So what's the best way to design a logo? Stick around to find out because
I'm going to be sharing with you my process from start to finish
What's up designers, welcome back to the
channel. If you new here I'm Matt Roberts
brand identity designer and illustrator
I often get asked about my process
behind creating logos, so today I'm going
to be sharing with you just that.
We're going to be using a fake company and
I'll be showing you an hour long logo
design process if this were a real
project I'd be spending a lot longer on
this but just want to guide you through
the process that I use.
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Right let's get started.
The first thing is to understand who
you're going to be designing for and the
background of the company.
Normally this would happen through the
initial discussions with the client and
you want to understand as much as you
can about them, their products, services
and what they're wanting to achieve
through the new logo design. So for
today's video the company that we're
going to be designing for is Modesk. Modesk are a start up software company
that produce project management software
that gives businesses full visibility
and control over the tasks enabling them
to be more productive and maximize
control of an efficiency of a project.
With being  a start up they don't have any
existing branding but they're looking
for something modern that works well
within the software industry but also
gives them a unique appearance to stand
out on their own. The logo is going to be
used in mobile and desktop apps, websites
and other marketing material so the
design must be suitable for those
applications. so now we've got a n
understanding who we're gonna be
designing for let's get to work.
Before I start designing I like to list
out some of the initial thoughts and
ideas and also do a little word
association with the company and its
products just to get like some creative
juices flowing. So take a notepad and
I'll just start writing out some ideas.
I'll flick it open to a new page and start
with their company name.
so they're a software company that specializes in
project management. I instantly start to
think of blues, greens
but could be an opportunity to be a little bit
more adventurous with color and to give
them a little bit more of an edge.
something sleek and modern.
So from that
it's time to get a little bit more
focused and the first step to really get
started in this project and any creative
project is research. we need to look at
what's out there and find out what's
working well, what isn't, what colors are
being used and what are the norms of
this niche. For this I'll be searching
google I'll be using books that have
lying around, checking Pinterest. I've
even got a folder on my computer with a
bunch of photos in that I've taken over
the years and I've seen out and about
that can use to draw inspiration from.
While collecting reference images I'll
also be taking note of what shapes and
trends iI'm seeing the idea is you want to
know what's going on in the industry but
it's going to be your goal to broaden
the horizons
if this were for a real client I'd be
putting together all this research into
a few Styles gates to go through with
the client before moving on to the
designs as there could be a few
different directions we could take the
project. But for today I'm just gonna be
collecting these into a folder that I
can refer back to.
Let's get started with the research
after I've got my research together I
take pencil to paper and start sketching
normally I start by writing out the
company name in uppercase, lowercase,
cursive and a bunch of different ways
looking for natural relationships to
form. Then I started to get wild with my
ideas just see what I can come up with.
It's good to explore options even if you
don't think they'll work as they may fit
or they may lead to other ideas. While
sketching you need to ask yourself
questions about what you're designing
like what happens if I were to make this
and like that what happens if I were to
try this line there the idea is you want
to try and explore different options so
don't be afraid. But make sure you don't
start stealing any of the ideas you've
seen or liked and you simply want to be
using them for inspiration the idea at
the moment is not to be perfect be free
and keep that pencil moving just to
start generating as many ideas as you
can
there's a massive pressure to create
perfect refined sketches with what you
see on Instagram but largely that's what
these sketches are the refined final
sketches and not the initial ideas so
don't be too hard on yourself and just
get the ideas out there I'm going to
come up with a few more ideas and then
move over to illustrate to development
further
once I've generated some ideas maybe
refined a few sketches it's time to move
over to the computer there's a couple of
different ways you can get your sketches
into illustrator you could scan them in
you could take pictures of them you
could email them yourself
you can even airdrop them to your
computer or you could go crazy and
freestyle and try and replicate the
ideas
now I've got my sketches into
illustrator it's time to start creating
a few of them but let's take a look of a
couple of them and see what we've got
so I quite like the structure of this
one the way it flows in together to make
the shape of the M here I like this one
here because of the structure of it and
it could be representative of the
planning part of the program and we've
got these here that create quite an
interesting connectivity feel some down
here so we've got a directional
Chevron's almost but making up the M
I like the connectivity in the middle of
this one here. So it's time to create a
couple of these so there's a couple ways
you could do it you could either trace
on top of these for which if you're
gonna do that I'd recommend coming over to
the layers panel double click on the
layer and then I check template and then
make sure dimming down to 50% what that
does it just knock them back a bit so
you can actually work on top, but you'll
notice it locked layer up so you can't
work on it so I'm just going to add a
new layer on top that I can work on and
so just start by creating this one I'm
gonna create a rectangle that I can just
work inside of just a try and keep things
uniform draw another square out from
this point here
another square up I'm going to use the
pen tool to delete this to create my
right angle triangle so now we've got
that and now can just size it up to suit
and then what I'm going to do for this
next bit is I'm going to draw a couple
of rectangles and then what I'll do is
I'll select both of the top points and
then I choose my directional keys to
slide them over let's train much the
angle of the triangle so I move that
over just takes a bit more in line and
then again duplicate this by alt shift
and dragging it across so you can see
this possibly needs to be a little
thicker on these parts here to balance
it out between balance out with that
first one so should make them a bit
thicker I'm just going to move them in
blend them around
that's one that we've got created I'm
just going to drag this over to this other page here so there's a couple of
different things that we could do now
I'm trying to check the alignment on
this one just to move everything over
but slightly but what we could do is we
can carry on developing this as I
mentioned before we're going to be
wanting to work on duplications and
these say losing the original so what
I'm going to do is select all it I'm
just going to drag out holding alt and
then press shift again and to keep it in
line but we could flip this I'm gonna
create another duplication of this one
what we could do is we could round off
this top left corner of each of the
lines there and just to add a bit more
flow in it and even that out. let's create another copy of
this and then maybe round this edge here
just to see it flowing back round and
maybe what even if we were to do it to
the far left corner as well just to see
how that was to come in and how could it
work in the design
there's no right or wrong it's it's
gonna be a case of just experimenting to
see what you can come up with and how
you can develop some of the ideas that
you've started up with
so let's look at creating one of the
others let's look at creating this one
here so this one is a little bit
different so what I'm gonna do is I'm
going to just create one of the initial
angles in there and we're gonna hold
shift to constrain the proportions on it
I was gonna make sure that I've got my
overrun to stroke and then what I'm
going to do is I'm going to use the
offset path function to create my two
outer lines so somewhere like that
possibly and then what I can do is I can
delete the tops and bottoms here and
then delete this one here then I'm gonna
come back to these and then I'm just
gonna thicken them up slightly
you probably pull these up a little bit
further to try and balance things and
what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna do a copy
of this and then I'm pasting in front using
command + F I'm gonna flip it and then
I'm just gonna draw these right over to
here I might switch over to outlines and
zoom in just to get them them as close
as possible they line up perfectly so
what I'm gonna do as well is I'm going
to join some of these at all I'm going
to pull this one back here so it doesn't
cross and then I'm gonna use the command
+ J to join those to that and why I'm
gonna do is I am going to run this
bottom corner off as well just to try
and create a nice flow between the
latter's so again let's duplicate this
one and put it on our other artboard
let's see what we can come up with pull
this out I'm going to let's try putting
this bottom point here
oh those inside pointers
let's try just pointing that back off
and see what that looks like we could
take this a bit further and increase the
length to the legs so I'm just going to
select all these bottom anchor points
and then I'm just gonna drag them out
slightly we could maybe pull these in
slightly so they kind of come back on
themselves creating a bit more of an
angle and what I'm gonna do is I'm just
going to use a white box just to
position over the bottom because when
I'm creating these I could actually
delete them off but the minute I'm
trying to keep everything live so I can
carry on working it and I can always
come back to things so I'm just working
by eliminating areas if this were a real
client project I'd be taking my time and
spending a lot more time on each step of
the way to ensure that Logan design is
fit for purpose and solves a problem
outlined in the initial brief let's
create a few more of these ideas and see
what we've got
when I'm creating ideas I like to keep
zooming out so I can check them of a
small size to see how the work small and
I like to flip to check the balance and
reflect just allows me to see it
differently than a letter form or
anything like that one of the main
principles of logo designs is to keep
things simple if you're looking for some
more tips on what makes a successful
logo I've got an article on my blog for
5 tips a successful logo design which
will drop a link to in the description
if you want to have a read so there we
go a piece together a few those ideas
now some things are working some are not
working so well but this is the idea of
trying to create as many as you can and
again if this was a real project I'd
carry on creating the ideas developing
them further and I'd fill the canvas as
much as I can do before finalizing the
concepts I was willing to show to the
client
so once I've actually got these
somewhere that I'm happy with
once you've managed to piece together a
few of the designs and you've refined
them to some way you're happy with it's
at this point you'll start prepping the
designs to show the client I show my
logo designs in a keynote presentation
that can go through with the client and
talk them through the journey and how it
solves a problem in client presentations
is super important to use mock-ups and
show their designs in context it's
importantly make them relevant to the
client to make the most impact do you
want to see how I present my logo
designs to Klein you can check out my
video on that I'll drop a link to it in
the description box below so there we
have it that's the process I use to
typically design my logos thanks for
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