World of Logo Design
Have you ever thought about designing a logo? Before going into the details of choosing a logo design for a company, which, besides, will be used for a commercial website or corporate blog, it is important to mention that there is no right or wrong logo design. Graphic designers today use modern technology to create designs that are unique and it also connects psychologically. Being one of the best animation colleges in Bangalore, we try and provide every aspect of learning to the students.
A logo is one of the strongest symbols of a company, brand, or product. It is the logo that stands out from 50 similar products in the market. A logo helps people recognize a brand and make decisions faster to purchase. The psychology of logos — from the fonts, colors, and shapes — affects how the UI/UX designers design them.
Besides, a logo is one of the most important assets when it comes to a brand and should not only communicate the environment of a brand but also be easily recognizable to the customers. The most important thing to remember when designing a logo is that the logo or symbol you create for a company must support the company’s brand and purpose.
Just think of the big brands: McDonald’s, Audi, Facebook, Nike, Twitter; They all have logos that talk about their businesses and become synonymous with the brand. But how important are logos for a company? In this article, we will discuss and present the various aspects that must be taken into account when designing a logo and how to make a logo, part of the brand recognition unit.
What is the design of logos?
Designing a logo is much more than choosing an image and a typographic font. The professional logo design consists of transmitting the values and corporate identity of a business through the image in the process of creating your brand.
A logo represents the first visual contact that a potential customer will have with a business. What does this mean? That as for everything in this world, there is no second chance to make a good first impression. If your logo transmits your values, represents your business and aligns with the services/products you offer, we can talk about a brand with a designed personality focused and oriented towards its customers.
If the world’s leading brands changed their logo, would it affect us? If it’s minimal changes, probably not. However, right now nobody imagines a Coca Cola logo with square and uppercase letters or Nike without its symbol.
‘‘We associate images with concepts, concepts with ideas and, consequently, ideas with brands.’’.
What is a logo and what types are there?
Logo definition
The logo is a unique graphic symbol of a company, brand, or product; as well as a group of letters, abbreviations, figures, etc adopted by an organization to identify its products.
If we analyze the definitions, we can draw two significant conclusions:
- A logo is a custom symbol for a specific purpose.
- Logos are made up of a series of elements, that is, they are sets of shapes.
Types of logos
We can differentiate several types of graphic representations to identify a brand:
Monogram Logo (Lettermarks)
A monogram logo is a decorative design made up of a combination of one to three letters (traditionally three) to create a single symbol. Monogram logos or lettermarks consist of letters, brand initials. IBM, CNN, HP, HBO, Noticing a pattern, yes? They’re the initialisms of a few famous corporations with instead prolonged names. With 2 or 3 words to remember, they’ve each come to the usage of their initials for logo-identification purposes.
Wordmark or (logotype)
Wordmark is used to refer to a specific design for the written name of an organisation, company or product, intended to aid recognition and provide what is often described as a graphic identity. Similar to a lettermark, a wordmark or logotype is a font-based logo that focuses on a business’ name alone.
Pictorial marks (or logo symbols)
A pictorial mark is an icon or graphic-based logo. It’s probably the image that comes to mind when you think ‘logo’. A true brand mark is only an image. Because of this, it can be a tricky logo type for new companies, or those without strong brand recognition, to use.
Abstract logo marks
An abstract mark is a specific type of pictorial logo. Instead of being a recognizable image—like an apple or a bird—it’s an abstract geometric form that represents your business. However, instead of being restricted to a picture of something recognizable, abstract logos allow you to create something truly unique to represent your brand.
The emblem
An emblem logo consists of font inside a symbol or an icon. These logos tend to have a traditional appearance about them that can make a striking impact, thus they are often the go-to choice for many schools, organizations or government agencies.
Combination
These logos combine a wordmark and a symbol or icon to give the flexibility for the use of either or both elements across a variety of applications.
The importance of logo design
Logo design is an integral part of the brand because it helps create an identity or recognition for a business or product by increasing brand visibility. A good logo design is important as it symbolizes not only how customers perceive a company, but also how they feel about it. A logo should send positive vibes about a company, a product and the philosophy of a business.
A company logo and corporate design should also look good and keep their proportions, whether you use them in print media or on your website, on social media or if you use them on a black or colored background.
What main aspects should be taken into account to create a logo?
In the creation of logos it is important to take into account a series of factors that will make an image stand out and have the success one expects. Some of these factors are as follows:
A logo must be easily readable. If we choose to use letters, we must pay attention to the chosen font, that the style is correct and that it can be read clearly.
Your logo has to be different from the competition. Can you imagine that the Coca Cola logo and Pepsi’s logo were first cousins? If your brand takes as a starting point the competing brand, let it be to differentiate you from it, but never so that it can give rise to similarities.
The logo must stand out for being original. You can rely on other logos to choose the letter, shape or even the composition, but never plagiarize. Do not be tempted to make your logo the same as another already known. Our mind associates concepts with well-known images, so we will always tend to think of concrete logos to represent our idea, which is fine to guide us, but we must customize them to our liking and according to our values.
Logos must correspond to the corporate image. Whether or not the logo is the first step of building a brand, we must start with some concepts:
Main values of our business, that is, what we want to convey with our logo: strength, sustainability, technology, efficiency.
Colors associated with our brand. We recommend you take a look at the theories of color psychology and how they influence our decisions.
Versatility: Your logo will appear throughout your communication and marketing strategy. Take into account its design to translate it into several media, both physical (such as cards, brochures, folders) and online (web pages, social networks). You never create your logo thinking only of the wallpaper of your computer or mobile, since in the long run it could mean certain limitations.
How to choose the right logo design?
When deciding to design a logo, you should take into account some things that will help you give your business the brand identity it deserves. Don’t underestimate the brand awareness that a good logo design can bring to the business.
Try to show the McDonalds logo to children and you can bet that they will respond immediately with “I’m lovin it”. It is quite clear that children associate the logo with McDonalds, even if they do not understand what a logo is. Amazing right?
How do I start with Logo designs?
Understanding the psychology of the people is an integral part of logo design. Applicants opts for courses in applied arts and graphics design to understand the keenness of designing a logo. There are many long term and short term courses with which you can start. Having knowledge of designing will help you think in a wider way and explore the ideas and trends. If you want to have a creative logo for a business, first try to get some inspiration in the logo by looking at successful brand concepts. Getting inspired with existing work but never plagiarizing should always be in the mind.
Briefing to design logos
To design logos and get a custom logo , you need to prepare a small summary of your needs or briefing first. For example, ask yourself questions like these:
- What is the purpose of the brand?
- What services / products does the company offer and to which sector does it belong?
- What values are associated with the brand?
- What type of logo will go with the company?
- Will I include a motto?
- What are the colors of the brand?
- What does each brand color indicate?
- What adjectives can I describe the business with?
There are also some important things to keep in mind when choosing a logo design. Those factors include visual representation, the uniqueness of the concept and the memorability factor.
Visual representation:
A good visual representation of the company logo increases the business’s brand potential and creates a visual impression on people’s minds. Then they will begin to relate the logo you have chosen with the brand, which in many cases makes the logo synonymous with the brand or the product itself.
Unique concept:
A unique concept in logo design will also help your brand stand out from your competitors and can be easily recognized and associated with your business.
Memorability Factor:
Many studies over the years have shown that people tend to remember a product or business because of the logo rather than the brand. This can be an advantage when you contemplate a new product, where you can create a new logo simply by adding the new name to the existing popular logo.
This helps to create brand awareness about the new product among customers that can relate it to a recognized logo and brand.
So, that’s all for the article. In our next blog, we will talk about the psychological impact of logos. Stay tuned and keep supporting Animaster.
Join our family of 6000+ Animation students. Get our Design College magazine free!
Receive latest & best Animation, Vfx, Game & Interior Design news , sign-in now