Joe Diaz
New Member
So it looks like we've got the starts of an icon based design. At least that's what we call it here. Which is good. Think of the atlas guy holding up the planet as your icon. With that type of design you have some flexibility when it comes to layout. You place the icon above the copy (or your name) and it fits a tall, skinny space, to the left of the name and it fits a short, wide space. That being said, I'm careful not to include part of the name in the icon, except for in some cases. In this case I don't think it's working.
The other thing that sticks out to me, is your use of fonts. You have four different fonts picked out with four different styles, none of which really work together.
Your main copy "signs" needs the most help in my opinion. So if you have a design for a business called "Johnsons Auto Body", what I think works best is to have the word or words that describes what you are doing to be the more basic of lettering styles. Make sure it's easy to read. The word that describes who you are "Johnsons" could be a font that has a bit more character and uniqueness, but it still needs to be easy to read too. It just doesn't need to quite as simple.
I don't care for the font choice for the word "signs" because its trying to be too unique at the cost of legibility. Or as my dad would put it: "it's too cutesy". When people read words, they don't read them one letter at a time, they look for patterns and symbols. This is why imagery in logos are so powerful, a picture is worth a thousand words as they say. Think of the words in your design as pictures, imagery, symbols or icons. Each word is a symbol they have seen before. It's stored in their brain. Have you ever seen this?:
The reason most people can read this is because, like I said, people tend to not read a word a letter at a time, they look for recognizable symbols. However, you will notice that it wasn't as easy to read as something that was written normally. You can take that knowledge and apply it to your designs. When you get too cute with your font choices, or there isn't enough space around the letters, or too much space, or the letters are too fat and the centers of the As, Bs, Rs, Os, Ps, etc. are too small, well then you are working against a person's natural instinct to look for those symbols when they are reading something.
Now your "Reading, Ca." has a similar issue. I think it's fine to use wide kerning like that for parts of a design that aren't as important, but I have found that it doesn't work as well when the font choice has an extremely condensed style. And why include "Reading, Ca" on your logo anyway? Have you ever notices the majority of successful businesses do not do this. You certainly won't need it on your sign, the people in town will know what town they are in. I can see it being used on some forms of advertising as an add on element, but it doesn't need to be a part of you logo, it's just one more thing for people to read. If you absolutly have to have it for some reason, down play it so that it doesn't compete with the primary message.
Also you could probably loose the "Custom Banners & Signs" You already used the word "Signs", it's kind of a given that you offer these services and again it's just one more element that people have to read. However, if you were going to stick with this design as is (which I wouldn't recommend) I would keep it on their, because it's actually the strongest element of the design in that it's the easiest part to make out.
So my point is focus on the mechanics of the design first, any decoration should be used to support your message, not be the message. Try starting with real basic lettering styles first, just to get a hang of it, then figure out ways to add character.
