Category: Branding

Animating the Logo

Reflecting on the concepts that underpin the design of a logo, Graphic Designer Adrian Shaughnessy in his book Graphic design : A User’s Manual (2009, p.181) notes that “a logo will have to work on numerous platforms, mobile phone screen, website, T-shirt, and at the end of a television commercial. Increasingly, too, logos have to move. The days of the static unchanging logo have gone. Today our logos are expected to be mini movies that tell us stories.” It is this idea of combining movement with the logo to help convey meaning that I wish to explore. When creating my branding it was with the intent that it’s forms would be simpIe and flexible enough to be able to be animated in a variety of ways to further reinforce the key themes of the brand, exploration, accessibility and unexpectedness. The high contrast forms should remain distinct even when manipulated and warped.

Shaughnessy finishes his reflection on logo design by saying the “final development in logo design that designers have to take into consideration is that the era of the monolithic, unchanging logo is over. In our visual culture we want variety and stimulus. Accordingly, the logos of the future are likely to be ever changing and malleable.”. For an author writing in 2009 this has been particularly prescient as you can see this malleability being apparent in much contemporary branding, for instance in Monotypes branding work for Amsteldok as shown below.

Amsteldok Branding (Monotype 2020)

This makes use of a variable typeface at it’s core to create a system of interrelated letterforms that warp and move in relation to each other.

Above Left. An animated gif of a pencil I created in the Animate tutorial
Above Right. The Animate tutorial

Previously, in my professional career I have created animations using After Effects, however I found this program to be too complex for the simpler style of animation I was looking to achieve. Instead I looked at using Adobe Animate, a vector based animation program that has a powerful suite of tools suitable to the animation and manipulating of letterforms. Having never used the software, I worked through a series of tutorials that are included with the program and created the animated pencil gif to the above right. Once I felt comfortable with the software, I experimented with some basic styles of revealing letters in the logo as seen to the right. I wanted to play with the idea of different parts of the logo revealing themselves as they are explored. There are still many things to correct, for instance the timing of the reveals and the quality of the movement, but it is an avenue I hope to continue to explore further as the project develops.

Above. My initial test animation for the ODD Foundry logo. The timing needs to be corrected as well as the removal of some thin outlines that not meant to be appearing over the logo.

Above. My amended test animation. I have altered the timings at which areas of the logo are revealed.
References

Branding Further Development and Refinement

Based on the feedback from the last round I continue to develop my branding.

Selected Logo Refinement

Evaluation

Designer and author, Shaughnessy makes the claim that Paul Rand designed “more enduring logos than most designers, was a pioneer of the ‘abstract’ logo.” (2009) and it is hard to dispute his claim. While also creating logos he also wrote about their creation. In Rand’s article Logos, Flags and Escutcheons, written in 1991 he defines a set of parameters for a successful logo:

“The effectiveness of a good logo depends on:
a. distinctiveness
b. visibility
c. useability
d. memorability
e. universality
f. durability
g. timelessness”

Here is some examples of my logo in different situations to demonstrate some of the values that I believe it fulfils.

References
  • RAND, P., 1991. Logos, Flags, and Escutcheons [viewed Jun 10, 2021]. Available from: https://www.paulrand.design/writing/articles/1991-logos-flags-and-escutcheons.html

Branding Development

I felt it was time to revisit some of my earlier designs for branding and push them on to the next stage so that I can brand my instagram account. I continued to explore the shapes that can be created by ODD, with the decision to set Foundry as the secondary element to the logo.

Feedback from Designers

I presented my designs to a collection of my peers who are all graphic designers for some professional feedback.

“Idea 1 is my preferred… if you straightened out the curves you could also flip it below to make it clearer.
Idea 5 is maybe too detailed but might be interesting to play with the silhouettes of the forms of ODD without the lines. I’d just be a little worried about the legibility of the lines when it goes small.” Vaughan

“Ideas 3&4 are most interesting and 1 prob most suitable, but wouldn’t automatically get ODD from them. As said maybe just needs more letter exposed or perhaps a more obvious reference to the O and D in FOUNDRY” Phil

“In idea 1, the cut off on the curve in the D reads as a P to me for some reason?” Will

“I am instantly most drawn to 1 and 4. I didn’t initially read it as ODD But I would question if it absolutely HAS to. 3 by the same rules reads ODD ODD Foundry. Maybe 3 to 4 variants of 1 would find a perfect “peek” of ODD?” Dave

“1 & 3 for me. I like the visual aesthetic of 1, but it could be misread. But logos like sweaty Betty and Digital Cinema Media are a little abstract” John

Initial Branding Ideas

The name of my project was based on my work in the Digital Media unit, I have previously registered the name Odd Foundry on Instagram as well as the domain name. Currently the content on each is based on the forms created in the Digital Media unit and I identified in my proposal a need to brand the foundry so that the work I produce in this unit will be viewed as a professional output. By trade I am a Graphic and Web Designer so I am well versed in the processes required for creating branding. Here are my initial sketches and developments that I have been producing alongside my 3D printing experiments.

Something I identified in these initial sketches and manipulations on the photocopier is that the visual similarity between O and D is both a benefit and a hindrance. Put ODD through too many distortions and the delineation between what is an O and a D is lost. But conversely, when set in the right typeface the similarity creates rhythm across the design. I feel that with the branding potentially sitting alongside what may be very abstract letterforms the branding itself needs to be clear, clean and distinct from the rest of the page.

I will continue to develop these designs alongside my other experimentations.