half-circle represents the willingness to accept other people’s opinions and gain more knowledge. And the lines and patterns in the letter S represent my inner thoughts.

Not too complicated, too simple, or boring.

The second design is an improved version and one that I am quite happy with. My name is no longer handwritten but by a type tool. I really like the colours of the logo, so I will keep the colours. The flower on the left seems to steal the attention from the letter S, which is already patterns inside there. The whole design has become a bit confusing. By removing the flower and the semicircle on the left, the letter S catches the attention back. The whole design is no longer too complicated, but not too simple or boring.

Out of my comfort zone.

I think the logo from the last one is too pink and gives the stereotype of femininity and girly. I wanted my design to be welcoming to everyone, so I adjusted the background colour and the pattern colour. This is one of my favourite and most satisfying designs. It doesn’t feel too girly without giving up too much of my favourite colours. This version is simple, as I have added some small designs to it. The absence of the half-circle design means that I am no longer in my comfort zone, but open to different opinions, criticism and change.

Software tutorials

After reading the essential and recommended tutorials, I feel that I have a better understanding of illustrator. It is useful for me to follow and go step by step. I have more confidence in using drawing tools. I also tried different typefaces, and I enjoyed playing around with different styles, colours and patterns. Because of my lack of experience, I am not sure when to switch tools.
I will do more practice and hopefully, I will become more proficient in illustrator.

I really like watching tutorial videos on youtube. I’m a beginner in illustrator and I got a lot of inspiration from them. I feel that I can find answers to many of my questions in YouTube tutorial videos, and they even inspire my creativity and imagination. The YouTube tutorial video, ‘5 MIND BLOWING Logo Design Tips’, has really helped me a lot. I got a lot of great and straightforward tips so I had a good start and process in creating my logo. I am very grateful for these tutorials as they have provided me with useful advice. This helped me to design my logo with fewer mistakes and less downtime due to their clear instructions. I’m glad I finally finished a design that I like and am more satisfied with. I would like to develop more skills in illustrator, and I hope that with more practice I will be able to enhance my knowledge of using illustrator.

Resources for research and inspiration

Logo examples.

During the research, I came across a resource that impressed me, which was not very long and straightforward to the point. It states 5 principles of logo design and which are simple, memorable, timeless, versatile and appropriate. I understand that a logo is to communicate with the readers and create something that resonates and is memorable. Examples are also stated in the blog which allowed me to take them as references. Those ideas inspire me to look at similar materials the common and popular logos have. I referenced different logos, for example, Facebook, Youtube, Twitter etc. I found that most of them are simple in both the illustration and colours. This helped me develop my own logo design and I decided to keep my logo simple. There isn’t more than one object in my logo design and I keep the whole logo in two colours.

5 Principles of Logo Design

25 March 2021

Pronounced Monograms

Produced using Adobe Illustrator.

Overview:

Carrying on from my previous Illustrator task, where I initiated my exploration with mesh and pattern tools, I wanted to further develop my skills and experiment with typefaces, this time, with monograms.

I was also interested in taking inspiration from past design trends, patterns and angles, primarily to help me visualise and aid me in my creation/experimentation phase.

Design Ideas and process:

Influenced from the popularity of social media apps like Instagram, a fusion of retro-kinetic (more popularly seen in Japanese Design trends) and retro-serif typefaces have taken over, paired up with minimalistic colour (like neutrals and pastels) and styling (in regards with packaging and branding). I was also curious to see if there could be a possibility to embed a 3-dimensional element to

This was something that I was really interested in carrying over, in my creation of monograms, with of course a hint of my own style and personality.

Some of my initial design ideas leaned towards the more retro-serif style, with elegant and curvy serifs, paired up with smooth cursives. Something that would be considered a lot more ‘trendy.’ But I also loosely sketched out some designs with a focus on height and patterns, with an element of movement in it. I also envisioned the use of sans serif fonts, but this was something that would require a lot of experimentation and exploration.

Soon enough, I was not really pleased with some of the results that were being resulted with retro-serif experimentation, so I decided to shift my focus to the retro-kinetic approach more (plus it would flow beautifully into my previous sticker-based design project).

One of my first design ideas was achieved through the use of the pathfinder and envelope distort tool, where I proceeded to create an outline of the letter ‘r,’ with the typeface Base Mono Bold, before using the rectangle tool to create parallel lines until half of the page was covered. The next step was to use the pathfinder tool to ‘divide’ all of the lines created and sending them to the ‘back’ of the page. All that was left to do was to combine the outline of the letter with the pattern that I created.

Software tutorials:

To assist me with my basic understanding on how the mesh tool works with typefaces, I decided to browse through a selection of videos on YouTube, just to get a glimpse of the process and understand any additional tips that could have been provided. Apart from using the mesh tool, I also wanted to develop a small portion of skills in regards with the warp and 3D tools and also generally see how different people approach the creation of monograms. Some of the mesh tutorials, especially with the combination of the pathfinder tool, took me quite a while to practise out, since despite it looking to be a fairly easily process, turns out there were small little details to focus upon, in order to have the final outcome (which was a really encouraging challenge for me).

Resources used for research and inspiration:

As established previously, most of my design work has been inspired from previous/existing/upcoming design trends and to ensure that I stay true to some of those elements, I always begin by creating a mood board consisting of other designer’s work, textures, fonts, colours and shapes, before constantly referring to this visual aid. It is a great reminder about some of the elements that could have been forgotten about. In terms of researching about design trends, different websites and blog posts reminded me about some of the features that I had previously seen on social media platforms.

24 March 2021

Illustrator: Creating letter logos

Design ideas and design process

For this task, I created three different letter logos made of my initials. I wanted to create three that were very distinct and unique, and to do this, I did a lot of sketches and rough drawings to help me brainstorm. I also played around with different ways of arranging the letters, as well as asking my family for their opinions, before settling on an official idea.

Initial sketches

Logo 1: From the beginning, I knew I wanted one of the logos to look classy and traditional, so when I sketches rough arrangements for my initials, I kept in mind that I wanted the letters to be a serif typeface. I first sketched a variety of different letter combinations for my initials, and the whole time I imagined them as having serifs and looking old and traditional. After this, I began to use illustrator to play around with my initials. I kept them in black and white however so that I was not distracted by colour. I then combined all of my experiments to decide which I liked most. After deciding on my favourite combination, I began to warp the text and explore different ways of presenting the thickness and length of parts of the letter. Eventually I found a shape I liked and stuck with it. I began to explore different colours and strokes, but stuck with a simple white fill and black background (final logo seen here Final logo 1)

Illustrator letter arrangement experiments

Logo 1 editing process

Logo 2: The process of creating me second logo was fairly similar to the first, where I simply continued to rearrange two letters on my screen. I also used my initial sketches for logo 1 as inspiration. Much like before, I combined all of my favourite arrangements on a page to help me decide which I liked the most (initial combinations left). After deciding which was my favourite, I warped the text and thickened and thinned it in certain areas until I found a style which I liked. Once I decided on a shapes, I began experimenting with colour. After finally deciding on a colour combination, my logo was complete (final logo here logo 2)

Colour experiments

Arrangement experiments

Logo 3: For my third and final logo, I wanted to create a more soft and delicate logo which looked almost hand written. Partially inspired by the coke logo, I chose to make this logo using the pen tool so that I could add on lots of different twirls at the end of lines. After I decided on a rough shape for my letter lines to follow, I started exploring different colours and thicknesses. Finally, I ended up settling on a simple black design with thick and thin lines (final outcome here logo 3).

Logo 3 sketches

Logo 3 colour experiments

Software tutorials

As I am fairly new to illustrator, especially text related features on it, I found myself looking at quite a few tutorials to help me create my letter logos. I used the tutorials for a variety of reasons including to help me warp and edit letters, to help me add multiple strokes to letters, and to help me understand shortcuts and other basic functions such as how to create and delete anchor points. The first tutorial I looked at was an adobe article about how to edit and warp text available here, this helped me a lot and once I figured out how to warp my text, the rest of the task was far easier as I understood the basics. The article also helped me understand more about how the text tool in illustrator works and how I can use the features available.

Another extremely helpful tutorial I looked at was an article about how to remove part of a shapes outer stroke without the stroke rearranging itself (available here). The article was immensely helpful as I have always struggled with combining shapes and not being able to remove parts of the stroke. This was especially helpful with my first logo and I was struggling to combine the two letters to make them look like one shape as there was a stroke line connected to the R which separated the two letters. As you can see in ”logo 1 editing process’ above, the removal of a small amount of stroke made a huge difference in the look and authentic flow of my logo. This is an issue I have struggled with before as well, including during my week 5 task where I had to make a podcast cover for home going.

Finally, an article about different text styles available on illustrator helped inspire me to explore a varsity/high-school football colour scheme and style in my second logo. The article also showed me how to add layers of stroke to one letter. Available here.

Resources for research and inspiration

To help with my idea generation at the beginning of my logo designing, I briefly looked online at examples of letter logos. I wanted to look more at how the letters were arranged and their shape than their colour and texture. Later on when I had designed the shape of my second logo, I looked at different ways of filling and decorating text (link here). I also looked at company logos which looked hand drawn such as Coca Cola to help me get an idea on how to draw my third logo as I wanted it to look hand written. I really liked the free stroke style of Coca Cola as well as Unilever, Cadburys, and Disney. Serif based logos such as Gap, Rolex, and Vogue are what inspired me to create my traditional styled logo 1.