Logo Revision

[Ry and Ny]

Being in the promotional products industry, I have to agree with s|s on this. Vector art is almost mandatory for any sort of logo for the reasons he went into.

As far as the MN logo, it has one more advantage as well: It can essentially be producted with 2 spot colors w/ a screen percentage on the green for the light green. If the WGA ever gets away from using Cafepress for logo gear, then fewer colors gives you far more options and much better pricing when getting gear. Many companies and organizations require a logo to be capable of being reduced to one color to satisfy some print requirements (say, for example, wouldn’t a laser engraved Mag-Lite be cool for your night-caching needs?).

Just something more to consider.

[-cheeto-]

“We Live in a Box Under a Tree in Minnesota Club”

I here it’s a simple club to join…

I continue to be amazed and educated with this string and contest. Personally, I like the idea of moving away from the current logo rather than “spiffying” up the current logo. You (we) have this opportunity for change. Why not make it what you want rather than settling for a little cleanup? Other’s have noted in other strings regarding the costs for an organization to change their logo. Why incur the costs to just “cleanup” a logo?

I like change. I am a proponent of change and change management within the workplace and I see this opportunity as a moment to make changes. There are enough requests for a change and there seems to be much interest in the result based on all the feedback in this thread. To me those things call out for something new. Not just a bit of cleanup.

That’s where s|s’s original submission starts to rise to the top. Other than the lettering and coloring of the lettering it really does stand out as a submission that shifts the way we view the logo and how it represents the organization.

Further we need to start thinking about those things that should change about the current logo. What does it not accomplish? How well does it represent the organization? Should the new logo attempt to be “timeless”? Oh and all those art vector scaling things as well.

Keep up the great work you masters of art. By the sounds of it we have a handful of very talented members that can really turn some of these ideas into a great new logo.

[Cachelovskys]

@Cheesehead Dave wrote:

I also don’t think our “new” logo should resemble other states. Here is the Washington State Logo…

Just my opinion

[seldom|seen]

@tyedyeskyguy wrote:

@seldom|seen wrote:

It answers all the questions it needs to:

State shape = who, where,
Ammo Can = what, why,
Tree = how.

IMHO it’s missing something important. Like, who/what is it for? Seeing that logo for the first time just now, I’d have no clue it was an ammo can at the bottom, nor would I know who the logo represents. I actually still don’t know. Other than they are from “up north”.

It’s a good logo, but it would be a great one it it said “Minnesota caching club” or whatever.

For all we know, it could be the “We Live in a Box Under a Tree in Minnesota Club”. 😉

Go to the Minnesota Geocaching Website and you will see the logo “bug” (the graphic element) placed in several spots on the site. In each instance, the bug has the text “Minnesota Geocaching Association” next to it or below it.

However, there are time that a logo bug needs to stand alone and why I would attempt to get the acronym in the bug itself – it leaves less in question. Really strong loog’s don’t need that, but we’re not talking about an international or national logo here. Now, obviously, if this stood alone, you wouldn’t know what it is for if you saw it for the first time and you might identify it as the “We Live in a Box Under a Tree in Minnesota Club”.

But if you had seen it anywhere before with even a little bit of frequency, you would instantly recognize the logo if you say, saw it blown up 500% and placed alone on a t-shirt as a stand-alone graphic.

There is power in simple graphics.

[seldom|seen]

@Cheesehead Dave wrote:

I also don’t think our “new” logo should resemble other states.

Yes, we do NOT need to emmulate another state’s logo. Moreover, the similarity between the 2 is so close you’d have a hard time arguing that you didn’t copy the design and could get into copyright issues if someone pressed the issue.

I will post a logo soon that is somewhere between the first concept submitted and the second that I created from scratch. I am going to go back to some simple foliage that looks like leaves, simplify the tree and do a number of other tweaks. I will also post a version that one of my cohorts is working on.

[PCFrog]

@seldom|seen wrote:

Feedback is appriciated in any form and designers have tough skins we can handle anything including, “I think it sucks” (or words to that effect).

A couple of constructive things to consider:

One: scalibility.

The size shown in the forums is only for purpose of having it displayed on the forums.

I can not have to forums as far as I know display an .AI file. I believe it only supports .JPG or .GIF, and possibly a .PNG. This eliminates the use of a vector graphic.

However, I do agree the final design that is chosen should be made into a vector format but don’t see how that has a bearing on the sample shown in its current size, or did I miss your point?

Just for clarification I’ve been in the graphic arts field for over 17 years know the uses of vector and raster graphics. One must take into account the ability of the medium in which it is being used.

[Team Deejay]

@tyedyeskyguy wrote:

@seldom|seen wrote:

It answers all the questions it needs to:

State shape = who, where,
Ammo Can = what, why,
Tree = how.

IMHO it’s missing something important. Like, who/what is it for? Seeing that logo for the first time just now, I’d have no clue it was an ammo can at the bottom, nor would I know who the logo represents. I actually still don’t know. Other than they are from “up north”.

It’s a good logo, but it would be a great one it it said “Minnesota caching club” or whatever.

For all we know, it could be the “We Live in a Box Under a Tree in Minnesota Club”. 😉

I had to smile when I read this. All advertising and logos require either context or explanation to make sense. If you saw the Toyota logo on a page without seeing it on a car (or an ad), you might think it is the “Very Lazy Spirograph Users of America” logo. If you saw the Mercedes logo out of context, you might think it is the Antiwar movement logo. If the logo was on our website, you don’t need additional text, as the website itself provides context, but if you put it on a cache page, there will obviously need to be some sort of text explaining what it is. The point is that you can have a logo without text and add a line of text to it when required.

Plus, I heard that King Boreas lives under a tree in a box…

[GrouseTales]

I located a cool website, AFTER, we posted the design contest. Check out 99designs.com.

This site lets you post a design contest, and attact designers from across the nation to compete. We’d have to be willing to fork out some prize money in order to attract submissions, so it will cost us some money.

Since we already have the WGA contest underway, this isn’t an option at this time. It is an option though.

Check out the website. It’s pretty cool

[Mathman]

@seldom|seen wrote:

Feedback is appriciated in any form and designers have tough skins we can handle anything including, “I think it sucks” (or words to that effect).

The only question remaining is when? (that’s the intent of the seasonal representation).

I bring all these things up as a matter of consideration when you are thinking about a logo. It is not as simple as putting something nice looking on a page. There are a whole host of considerations to keep in mind and that is why some logo’s that look like orange trees may actually be stronger than pictures of the real thing.

I would update the current logo by adding some dimension to the existing ammo can and GPS with shade shapes like the pill bottle has in the tree.

I think we should should show green grass with snow in the air! It needs to be realistic. Perhaps half of the ground could be snow covered and the other half sunny with thorn bushes.

[2_Stand]

Always looking for inspiration, I saw these iconic pines on a sign to someone’s lake home. They were sharp-edged, but I haven’t the time to draw tonight. The same symbol, inverted, could indicate “here.” I also saw the “transmission” waves on a cell-phone sign. They could indicate the satellite usage. Simple symbols we might could use.

Speaking of symbols in context, when I laid down the background, I had to check to see if I had just drawn the Direct TV icon, and the iconic pines aren’t quite the same as Weyerhaeuser’s.

[Team Hemisphere Dancer]

@gotta run wrote:

@Team Hemisphere Dancer wrote:

I do really like this one as it is simple and to the point. And it doesn’t look like it came off of a Minute maid can like the orange tree in the shape of WI.

WOW! I hope sometime you spend a lot of time on a creative project pro bono only to have it ridiculed and trivialized! 😯

I was just expressing what I initially though when I saw the logo. Think of me as the Simon Cowell of Logo Idol 😆

[TyeDyeSkyGuy]

@seldom|seen wrote:

@tyedyeskyguy wrote:

@seldom|seen wrote:

It answers all the questions it needs to:

State shape = who, where,
Ammo Can = what, why,
Tree = how.

IMHO it’s missing something important. Like, who/what is it for? Seeing that logo for the first time just now, I’d have no clue it was an ammo can at the bottom, nor would I know who the logo represents. I actually still don’t know. Other than they are from “up north”.

It’s a good logo, but it would be a great one it it said “Minnesota caching club” or whatever.

For all we know, it could be the “We Live in a Box Under a Tree in Minnesota Club”. 😉

Go to the Minnesota Geocaching Website and you will see the logo “bug” (the graphic element) placed in several spots on the site. In each instance, the bug has the text “Minnesota Geocaching Association” next to it or below it.

However, there are time that a logo bug needs to stand alone and why I would attempt to get the acronym in the bug itself – it leaves less in question. Really strong loog’s don’t need that, but we’re not talking about an international or national logo here. Now, obviously, if this stood alone, you wouldn’t know what it is for if you saw it for the first time and you might identify it as the “We Live in a Box Under a Tree in Minnesota Club”.

But if you had seen it anywhere before with even a little bit of frequency, you would instantly recognize the logo if you say, saw it blown up 500% and placed alone on a t-shirt as a stand-alone graphic.

There is power in simple graphics.

Exactly.

PS I like the way your logo is shaping up. I mean that literally as well as figuratively. The way the tree is now shaped like WI is really nice. A few less leaves, and actual leaf shapes would be nice. And a bit less color too. I think you’re on to something with it for sure.

[seldom|seen]

@PCFrog wrote:

The size shown in the forums is only for purpose of having it displayed on the forums.

Right, and that was the point I was making, not for your sake as I now comprehend your depth of knowledge, but for the sake of everyone following this topic. That if you intend on using “raster” graphics like the ammo can and the GPS AND especially the “drop shadows” in your logo, you will need to have multiple versions of the file or have some individual responsible for creating and supplying files of various sizes.

As stated, this is just not the best way to go. When you post a raster graphic to the site as a concept, we take it literally, just as the concepts I posted are taken quite literally. We all need to keep in mind that what we are after here is a strong “concept” and sometimes it’s difficult to imagine what a final logo, especially one translated into vector line art, will look like when these rough concept images are staring us in the face.

However, I do agree the final design that is chosen should be made into a vector format but don’t see how that has a bearing on the sample shown in its current size, or did I miss your point?

Just for clarification I’ve been in the graphic arts field for over 17 years know the uses of vector and raster graphics. One must take into account the ability of the medium in which it is being used.

Points made above. It is clear now that your “updated” version would look more like the existing logo than does your photo-realistic concept.

[seldom|seen]

@Mathman wrote:

I think we should should show green grass with snow in the air! It needs to be realistic. Perhaps half of the ground could be snow covered and the other half sunny with thorn bushes.

Yup, already there mathman, added a green knoll on the left to balance the snow mound on the right.

But the revision is not quite ready to be posted yet…

[Team Hemisphere Dancer]

If we were to go with the tree Idea would it make sense to use the Wisconsin River and its tributaries as branches?

[Author]

Posts