Element taboo is actually a cultural (religious) taboo. Due to the cultural differences in different countries, every country and region has certain taboos, such as Japanese taboo lotus, numbers 9 and 4, Korean taboo number 4, American taboo number 13, Canadian and British taboo Bai Baihe. The lotus flowers and figures I mentioned above often appear in the form of graphic elements in logo design, so make sure that you fully understand the local culture at the beginning of the project. More content, no longer expand the description.
The understanding of dragons in eastern and western cultures is quite different. What is considered auspicious and sacred in the East is understood as evil in the West. This is why dragons are rarely seen in international competitions held in the East.
Of course, there have been exceptions in my memory.
The reasons behind it will not be elaborated.
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The second taboo: communication taboo
I will emphasize this point. We are discussing various taboos, aesthetics, or graphic connotations. In fact, we are all trying to improve the spread of logo.
Logo, brand name, advertising language, product quality and many other aspects are all helpful to enhance brand image. If the brand image wants to penetrate into the hearts of consumers, the first condition is to be able to spread, and the second is to be conducive to spread.
The following contents only explain and analyze the violation of communication conditions by logo.
The above picture shows three factors that affect the spread of logo.
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1. Is it easy to use? 1. 1 medium
As the identity label of the brand, logo will appear in front of customers at the same time as the product.
Cloth for clothes, alloy for cars, aluminum cans for drinks, wood for pencils, and plastic for communication equipment, all of which are the media for logo presentation. At present, few people will consider this point first, because with the progress of science and technology, some media that were unable to print logo have gradually solved these problems.
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1.2 medium
Media is different from media.
Cloth can be understood as the medium of clothing brand logo, and collar is the medium of clothing brand logo.
Alloy can be understood as the medium of automobile brand logo, and the front face, steering wheel and car keys are all the media of automobile brand logo.
When designing logo, we must fully understand what kind of media logo will appear in.
When the media area is small, it is not appropriate to have a complex logo. Of course, this role is gradually replaced by auxiliary graphics in VI design. For example, the three winning bars of Adidas in the picture below are born to adapt to different media considerations.
For example, in the above picture, the elements in the logo are split, and the application requirements of different media are fully considered in the initial stage of design.
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The first summary:
In logo design, we should fully consider the final realization media.
I once met an incident. The customer wants a logo of a domestic mobile phone brand, which was conceived by the designer and did not fully consider the release media. The logo on the final product is too complicated to see clearly. Since we can't see it clearly, let alone identify and spread it.
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2. easy to identify? The psychology behind easy identification is actually easy to perceive.
After seeing the logo, consumers can quickly understand what kind of enterprise or product it is through the logo style.
If the logo above is applied to men's related products, it is a wrong choice.
2. 1 sign expression form
The forms of signs are usually divided into the following three categories:
A. Graphics-oriented
B. mainly writing.
C. combination of graphics and text
With regard to the combination of C and graphics, I want to make it clear that the Lenovo logo in the upper right corner of the above picture is the native language area of Chinese characters. Therefore, when we look at the English word Lenovo in logo, our first reaction is not as words, but as graphics.
Please go to: Why can't many people accept Chinese characters in product design?
First of all, let's explain the "graphics" mentioned above.
As one of the main elements of the logo, graphics can be divided into the following two categories from the form of expression:
A. Reflect the connotation of industry or brand value (abstract)
This kind of graphic design is often used in: enterprises with specific business but no specific products; Enterprises with rich product lines; Enterprises with rich business formats; Enterprises with low industry awareness ......
Because it is impossible to reflect the characteristics of the industry or business categories from the specific shape, most logo designs use graphics to reflect a certain mental state or appearance.
B. reflect the characteristics of the industry or brand (metaphor)
Graphics directly come from the characteristics of industry or products, which is the main form of graphics in this kind of signs.
This kind of graphic design is often used in: well-known service-oriented institutions; Single product line enterprise ......
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2.2 graphic taboo? No matter the concrete or abstract graphics mentioned above, we should consider the graphic style more to avoid ambiguous association.
As follows:
(The picture above is from the network)
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2.3 Taboos such as identification
In particular, the human head is the main graphic of the brand logo.
The above four groups of logo are all based on portraits. Except for the brand Laoganma, the other three groups treat the characters in a two-dimensional way, weakening their real social identity and emphasizing the connotation orientation of the characters (KFC: kindness; Wang Zhihe: tradition; Kung fu: overbearing).
At the beginning of their establishment, some brands focused on product research and development, channel construction and other conveniences, and paid little attention to brand image construction. Because I believe in the truth that "good wine is not afraid of the depth of the alley". Moreover, because the brand owner misunderstood the meaning of the brand, he hoped to make himself a brand rather than a product, which violated the law of enterprise development market. This is the main reason for the popularity of portrait logo in previous years. This expression will bring some bad associations to the audience. In recent years, people's logos have been spit out a lot, and many brand owners have gradually changed their minds and no longer insist on their avatars as brand logos.
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2.3 Font style taboo
Above, the taboo of graphic style is briefly described. Next, let's talk about another element that constitutes the logo-text.
Let's take a look at Zhihu's pinyin in the picture above. You can feel it yourself. Which do you think gives you a more serious feeling? Which is more entertaining?
Thirdly, in the design of logo, the difference between graphics and text is actually very vague. Although the Hu Zhi in the above picture appears in the form of words, our first impression is still to understand it as a graphic. For details, please move: Why can't many people accept Chinese characters in product design?
The specific glyph feels that it will not be expanded here. Can be moved to: What are the rules for capitalization of business logo?
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2.4 color selection taboo
Color is the most attractive element.
In the choice of color, we need to refer to cultural (religious) taboos first, and then fit with the industry.
Logo colors of internationally renowned brands are particularly concentrated in some sections (blue, red and yellow), but less in some sections (green, purple and purplish red). Why?
The same graphics dominate, but different colors will produce different psychological feelings. Generally speaking, food should avoid cold colors; Children avoid cool colors; The psychological feelings of more colors will not be explained here. If there is an opportunity, give a specific answer.
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The second summary:
In logo design, the style of graphics, whether concrete or abstract, needs to consider the aesthetic feeling and association of graphics more. Avoid ambiguity. In particular, some concrete graphic signs, since they appear in a concrete way, should reflect the characteristics of products or industries more accurately and avoid painting tigers and dogs.
In the choice of font style, we need to understand the value orientation of the enterprise or brand more thoroughly, and then choose the glyph that symbolizes the brand image orientation to express it. Choosing the wrong words will violate the original intention of brand image positioning.
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It's easy to copy. Before we look at the following, let's take a quiz. You can take a piece of paper and a pen and draw a sign that you can remember. Let's see which logos are memorable.
Logo's visual image is not like advertising copy, which has such a great communication opportunity. We can use the advertising language in life in a teasing way, such as Zhao Benshan's sentence: "Who knows who uses it!"
Logo needs to be easy to spread, so it needs to peel off its complicated and cumbersome design concept. This point is ignored by most designers or customers, but in my opinion, it is the most important and the most important standard to measure the spread of logo. Customers will mistakenly think that it is not cost-effective to spend money without buying complexity. Designers will mistakenly think that they can't show their own strength unless they do something complicated. These concepts are all wrong.
After iOS7 became like this, everyone complained that it was ugly, but few people found opportunities. After throwing away the complex quasi-physical design, we are left with the basic graphics of the real diaosi. The basic figures in the world are nothing more than circles, squares, triangles and hexagons. The future is in your hands, who can grasp the psychological positioning of these graphics in the eyes of customers for the first time. Who do we think of when we see the hook? Who will we think of when we see the blue, red, white and Tai Chi pattern? This is the simple charm.
The third summary:
Don't go against the original intention of communication in pursuit of formal complexity.