Creating and Adapting a Logo

Course details

Learn how to create an eye-catching logo from scratch and adapt it to fit a variety of applications: from business cards to banner ads. Join Deke as he works with art director Danielle Fritz on a logo concept for Frontiers Unlimited (a space tourism company with big ambitions!) and then as he vectorizes the design using Illustrator and Photoshop. He'll take you through every step in the process, from identifying the brand's objectives to creating the base artwork, adding typography, assigning spot colors for print, adding device-independent color and shading, and integrating some intriguing touches of photorealism. Lastly, he'll show how to change the orientation of the graphic so that it can work in many different layouts. In the end, you'll have a memorable logo that communicates your brand's personal or corporate values in a single glance.

Learning objectives
Identifying the brand's objectives
Sketching a design
Drawing the artwork in Illustrator
Selecting the perfect font for a logo
Adding type
Choosing and assigning spot colors
Adding vector-based shading with gradients
Using photographic details for a more photorealistic look
Changing the orientation of a logo

Concepts

0. Introduction

01 - Welcome

1. Brainstorming and Development

02 - Identifying the client's brand objectives
03 - Sketching a few prospective designs
04 - A brief tour of the logo development process

2. Drawing the Art for Your Logo

05 - Documenting your design with interactive instructions
06 - Creating a new document for your logo
07 - Numerical sizes and coordinate positions
08 - Establishing a few custom guides
09 - Creating an element as a compound shape
10 - Drawing Saturn behind a rocket
11 - Fusing Saturn and the rocket into a single path

3. Setting the Type

12 - Selecting the perfect font for your logo
13 - Taking a first swing at the text on the Mac
14 - Formatting your logo with a free OpenType font
15 - Reshaping a letter with the Join tool
16 - Upping your game with a commercial font
17 - Tweaking letterforms to achieve a custom effect

4. Assigning Spot Colors for Print

18 - Choosing the perfect spot colors
19 - Adding Pantone spot colors to your artwork
20 - Modifying art inside a clipping group
21 - Streamlining your inks in CMYK
22 - Streamlining your inks in RGB
23 - Identifying and correcting spot-color mishaps

5. Adding Device-Independent Shading

24 - Preparing your logo for vector-based shading
25 - Establishing a base radial gradient
26 - Blending a second gradient using translucency
27 - Coloring a gradient with a blend mode
28 - Exporting your logo as a PNG graphic
29 - Scaling your PNG graphic to fit a large display

6. Adding Some Photorealism

30 - Exporting your logo as a layered PSD file
31 - Scaling a design to avoid antialiasing
32 - Masking a photograph into your logo
33 - Better integrating the photo into the logo
34 - Introducing a photo as a Smart Object
35 - Reestablishing the original color scheme

7. Changing the Orientation

36 - Arranging the logo into a horizontal design
37 - Copying a graphic with all blending intact

Conclusion

38 - Until next time