Designing a logo. The 5 most important things.

1. It must be memorable.

The very best logos throughout history have been simple designs; easily recognisable and easily remembered. Take for example the Nike swoosh or the McDonalds famous golden arches, both easy to picture and both easy to draw.

2. It must be able to work with and without colour.

Logos will often be used in black and white prints and therefore need to look great in black and white and shades of grey if required. Logos should be designed in black and white first to focus on the shape without the distraction of colour. Once the shape is perfect the colour can be added if desired to further its cause.

3. It must work at all sizes.

All successful logos need to be able to scale down to the smallest of sizes and still look great. Likewise the opposite is also true, when scaled up to larger dimensions the logo must appear faultless in it's compositional balance.

4. It must be appropriate.

A beautiful logo is pointless if it holds no relation to the business it is fronting. Before ideas for a logo design begin it is crucial to research into the line of business the logo is representing. It is more so important to identify the business' unique attributes that set it apart from it's competitors.

5. KISS

Keep It Simple Stupid!

Some of my logo designs of this year:

Click here to view more of my logos on my site.

All time favourite movie..... poster

What are the best movie posters of all time and what is it that makes them so special?

This poster for Premonition starring Sandra Bullock is a particularly good example of how a poster is better than the film it's promoting. The film wasn't awful, it was quite good in places but I really like the attention to detail in the poster. Bullock's face can clearly be seen within the branches of the trees making this a very cool poster.

The poster for Little Miss Sun Shine captures the charm of the film wonderfully. I enjoy the poster's simplicty of colour using only shades of yellow, white and black to reflect the playful title.

The poster for Breakfast at Tiffany's is a beautiful illustrative design framed with bold funky primary colours that encapsulate the fashion of the time and Golightly's personality. Hepburn in her black dress jumps off the white page, owning the space as she did the screen. The overall composition has a less is more feel with plenty of white space to allow it to breathe.

Such a simple design with a huge impact. The yellow with black stripe reflects her clothing whilst creating a hard hitting visual that matches the boom of the film. The bold black type face only amplifies this message.

This poster for Trainspotting is purely typographical using the san serif Helvetica type face. It uses nothing more than punchy hard hitting text to give a sense of the films content without the typical routine use of actors or actresses mug shots.