New revision of Raccoon Rocket logo
Community Forums/Graphic Chat/New revision of Raccoon Rocket logo
| ||
| I was working on my company profile on CGTalk the other day, and I needed to submit a small logo for the profile, so I used my splash screen, but then I noticed that it seemed a bit hard to read and busy for such a small image. I thought maybe the outline on the company name needed to be a bit thicker for the small size, so I started with that, but quickly found that didn't make it look better. Anyway, after a whole lot of tweaking, I ended up with this. You'll notice I removed the planet and trees. I was never happy with those trees, and that whole bottom part just made the image too busy and drew your attention there instead of to the logo. You'll also notice the smoke trail is sharp now. That's how it was when I got it, and I think it results in a cleaner image. And the black bars are gone. Those just looked cheesy. I also did some tweaking of the brightness and color. The word Raccoon is a bit brighter now, the clouds are brighter and blue-er so they look more like part of the background, and I fixed a slight color cast and increased the brightness on the raccoon itself. (I now have a Huey color calibrator for my monitor, so I no longer have to guess as to whether the color cast is due to my aging monitor or my inability to correct it by eye.) Anyway, I think it now looks a lot cleaner and brighter overall, and the changes combined with the added drop shadow on the text make it quite readable at the smaller size. (Click for fullszie image.) Old splash screen/logo:  New splash screen/logo:  |
| ||
| I like the new one better for sure |
| ||
| I like the old one, it gives a better view of the altitude and distance from the land the racoon is. Plus the fire cutting into the black zone gives it a nice touch. |
| ||
| I like the old one better because of the widescreen bars and the blur in the background to show distance. So basically what chwaga said. |
| ||
| Both are good. I agree, the trees do disturb, also because green is kind of too much. Blue and orange already build a complementary status quo. But now there's a hole, a big nothing where the planet was, especially when you consider how close the rocket is aligned to the "R". Maybe you should cut off some of the bottom sky. Probably with the rocket flame and tail overlapping the new bottom line. Just an idea. But basicly they both are already very good. |
| ||
| I like the old one better . |
| ||
| Also, it'd be cool if the racoon or his rocket cut into the R |
| ||
| I thought I might get one or two people saying they liked the old version fo the logo better, but this is rediculous! :-) The blurry background had to go, it looked unprofessional for a logo. I want to be able to put this on a business card. I agree that it seems like there's a hole there now, but that hole can be filled. On a business card, one could put contact information there. (I'll have to play with the locations of stuff to make it work at that aspect ratio of course.) And I didn't plan it this way, but I'm thinking that what I could do to fill that gap, and to give a reason for the splash screen being up on the screen, would be to make this the loading screen for my games. So I would put the word "Loading..." down in the lower right corner, and a red progress bar beneath it, and that would fill in the gap there. That would look pretty good, would get people to look at the logo instead of being annoyed at having to skip past it, and would save the time and bother of having to make unique loading graphics for every game. As for cutting the rocket into the R, I don't want to do that because it would make the text harder to read, and I want the text to be able to stand alone as a logo without the graphic, if need be. Besides, I think it looks nice as it is. |
| ||
| I also prefer the old one, I'm afraid... |
| ||
| I think the logo looks OK, but If you still want to make it better, maybe this suggestions can help you (not easy to explain in english, but I will try): 1. about the logo: Maybe you can use a dropshadow or a glow for the logo, this would help to seperate it from the Background, and would make the logo more being in the foreground. 2. The use of the right colors can help you to support your logo and what you want to tell the peoples about the "character" of your company. A color always can represent a feeling and transport something to the customer. A few examples: In a hospital, sometimes they use green colors for the walls... Green colors should make people still. Red has the most power and announcement effect. In nature, it is a warncolor, but for people it can help to transport "feelings" like love, death... Beerbottles a long time have been brown in Germany. Then, maybe 5-10 Years ago they made them green to suggest a "fresh look"... Chocolate and filled chocolate boxes often use dark blue, violett, golden and brown for the packages... This is supporting the feeling that this product is expensive, luxorius, ambitious. Much banklogos are using green for "Trust" or dark blue for looking serios... You have used much colors (maybe motley is the right word). That is ok, If you are making products for children for example. Not sure about, but if you want a serious logo/design, you could use more desaturated colors. Take a look at the logos from other softwarecompanies or banks for example. The Font: If you use a modern font, this would help you the same way like with the colors mentioned above. Fonts are also transporting emotions/feelings... Placing you elements in an image: In an Image you most have an foreground, middle and background. Try to use the golden section, dont place the elements to much basicly. Try to generate an "dynamic" composition. Try to make your logo that the people will remember it. If your companylogo is more important or known, make it bigger than the gamelogo... Try to think about this: What will my company represent? Who is my clientgroup I will sell products to? How are this clients? What feelings/emotions will I transport to the customer. Here some links, maybe they help more than my poor trying to explain something in english:) http://www.lighthouse.org/accessibility/effective-color-contrast/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_Design |
| ||
| It's aimed at casual gamers. It's supposed to say "fun". It's supposed to be memorable. It achieves these goals. And the golden ratio is only a guide. :-) |
| ||
| I prefer old one. I'm not an artist and don't know the technical terms but there is too much 'open space' perhaps in the second one, the colors look more vibrant - jump out at me in the first one, although the red on the rocket is probably the same in both images it looks better in the first one, more contrast. The black bars add something, not sure what, makes everything else stand out more. Not as much appears to be 'going on' in the second one. |
| ||
| I prefer the old one too. You are right about the trees etc but I think you just need to desaturated them to make them more backgroundy. But the flame spilling out of the picture looks good. If it's for a business card the new one is better, however, it's the wrong aspect ratio (as you mentioned), and I'd push the raccoon and text over to the left and have more cloud on the right where you'd put the contact details etc. |
| ||
| Okay you convinced me to try adding the earth back into the image. I still hate the trees, so those are gone, but the planet is curved so much, and there's so little green visible now, that I don't think it's a major issue. I tried to make it look like the planet surface itself is tilted a bit to add more action to the scene. I don't know if I succeeded there, but it looks better than just having the earth at the bottom of the image, centered. The main reason I decided to add this back, besides all you naysayers, :-) is the darker blue and green add some much needed contrast to the image, and really make the orange in the logo pop. So this looks better than the one with just sky right?  Let me guess, you like the orignal better and you still want the blurring. Well YOU CAN'T HAVE THE BLURRING! :-) |
| ||
| Looks better... Although I think the planet should peek out behind the gap in the clouds on the left... I could be wrong though, but it looks like if you follow the curve it should show up. I think it needs more elephants now. And maybe a tractor. |
| ||
| It look nice. To nit-pick: Some blurring (not so much as the old one) would give more depth to the scene. I also like the black bars in the older one. |
| ||
| The "new new" revision is good. Of the original two, I definitely would have preferred the old one, but with the new non-blurry earth, I think you've found a happy balance. The earth is definitely required to get a sense of perspective. |
| ||
| bluring :D |
| ||
Just noticed the clouds were much too dark. Fixed that. Note how it makes the word Raccoon stick out more now. Chwaga: ? Blurring is the correct spelling. |
| ||
| Blurring is the correct spelling. Whoa. Ouch. I still think you should do a minimum blur on the earth. I think it makes it look more professional. |
| ||
| As Numen Lumi has mentioned you need some blurring to push some of the clouds and planet into the background (just don't go as mad with it as you did last time ;o)), less saturation/contrast would help also. [edit] Where'd those last two posts come from? ;o) [/edit] |
| ||
| I'll probably try a blur on it later. Right now the clouds are all one layer. I need to grab them from an old version to do that again. But I don't think it will have the clean look I want. |
| ||
| I had just woken up, OK?? Try a 2-4 pixel gaussan (don't kill me if I spelled it wrong) blur on the earth, try to give the clouds more depth |
| ||
| You can end up messing about with this stuff forever. I'd have just stuck with the original one. |
| ||
| same |
| ||
| chwaga: I thought you were correcting my spelling. What I meant to say was "The way I spelled it is correct." |
| ||
| suuuuuure |
| ||
| Fine! Don't believe me! And it's gaussian. :-) |
| ||
| darn. |
| ||
Okay, here's one with blurring. Do you like this better than the one without blurring? |
| ||
| It's the best one but the first time I saw it, I thought it was planet earth in the background and I was like "what the...clouds in space?" heh. Nica artwork. |
| ||
| It is earth. Did you decide it was something else? It's stylized. It's supposed to be exaggerated. Also you can actually fly pretty high above earth and still be in the atmosphere, and see the curvature of the earth. Though you would need a wide angle lens to get something with that much curvature I think. :-) |
| ||
| Like the newest version of the picture. Perhaps a little to over-contrasted / color intense to be used on a bussiness card but that logo version shouldn't be too hard to create from that one. |
| ||
| Try adding a desaturation gradient to the earth so the furthest point seen is the most desaturated - gives a nice effect - maybe even better than the blur. I like your racoon. ;) |
| ||
| I should hope you like the raccoon! I paid good money for that raccoon! I didn't draw it. :-) |
| ||
| I still prefer the widescreen version of the logo. |
| ||
| So do I. I just think sswift has gotten used to looking at it so thinks any changes he makes looks better. :P |
| ||
| For on-screen i like the widescreen version better, too. For business cards the bars need to go or be tuned down alot. |
| ||
| I seem to recall that everyone hated the one with the black bars back when I first made it. And half the people wanted me to have a blurred background and half wanted it to be sharp. :-) |
| ||
| Heh - you cant please all of the people all of the time. :P |
| ||
| I prefer Newlogo3. Having the blurring gives more depth, but it's out of place with the sharp clean graphics. |
| ||
| SEE?! |
| ||
| If I could offer my suggestion without offending ... Drop everything but the cool looking raccoon and the text, to be honest, anything in the background, even for a splash screen is just pulling the eye away from the cute little guy, as I see it, you need nothing more than a coloured back ground, and your wee raccoon with the text. possibly reposition them a little. I really dont think it needs all that extra crap going on. |
| ||
In fact the wee guy reminds me a lot of >> EDIT : Titus<< the Fox. |
| ||
| Note to sswift: Don't ask. Just pick one you like and plaster it all over the many games you're due to release any second now. Design by committee smells of wee, and this community is the Committee From Hell. You know it. :o) |
| ||
| The newest one looks good swift. I'd leave it at that! |
| ||
| I've got a rocket in my pocket! edit: oh and I like the last one.. but I thought the black bars were kinda cool too.. but I guess you could always do those in code when splashing the screen.. :) |
| ||
| I prefer the old one |
| ||
| i like the new one. add those black borders to the new one and i am fine ;) |
   |