The Culprit
I bought a new bike a few months back, and I’ve been riding the trails around Northern Virginia as much as the weather and my schedule permit. I saw this sign on the Washington and Old Dominion, one of the primary trails in the area. At a moderate cycling speed – maybe 20mph – I did not even come close to being able to read this monstrously complex sign. I suppose walkers would have time to puzzle it out, but it’s hopeless for anyone moving at speed or concentrating on what they’re doing.
Taking the time to decipher the sign, it tells us that bikes and inline skaters should yield to pedestrians, and everyone should yield to horses. But when I see a triangle with arrows on it, my first expectation is that I’m looking at a cycle (for example, rock yields to paper yields to scissors yields to rock). Only after looking at every single icon and arrow do I realize that this is not the case on this sign, because one of the arrows has been flipped. Instead of fighting people’s expectations, the sign should be laid out in the same way people read: left to right, top to bottom. Put the message on two lines: “Cyclists yield to Pedestrians / Yield to Horses.” I’ll admit their design is more clever and takes up less space; however the meaning is muddled. In signage the goal is clarity, not wit.
Of course in a more perfect world, this sign would function better if split into two: first, a sign indicating cyclists and rollerbladers should yield to pedestrians; and 20-30 feet later, a sign reading “Yield to horses.” This would give more time to read the sign, and clear up any confusion about who should be yielding to whom. Come on economic stimulus package – get me a new sign!
Anyway, I don’t usually gripe this much, but I can’t bike past bad design and let it stand.
I recently completed a few design and identity projects for Beltway Technology Connections, a startup company in Washington, DC. BTC came to me looking for a new logo and a set of print collateral to go with it. I’m quite pleased with the end result of the logo project, but in the process of creating it a lot of good alternative designs were tossed away. As they would otherwise never see the light of day, I thought I’d post a little bit about my logo design project.
The finished product
The client left this project pretty open-ended. The primary design criteria was that it fit for both of the sectors they market to: federal government agencies and technology companies. Their first logo, which they had always viewed as something of a placeholder, depicted a sketchy line-drawing of the US capitol building – fine for government, but no connection to technology. My first set of sketches included some designs that played off the building idea, and others that took the logo in a more abstract or techy direction.
A sampling of BTC logo sketches
As I continued designing, I moved the sketching process into Adobe Illustrator. I still wasn’t creating polished and complete logos, but switching to the computer allowed me to give the client a better idea of what the final logo would look like. The need to keep the building became clear through this process – the client wanted a concrete symbol for government, and the building worked very well in that regard.
The color scheme was essentially set before the project began. I had already designed 2 or 3 marketing sheets for them, and developed a color scheme of red, light-but-saturated blue, and gray. As such, my main color decision was not which colors to use, but whether to use the full palette (ie, red/blue/gray) or only a subset (red/gray seemed to work the best here).
BTC Illustrator sketches
With the decision to use the building made, I realized that the “tech” side of the logo might need to come from the style. I hit upon the idea of placing the building mark inside a circular badge. Badge or button logos are a trend among tech companies. While trendiness on its own is not a good reason to make a design decision, in this case the “glowy badge” was able to draw the connection between a government building and the tech industry. But also, round emblems are common as logos for governement agencies. So the BTC logo can be read as a stylized update on a governemental crest.
Color, shading, typeface, and building-shape options
With the BTC logo completed, we shifted focus to GovTechConnect, BTC’s flagship product. GovTechConnect is an online directory that helps bring together government agencies with high tech contractors. We decided to keep the style similar to maintain a connection between product and company.
The beginnings of the GovTechConnect logo
The mark within the GovTechConnect badge was based on an early sketch of the BTC logo. A building symbolizes the federal government, while a gear represents tech as well as the concepts of work, efficiency, and industry. A few alternate designs and a little bit of tweaking later, the GovTechConnect logo was ready for use!
Design alternatives for the GovTechConnect logo
More options for the GovTechConnect badge. I
Thanks to BTC for this very enjoyable project, and for their cooperation in posting this little window into the process on the Rocdove blog.
