Also, If you’re not on this list, it’s not a ’shot’ at you or its not that I don’t like you.  I seriously couldn’t remember everyone and if you leave a comment below with your twitter info, I will keep updating the list.  Enjoy and let me know your thoughts.  Also, they are not ranked in order of favorite to least favorite.

And of course, I know I’m missing some people.  If you would be so kind to recommend them in the comment section, I will gladly add them to this new and updated list.  And if you would like to, you can follow me here: twitter.com/brand_clay.

Having been a member of Logolounge for about a year now, the exposure you get from it is incredible.  Not to mention, you have the opportunity to connect with top creative firms and freelance designers around the world.  If you are a logo designer, you need to be on that site.

The logos chosen were some of my favorites.  The first one was Brandstack; an online logo marketplace where you can go to sell unused and new logo designs.  They also implemented upstack, a new and innovative way to hire graphic designers who range from logo design to web design.

The other two logos that were chosen are We Heart Short Films; a popular blog dedicated to reviews and news about short films, and  Video Burst; a video production/editing company in Michigan.

Thanks LogoLounge for the Inclusion!  Time to start uploading lots of new work!

Church: Grove Church
Designer: Sabingrafik, Inc.

Church: Watermark Community Church
Designer: Jon Flaming Design

Church: Lord of the Ring
Designer: Jon Falming Design

Church: CalledToBusiness
Designer: Siah Design

Church: Grace
Designer: Pure Fusion Media

Church: Cross
Designer: Vonster

Church: Ministry Studio
Designer: Mattson Creative

Church: First Family
Designer: Marlin

Church: 4 charis
Designer: Green Ink Studio

Church: Conferences of Churches
Designer: Albonello

Church: Westwood Lutheran Church
Designer: Schwartzrock Graphic Arts

Church:First Baptist Church of Paducah
Designer: Vladimir Sijerkovic

Church: Dig for Saint Michaels
Designer: Down with Design

Church: The Well Church
Designer: Brandclay

Church: Grapevine Church
Designer: Brent Couchman Design

Church: Crossway Church
Designer: The Infantree

Church: Hebraic Christan Global Community
Designer: Mattson Creative

Church: Addington Baptist Church
Designer: Visual Inventor

Church: First United Methodist Church
Designer: Oxide

Church: Twin Oaks Presbyterian
Designer: Metagramme

Church: Valley Creek
Designer: Church Media Group

Church: Seeds of Grade
Designer: Rick Landon Design

Church: Bethel Temple
Designer: Church Media Group

Church: Westbrooke Church
Designer: Blues Cue

Church: First Trinity
Designer: Brandclay

Church: Calarus Group
Designer: Murillo Design

Church: Kingdom Advance
Designer: Second Shift Design

I hope you enjoyed this post.  Which one was your favorite?  Did I miss any?  Leave a comment below with your thoughts.

Here is a list of the sites I used for references:

Logopond
LogoLounge
Logomoose

Contracts are a great way to hold the client and designer accountable.  Contracts can always back up what was discussed prior to the project and include all the responsibilites for both parties.  It’s important to have a contract for every project in case things turn south and you need to have everything in order.  In this post I will lay out some of the things that you should include while making your design contract.  I would open up a microsoft or pages document and start with:

1.  Project Name:

Clearly identify the project and name.  Save all files that associated with this project with a similar name and in a folder that is easy to find.  You need to be organized and detailed.

2.  Contractor Information:

This is most likely going to be you or someone who works for you.  This needs to list all the people who are going to be involved in working on the project.

3.  Client / Company Contact Information:

You need to make sure you get the names, emails, and phone numbers of everyone of the company you are going to be doing work for.  This is important because you’ll always be able to pull up information quickly.

4.  Client / Company Billing Information:

Grab their home address (if applicable) or their company office.  Business residence address with phone number of the company and general information email and operator contact.

5.  Project Start Date:

Have this so you can always look back and verify when the project officially started.  Email is not good enough since it is not signed.

6.  Projected End Date:

This is important if you are working with a deadline.  Be sure to add in this area that it can be amended if discussed and agreed by email.

7. Milestone table:

This is usually set up as a table.  - You can set it up like this:

#   |   Milestone   |   Deliverables   |   Target Timeframe   |   Cost

8.  Terms and conditions:

Accessibility – Here is where you will detail when and how often you can/would like to be contacted. Daily hours, estimated hours of work, how to contact; including phone numbers, IM services, etc.

Delivery – Here again (as you can see it is important) is where you will want to list projected end dates and delivery of files.

Payment - Determine price, retainers, incremental payments, deposits, etc upfront and be very clear and direct.  Include when everything is due.

9. Signatures:

Make sure you have 3 lines for your signature, your printed name, and the date.  Same goes for the Client/Company.

10.  Trademarks & Copyright

Graham Smith from Imjustcreative says (I have added this to my contracts – Thanks Graham):

“Due to the lengthy and often costly procedures required to initiate any form of Trademark, Copyright, and legal name search, I am unable to help with this.

If you require the logo to be trademarked, then you must seek appropriate legal advice.”

11. Artwork release form:

I scoured google for some different types (I usually require the company to draft this) of artwork release forms.

Check them out here

I would love to hear your thoughts on this and if it helped you or not.  Remember, you don’t have to follow these exactly and you can make it unique to you, but these are key in order to keep your work and your business safe.

1.  Sketching:

Sketching is a vital part in the logo design process.  It allows you to get out of your comfort zone and really lets you explore all the options that are possible.  You can instantly explore ideas that wouldn’t be possible with the computer.  Sketching allows you to try things that would be uncomfortable in a computer application.  Putting pencil to paper is the easiest way to let your god given creativity loose.

2.  Mind Mapping:

People often underestimate the importance of mind mapping and brainstorming.  In my questionnaires (download available below), I always ask the client to give me a list of keywords that best describe their company.  I take those words and plug them into the dictionary and thesaurus, often finding better words that use a more illustrative definition.  This allows you to start thinking about images and symbols rather than words.

3.  Moodboard/Questionnaire:

Another part that is often overlooked in the process is getting a sense of what the client wants before the project starts.  Colors, fonts, style, etc are all key elements that you need to know before starting.  I have attached a sample of my logo questionnaire, in case you’d like to see what I ask my clients.  One of my main questions in the questionnaire, and the one I often rely on the most, is the question about what kind of logos they like.  I have them attach/link logos they like.  Be careful and make sure you read about who their company is trying to appeal to.  These two could potentially conflict.

4.  Choose the right typeface:

I am not a typography expert, but I have been able to pair fonts with logos rather easily.  I don’t know all the technical terms but I would recommend reading:

How to Choose a Font – Just Creative Design

On Choosing Type – I Love Typography

Typography – Graphic Design Info

I would recommend any of these sites, especially I love typography.  For a list of sites to get some unique fonts, I would visit veer, myfonts, fontshop, house industries, and linotype.  These are some great places to buy and get free fonts.

5. Lateral thinking:

You will often find the most successful logos have a hint of hidden elements in them.  Hidden images, hidden meanings, something that makes you go “aha!”  Now this isn’t the case all the time, but when a logo does this, it does evoke some thought.  I remember reading a blog post done by David Airey about a book named “Lateral Thinking – Creativity Step by Step.”  This book changed how I thought about approaching logo design.  It teaches you to think way outside the box… something that is needed when designing logos.

6.  Presentation:

Presenting the logo to the clients is always very important.  Everyone has their way of doing it.  I personally do it a very simple way.  I produce low res jpegs that show the logo in full color, black and white, and in grayscale.  This allows the client to see the logo in the three different formats that it will most likely be used in.

7.  Revisions:

Ah! the word revision can often be coined as a four letter word.  Often the reason why is because of all the horror stories you hear about from clients from hell, and who can forget the hilarious article by the oatmeal “How a Web Design Goes Straight to Hell.”  I would say to you though, to look at the word revision in a new way.

It’s also important before I go any further, that if you are a logo designer, you have to set a limit to how many revisions you give the client after a concept is presented.  If you say unlimited, you are in for one heck of a ride.  I’ve been there… I’m never going back.

That being said, revisions are actually something that can be very helpful.  Sometimes, when you stare at something for so long, you start to lose it.  When you give the design to the client, its a fresh new eye looking at it; they may see something that you don’t.  You can see a case where the end logo was better than the beginning one here.

As always, I’d love to hear some steps that you guys take and what your thoughts are on this post.  Thanks and look forward to hearing from you.

“CLEAN, SMART, QUIRKY, MAINSTREAM WITH A LITTLE MARTHA STEWART!”

There is nothing better than (at least for me) working with someone who uses clean and quirky in the same sentance  I also love any company with a unique name.  After we had talked and finalized the direction we wanted to go, I started sketching.

Sketches for Homespun Chili:

You can see I circle the ones I want to pursue because I believe those are the best options.  I usually never show my concepts to the client for a couple of reasons; one being that they are pretty rough sketches and it usually freaks out the client and two, you never know if they are going to just take your sketch images and claim them as your own to hire another designer (usually not the case but I’ve seen crazier things).

After I sketched out some possible solutions, I mocked them up for the client to see in low res jpeg format.

Concept 1:

Concept 2:

Concept 3

After the client had a chance to look at these three concepts over, we talked out the possibilites and decided that concept #2 was the best direction to go.  He did have some revisions for it so here they are:

Revision 1 – In this revision he wanted a couple of things: Tea colored background with rounded corners, curvature to the chili pepper, an artsy border, and to implement the tagline.

After he saw these, he loved the colors but not the border.  So the second set of revisions brought: A Different border option, no border option, and a font change from Gotham Rounded to Gotham Condensed Bold.

After these we made the decision to just use the background color for certain mediums and use no background for other mediums.

Final logo:

Other variations of final logo:

Then following up with his logo, I did his stationery set:

And as always, I’d love to hear your thoughts on the process, any critiques, and compliments.  Did you like the outcome of this solution or should there have been a different one chosen?

“Dribbble is show and tell for designers, developers, and other creatives.  It allows you to share sneak peeks of your work as ’shots’ – small screenshots of the designs and applications you’re working on.”

Currently, I am really interested in drafting some great icon designers… but being a logo and web guy I am open to other forms of designers.  I have had the fortunate opportunity to meet and collaborate with new designers from around the world because of this social design community.

To be considered for an invite, leave a link to your portfolio and a short comment about your design style.  After a few days, I’ll review the the portfolios and email the two designers I’d like to have as my draftees.  Thanks and good luck!

UneekGrafix:

Stephen Olmstead:

Sneh Roy:

Shane Guymon:

Mabu:

Leighton Hubbell:

Josiah Jost:

Joshua Geiger:

Josh Hemsley:

Greg Newman:

Fabian:

Euan Mckenzie:

Duneya:

Daniel Irmler:

Courtny Cotten:

Chris Young:

Brian Hoff:

Brandstack:

Blake Stevenson:

Adam Diehm:

Anthony Lane

As always, I appreciate your comments and look forward to them.  If you would like to send me a picture of your workspace, hit me up at sean@brandclay.com.  Which one is your favorite?

I started designing in April of 2008. Having no experience, I decided to look on craigslist for design gigs and offer my services for free, just to get my foot in the door. I worked for some charities, independent artists, and other businesses. After a few weeks I had some experience under my belt and started building my online portfolio. I spent every waking minute learning photoshop on psdtuts.com and illustrator on vectortuts.com. One day, a client said that they wanted to pay for the work I did… At the time, I really didn’t feel ‘worthy’ to charge someone for my work, because I had no formal training. I knew I had an eye for design, but when it came down to it, I didn’t even know the difference between raster and vector.

During this time I was still involved with Dippin’ Dots. Between this new venture and managing 4 Dippin’ Dot Locations, I didn’t have a moment to think. For those of you who don’t know, I am a Dippin’ Dots franchisee (I know – weird) and have been so since I was 19. To make a long story short: I was getting married, needed more money than Dippin’ Dots was pulling in, decided to try design. Along the way, I found some great clients, learned a thing or two about design work, and people decided to pay me for it.

Getting back to the main story, I started finding clients who were willing to pay for work and remembered charging $25 for a logo, $40 for CD covers, etc. At this time, it was great since I really felt like it was free money (I was doing design from the Dippin’ Dots kiosk). So In my mind it worked out great… I had something fun to do while sitting at the kiosk, and people were paying me for it. It wasn’t long before I started getting burned by clients on craigslist…(clients were ’stealing’ my work, and having other designer’s do it for free, etc.) After that, who would have thought it could get even worse!?!. It was then that I started to learn about design competitions.

If you know me (and anyone who does will tell you this is true), I am a very competitive person. Growing up I was in every sport possible, and even took a shot at competitive gaming, I thrived and loved the feeling of competition. In my mind, competing in design was a challenge, and I thrived off the competition. However, the ‘fun’ began to diminish after months of struggling, frustration, and let-downs… Not to mention, working my tail off doing 10 contests at one time.

Coming from a designer who worked on a number of spec sites at one time, I could have cared less about the company I was designing for; It was more about doing whatever it took to win the contest. That may sound harsh, but this is the truth. I know a lot of people on those sites, and a lot of them are just doing the bare minimum to try to win, unless they see real potential in winning.. even then, the idea isn’t to find the best or most creative solution, but rather just about doing what it took to win, and nothing more.

I ended up entering over 700 design competitions over a period of eight months.  If you break that down, that’s almost 100 competitions a month, and nearly 25 a week. Needless to say, I didn’t have the time or energy to invest in any of the companies I was doing work for.

After eight months of working extremely hard, (without the pay-off), I started to research spec work and the negative aspect it has on the design community. I remember specifically reading David Airey’s blog post about this topic (http://www.davidairey.com/a-conversation-about-spec-work), and seeing a specific site dedicated to sharing the truth about spec work: no spec. I knew after reading a few articles, it was time to get out of spec work completely… However, the  fear started to creep in, as I began wondering where I would go from there.

I am a Christian, and I knew deep down that God had better things for me. So I started to rely on what His word said more than the doubts I was feeling about the future in this business. So, I started to search His word, and He spoke a verse to my heart that would forever change the course of my business. Proverbs 3:9-10 says “Honor the LORD with your wealth, with the first-fruits of all your crops; then your barns will be filled to overflowing, and your vats will brim over with new wine.” I felt God tugging at my heart to give away every dollar I had made (my first-fruits) from my spec work time.

As you can imagine, I had a hard time with this and reasoned with God for months,.. (like I was going to win that battle!) I was trying to force my will on God’s will… and I knew it was a losing battle. The bible also says, if He (God) can trust you with small things, then He can trust you with bigger things. I felt these two verses speaking to me specifically and after I gave that money away, things have never been the same.

I decided to be obedient to the Lord, and ever since then, I have never had to search for one job! I guess you could say, work just finds me! The Lord literally took my business and expanded it beyond my wildest dreams.  He has also connected me with some great people who have since helped me expand my skills more than I could have ever imagined!

I am telling my story to share how God has changed my life since my ‘humble’ beginning. I believe that God want’s all Christians to be successful, and I can honestly say that I owe every success to Him.

I hope you enjoyed my story…And I would love to hear your thoughts about spec work, (and if you’ve ever been or still are still involved in it.)

Thanks and God Bless!

My goal while designing this was to create a very simple, yet refined app that would allow current logopond users to view things on the go and keep up to date with the latest entries and comments.  Here are some snippets of the fully designed app.

1. Sign In

Once the app is loaded, every person would be directed to this page.  The user would have to log in (create an account) to view the work.

2.  Gallery Sections

Each gallery will look like what is below.  I designed it to make sure each thumbnail was still clearly visible so you don’t have to click on it to really ’see’ it.

3.  Interior Logo Entry

After you click on a logo from the gallery section, it will bring you to a descriptor page.  This page will include all the same info that is listed on the descriptor page found on logopond.com.  It will also feature the designers icon in the top right (not shown) where you will be able to click and be able to find information on how to contact that designer.  It will also include a link to that designers online site and members portfolio.

4.  Commenting

This will work the same way the site does, listing other users comments and being able to comment from the mobile device.

5.  Featured Designers

Keeping in tune with logoponds premiere featured designers spot, the mobile app will also have the featured designers listed.  The idea here is to have a rollover effect that will allow the user to once again, find info on your tags (listed on your logopond profile), be able to contact you, and be able to visit your personal website or logopond gallery.

6. Who’s Commenting?

Just like on logopond.com, you’ll be able to see who’s commenting on what from a specific commenting section.

7.  My Account

In the ‘my account’ section, you’ll be able to see the info that is uploaded from your logopond.com profile.  Not sure if we are going to implement being able to change it from the mobile device or not.

8. Navigation

Here is a full snippet of the proposed navigation (still reviewing).  As you can see, you’ll be able to manage your account, search for logos, pick what gallery you’d like to view, your favorites, and added the logopond lily pad as a nice decorative touch.

9. Logopond icon

That does it for now, can’t show you the whole app but I at least hope you enjoyed these snippets.  As always I appreciate your thoughts and opinions, please share them by click on the link below.

Thank you Logolounge for choosing some of my work!  Looking forward to next year with even more submissions.

If you’re a logo designer, appreciate your God-given creativity.  It is a blessing that most times can’t be learned through a text book.  Being able to develop a single image to depict an entire business is not an easy task.  We need to cherish our creativity and embrace our ability to accomplish this task.

Sometimes we as designers can feel like there’s nothing left in the tank, yet creativity doesn’t go away one day and come back the next day.  Often times it’s the briefs, restrictions, guidelines, deadlines, and even procrastination that gets in the way. If your process for designing has been successful, stick with it despite these roadblocks until it becomes like second nature.  Adapt a new strategy only when you are currently doing is not working.

1. Price / Statement of Work

My projects start off with first determining a price point.  If you don’t establish this up front then it can get messy later on.  I require a 50% deposit to ensure the beginning of my work (details below) is compensated.  Some designers I know require half upfront and some require nothing (silly).

Here’s a free plug for my invoice system.  I use curdbee for my invoicing system.  I pay $5/month for the pro version so I don’t have to have a curdbee logo on my invoices.  Other benefits of this version include overdue reminders, thank you’s, and dedicated customer support. The free version has a lot of the same features but the curdbee logo appears on everything.  Curdbee is the most user-friendly invoicing site I’ve come across.

2. Brief

After the deposit has been made for the project, I send my clients a questionnaire that once completed will help me identify their specific needs.  The more detailed responses they provide, the more detailed I can be with the logo – it works both ways.  It’s very important to collect as much info as possible and do as much research as you can for a project before the pencil hits the moleskine.

After I read over the questionnaire, I’ll email the client to verify anything any information provided that’s not clear.  The most critical areas on the questionnaire in my opinion are the responses to “state a single sentence to describe your company” and “logos you like and dislike.”  From these responses you get a sense of how they perceive their company’s image and what style they like.

3. Research

I am usually able to grab a few key words to start my work.  I take those words and write them down in my moleskine under the new project headline.  After that I use the dictionary and thesaurus to research the words definition and meaning.  More times than I can remember, the client gave me some words that I couldn’t draw anything up with but after using the thesaurus, i was able to come up with more descriptive/ visually stimulating words.

Afterwards I use the dictionary and thesaurus to research the words definition, origin, and alternate meanings.  More times than I can remember, the client gave me some words that didn’t conjure up any ideas, but after using the reference tools, I was able to come up with something descriptive and visually stimulating.

When word mapping is complete, I start researching the competitors and similar sites in the same industry.

4. Sketching

After looking at other logos, I determine how to make the new client stand out will start sketching out ideas freely.  I normally sketch until I have no more ideas during the initial sitting, then take a break and try to come up with a few more ideas during the next few days.  It’s important to try new things here.  This is where you can really let your creativity loose.  Try things on paper that you aren’t comfortable with and wouldn’t necessarily try in illustrator.

5. Comps and Mocks

When satisfied with my sketches, I’ll circle my favorite 3-5 designs and open up illustrator and photoshop.  Sometimes I’ll scan the sketches in so the drawing looks like the sketch and other times I’ll just look at it as a reference.  Sometimes being able to deviate from the initial sketch make it better on the computer.

Once I complete the digital mock ups, I’ll present them to the client in a presentation format including the full color design, the grayscale, and the black and white.  I’ll also explain the rationale behind each decision and explain why it would work well for their company.

6. Revisions

The price point and statement of work determined at the onset will determine the amount of revisions allowed.  If you are allowing unlimited revisions initially, you should change that practice immediately.  Allowing unlimited revisions is a recipe for disaster that will end up costing you time and money.

Revisions should never be a bad thing but something that is done in moderation.  Often times, clients can be “that guy” and start fussing over small things like wanting to see every possible sans serif font to make sure the one shown in the comp is the right one.  The best thing to remember when dealing with revisions is to think of it as a refining process.  More often than not, feedback from the client may help improve the logo… at least in their eyes.

I hope this gave you a little insight into my logo design process.  Check out the  portfolio to see the work.

For those of you who don’t know, Gamers Outreach is an organization that actually creates programs which use interactive entertainment in ways that improve the lives of others.

The organization works on a few different projects. They send video game care packages to soldiers serving overseas. They host online gaming tournaments to raise funds for other charity organizations. But the initiative I’ve become most interested in this year is called Project GO Kart, a program that supplies portable video game kiosks to children’s hospitals.

From now until December 25th, I’d like you to be a part of the project with me.  I just recently purchased an Xbox 360 for the organization’s first gaming cart, which was donated to Mott Children’s Hospital in Ann Arbor, Michigan. I’m also donating some new Xbox 360 games, but we are asking for old or new games.

Brandclay is hosting a game drive! I’d like to ask everyone reading this post to donate 1 game that you don’t play anymore. Seeing this organization’s work first hand has been an incredible experience. The joy they bring to kids who are going through treatments in hospitals through something as simple as video games is truly inspiring. We’ll be delivering all of the donated games to Mott Children’s Hospital near the end of December.

The hospital the organization is currently working with has a wide range of patients who vary in age (from preschoolers to 18 / 19 year olds). Any game rated E through M can be donated. If you would like to participate, please follow these easy steps:

1. Package your game so it doesn’t get damaged.

2. Mail the game(s) to: 127 Fieldcrest Street, Suite #203, Ann Arbor, MI 48103.

3. Send me (sean@brandclay.com) an email with your logo (589px by 200px) and a link to your website so I can include you in the list of people who’ve donated.

4. Receive a warm feeling in your stomach for helping out.

We’ll include pictures of the donation ceremony and update you with the progress of the new GO-Kart.  If you don’t have any used games, but you’d still like to get involved, you can donate directly to the organization by visiting their website at www.GamersOutreach.org (still under development).

———————————————————————————————————————————————-

Designers who have already decided to give:

Josiah Jost (Siah Design):
NHL06

Jared Lunde (LUNDE):
COD4, NCAA Football 2008

Nathan Sarlow (Cobalt Cow):
Tony Hawk’s Project 8, NFL Street

James Bruno (Jeiji)