Brand Identity
Idea Iteration
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| Final Logo |
I started iterating my logos on paper as it allowed me to brainstorm quickly while looking at references. I started with the intention of having 2 ideas include my nickname "eli" and a fox and the last logo idea solely focused on my name. I chose a fox as it is an animal I relate with, especially in terms with its' cheekiness and its' general happy attitude to life. I mean, look at its' face, how can you not smile back?
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| Issa happy fox :D |
I then transferred ideas that I preferred onto AI. While working on each idea, I kept the previous iteration in order to compare and reference the modifications I made as I continue exploring the design. Often times, I would end up overstretching from the original idea and restart again from the first iteration.
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| 3 Logos used for Critic session |
These are the final logos I used for the critic session in class. For the first logo, I used a pen tool to get seamless round curves and embedded the icon in a circle which was a more friendly shape, relating to my bubbly personality. I used a brush stroke for the circle to signify a creative flow. I also used the L to create a fox silhouette as it was the letter that allowed for the most versatility and manipulation. To show that it was a fox, I focused on its' pointy ears and long snout.
The second logo was an inspiration from the fox masks in Japan. I tweaked it such that my name was used to form the shape of the mask. The identifying feature of the fox face was its slanted eyes that I made sure was prominent in the logo.
The third logo was the most difficult as I struggle incorporating E L I into a single form, seeing as they all have the same edge. My name formed a 日 when put together and this inspired a sunset design which was reflective of my bubbly and cheery personality. I decided to bring that out with the sunset setting.
Critic Session 1
Most of my classmates expressed their like for the first logo and suggested for me to implement that. It was an obvious choice for me as well, though I really liked the rough and abstract look of the second logo and the slanted eyes that shows the cheekiness of it. Most of their critic focused on the first logo, giving constructive suggestions like increasing the stroke to make it more visible and bringing out more fox features so that the fox shape would be more prominent. I also settled on the first logo over the second as I agreed with their critic that though the second logo is more abstract, it was a lot harder to see the words ELI which was very important to my brand identity as it is my name. The third logo was quite easily ruled out as while the idea behind the logo was nice, the logo design itself was not immediately identifiable as ELI.
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| AI workspace on experimenting chosen logo |
Taking into consideration the feedback, I increased the stroke of the logo and also transferred the slanted eyes from the second logo idea onto the fox face. I feel that the slanted eyes are the most distinctive visible feature of a happy fox. I also explored including a tail at the end but decided to do away with it as it can cause confusion - the fox is looking right but the tail is on its right when one would immediately assume it to be on the left (behind its' body), the name would also appear e L i.
Name Card, Resume, Brand Guide
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| AI workspace on finalising assets |
To ensure that the logo and stroke would scale when adjusted, I used the Outline Stroke feature (Edit > Path > Outline Stroke). Keeping in mind that I may need to edit the logo later, I included the raw logo and the outlined logo. I used the outline logo for the name card, resume and brand guide. I explored the name card layouts on AI and immediately decided on including a fox motif which is the same fox used in my name but without the full e and i. I also did all the logos for the resume on AI after tracing out from reference photos to adopt it to the artstyle I wanted. All assets were copied and pasted over onto the InDesign file.
After this, all the text-related work was done on InDesign so that I can leverage on the Character and Paragraph Style to explore different typefaces easily. The Paragraph Styles mainly differed in bullet style, kerning and text alignment. InDesign also allowed me to use column and row guides to play around with the layout. I used the aligned tool to properly ensure even spaces between texts on the resume as proximity is an important design rule to follow since I did not put any immediate separators between sections on the resume. As I was going for a clean, minimalist and modern look, I used Sans Serif fonts and focused on spacious breathing space between different elements to reduce visual clutter but also allow for easy mental grouping of similar looking information. For the brand guide, I played around with the layout on different pages to make each page unique yet consistent with the minimalist theme. I followed a 5 colour pallette that consisted of orange and yellow tones that are warm fox colours which shows my warm personality, while the complementary dark green and white colours are used as a contrast (both are slightly warm toned to avoid clashing with the orange and yellow tones).
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| Example of how Rulers and Guides were used |
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| First iteration of name card |
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| First iteration of Resume |
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| Character Styles sorted according to where it was used |
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| Swatches used |
Consultation
During the consultation, I originally had two different layouts of the resume with the skills portion on either the left or right. Together with Kai, the final choice was to put it on the left to give more space to the experience and education portion since it had bulkier information. Kai also suggested to align the information in the headline with the Experience and Education text. He also suggested to increase the padding between the circles used for the Skills to fill up the space between the left and right side of the resume. I took these advice since I agreed that it will improve the legibility and make the layout more organised. In the Skills and Languages section, I cleaned up the design by changing the fox circles, from my logo, into proper circles as the fox circles did not register well on the pdf and when zoomed out.
Final Brand Guide after Presentation Feedback
Ina suggested to colour the icons but I decided against it so as to keep the design consistent with the minimalist aesthetics (without exaggerating the icons). For the same reasons, I did not increase the circles used for the Skills and Language to keep it consistent with the circles used on the timeline for Experiences and Education. She also mentioned her distraction by the fox eye in the name card. I did try to change the eye to the same orange colour but it made the design very flat and made me realise that I wanted the slanted eye to be prominent since it is the main feature of a cheeky and happy fox which is the personality I want to display in my brand identity. Following Zhan Hong and Audrey's feedback, I made the company name, position and school name more prominent by changing it to the typeface used for headers such that it is immediately recognised as sub-headers to the body text below. Additionally, I adopted the suggestions from Kai and classmates on increasing the leading between bullet points for better legibility. I also increased the font size for the body text for the same reason, especially since geosans is a thin typeface.
Now focusing on the brand guide itself, Kai pointed out an issue I was worried with which is the flow of the guide. With his feedback, I was able to rearrange the pages to allow for a more seamless experience when perusing the brand guide. I also followed his advice to put the resume in a landscape format, consistent with the other pages. To do so, I had to copy and decrease the size of the resume on PS as doing so on ID distorted the layout. Overall, I think it was a very fun experience in designing not just the collaterals, but also the brand style guide to tell a story.
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