What can I say. I felt this logo design I found on logopond was a great example to post for the logo design portion of the lesson. I am covering some very important rules to remember when designing your logos and the steps to conventionalize for the new projects. Keep in mind that logopond is a great resource. Be sure to use it!

Five Important Logo Design Tips

1. The logo must be memorable.

It is some important when someone sees the logo that they are able to easily remember it. There are many companies that have used their logos to get their name noticed by having a memorable logo that the general public will remember and share with others.

To create a more memorable logo, keep your design simple and clean.

2. The logo must be describable.

People should be able to see your logo and describe it easily from memory. If a logo is very ornate with lots of little details the design will look cluttered and hard to see effectively. A logo is all about be marketable. If people cannot describe the logo they are not going to spread the word about the company.

McDonald’s, the golden arches!

3. The logo must be effective without color.

Your logo must be readable without out color. Try on to rely on color to describe your design. If your design was grayscale it should be just as memorable and desribable.

Relying on color too much.

Better use of contrast to create a logo that works in grayscale.

4. The logo must be scalable.

At some point logos will need to be printed in all sorts of places, business cards, website, brochures, etc. When scaling a logo smaller your logo must still be describable. A logo with too many elements will get pushed together and be hard to see. That is why making a logo that simple and clean is so important.

5. The logo must be appropriate.

It is important to use the appropriate font that fits best with your graphic. If you have a graphic with hard edges and straight lines so should your font have the same characteristics or go with stronger contrast like a script font. If you are designing a logo that is very traditional then your font style should not be so modern. You want to think what will promote the companies style.

Please read. This blog has some really great tips! 10 Common Mistakes in Logo Design

Please check out the third-party logo/logotype example in the resources link to see more examples of contrast being used by other designers.

Also, some great student examples can be found on the maclab website.