The design is of course based on a sunset,
with its reflection being shown within
the pages of a book. The reflection also
symbolizes text that would be shown in a
book’s pages. This is representative of the
the beauty found within a story, and the power
it holds, to elicit the same emotions as an
alluring SUNSET.
This company was inspired by the character “Dazai” from the series Bungo Stray Dogs. That i recommend watching. Dazai represents being smart, witty, and unpredictable and so many more and that’s exactly what we are. We hope to collaborate with you very soon.
For the logo project I knew I wanted to mold my company around the idea of book-to-screen adaptations. I’m a big reader and I always love seeing them come to life on screen, which prompted the idea of a publishing house that specializes in that process.
The branding of the company comes from the act of writing a script. The bright white and classic black of writing and rewriting, as well as the red of typos, edits, and mistakes. The name of the company came from the satisfaction of finishing a project and typing that last word, and especially that last letter. I played around with the idea of separating the words and the capitalization, but ultimately the look of them together felt right.
I knew I wanted the logo to be stripped-down and simple. The icon of the text-cursor fit right in to the branding, and hopefully will be useful down the line when it comes to the animation. The font itself is the industry standard font for scriptwriting, which felt like an obvious pick.
If I were to make any changes or additional variations in the future, I think I would like to make a few more illustrative logos. Although I love the simplicity and scalability of this version, I do think a more intricate logo could be interesting for special occasions.
Overall I was very happy with LastLetter’s branding and I’m excited to continue bringing it to life throughout the course.
I created Sunset Publishing because when I think of reading, I think of something very relaxing and tranquil. Watching sunsets is something I like to do in my free time to decompress and appreciate the sky’s beauty, just like how when you read, you appreciate the narrative written by the author. Because of this, I made my publishing company called Sunset Publishing to publish books that make the reader relaxed and carefree and help them escape life’s stressful moments.
While thinking of the concept, I mapped out some ideas on paper to somehow create a logo that incorporated a sunset as well as a book or a bookmark. I found it difficult to come up with a clever way to incorporate both ideas into one image, but eventually I came up with a sunset that is made out of the book pages if the book was held upside down. I wanted something simplistic and modern as well to emphasize that the books published by this company are not over the top or super bold in their cover design.
I had trouble choosing a typography that went well with the sunset. Originally, the sunset had rigid ends (not curved), but I wanted something more whimsical and carefree, so I rounded those corners. After doing that, I thought I should have a typeface that has rounded edges to correspond to the roundness of the sunrays. I think the type I chose works out well and looks like it goes along with my logo. The colors I chose were orange and blue because I thought that most sunsets have orange in them and blue is the opposite on the color wheel to orange. The contrast of blue and orange offers some dynamic contrast to the relaxed logo and message.
In the future, I would try to create a logo that is a bit more scalable. I did my best to work with this one and make it look good both big and small, but it was difficult at times. With books, sometimes the logos are super tiny, so I think I might have to rethink the rays/amount of rays if I were to complete this project again. I am proud of my work and could see this logo used for a real company.
For DEAD HEAD Publishing the main idea was to do something more edgy and iconoclastic. I loved the idea of doing a “skater brand” but a publishing company. The idea was to make a more intricate drawing, but through the sketching process I decided to move away from that in favor of something more simple. The words were always meant to be the main statement so finding and editing the font to my exact vision was an arduous process, but I am very pleased with the results. In my mind a publishing company is meant to be professional and high end, so the idea was to go the entire opposite direction and make something that does its best to break the norm.
Overall, I am super proud of what I was able to create and the message behind what DEAD HEAD stands for. I would be more than happy to represent a brand with this kind of message and voice. I think it encompasses a personal view of mine of not being tethered to the opinion of others in a way that changes you. So the nonchalant and matter-of-fact nature is one of my favorites to represent. I went with pretty obvious choices for the color and I think that it was the correct choice for the brand.
If I was to do the project over, I might spend a little more time on choosing colors that I like and represent me better than red, white, and black. I think that it works here for what I created, I just don’t associate with the scheme in the same way that I do the message and voice. Typography was a challenge because I had a look that I was invested in creating and it took a lot of time to search and tweak the font to make something that I felt proud of. There is not a ton that I would change and I would happily include this in my own portfolio or as a personal logo.
For my logo project, I wanted to create something that evokes childlike wonder and reminds me of the children’s books I grew up with. The art in those books always inspired me and made me happy, so I decided to channel that same spirit. The idea of Funny Bunny Publishing struck me as I recalled childhood names, one of which was “funny bunny”. The name not only resonated with me, but it rhymes which adds a fun dimension to it.
After sketching, I decided to connect the two words by sharing a letter. The letter “U” stood out because it could be shaped into an abstract bunny, while also highlighting the importance of the reader (“you”) to our company. I wanted to keep the color of the bunny a simple off-white, like many real bunnies, so it would make it easy to recognize.
I had the most trouble with deciding if the bunny should have a face as I worried it might complicate the design. In the end, I decided to include a face for aesthetic purposes and to make it clear that it is a bunny. The pink and blue tones in the logo are slightly faded to give them a softer, more childlike feel.
The font of “Funny Bunny” is Gambano Sans, which has a slightly off-kilter tilt which I found to be playful and fitting for the whimsical tone of the logo. One area I struggled with was balancing the text and image, specifically with alignment and symmetry. In the future, I’d give myself more time to sketch through ideas and work on achieving visual balance.
For this logo I initially was really stuck figuring out what I wanted my company’s name to be. I tried my last name, middle name, and some random words, but none felt like they were the best option I could make. So I thought about how I felt very creative when making brainpan and that was two random words put together. That made me think about my internship this summer which was a card game of random words. Now I made this a challenge where I picked two words and created a company from them. There Lottery Haus Publishings was born.
I decided to lean into the lottery aspect and make a slot machine. I had a couple different versions of a slot machine but I decided to go with this version because it is smaller, less detailed, and will look better when minimized.In the beginning I had 777 in the slot machine to lean into hitting the jackpot when publishing your book with us, but I decided to add the initials into the slot and make it look like 777 so it still comes across the same but now has branding when standalone. I tried to keep the font also reminiscent of casinos and add a spade and diamond into the T and H.
Overall, creating a logo was harder than expected. There was a lot of curveballs in the creative process and I was stuck in some creative ruts at times. But overall I think I ended up coming up with an effective, cohesive logo.
For the first project, I wanted to create a logo that was simple and could be recognizable for what I was trying to accomplish. I knew from the start I wanted to marry two icons together, and after much trial and error, I decided on combining an open book with a sandbox. Stylistically, the two elements paired well together as they both were composed of similar geometric shapes, and brand-wise a sandbox would represent all the limitless creative potential that I wanted by publishing company to be known for. I decided to include two well-known objects to help convey that my image was a sandbox: a shovel and a pail.
I first tried creating the book from a birds-eye perspective, looking straight down on it with sand covering the entire surface. But this did not create an interesting design that really popped out at me, so I did another attempt from a sideview, and this become my final image. I knew from the onset I only wanted to use a few colors, so I experimented with different sand colors until I found one that felt natural, and only used black and white for the remainder.
For typography, I knew I wanted something light and inviting that would translate the hardworking, but creative outlook my brand would be known for. I chose one called “Pinecone” on Adobe Fonts that felt simple but fun and utilized the same sand color as my image for consistency.
I am happy with how my design ultimately turned out and I feel I made a logo that can translate well to any size and be recognizable. I do think I could have added more details in the sandbox itself- maybe pebbles or just texture to further convey the sand- but I am still confident that most people will be able to immediately understand what I am going for.
When designing the logo for Nabi Publishing, I wanted to create something that symbolized transformation and cross-cultural connection. I chose the name “Nabi” because it means butterfly in Korean, perfectly representing the idea of taking a piece of work from one language and transforming it into something new while preserving its core essence. The butterfly, a creature that undergoes metamorphosis, became a natural symbol for my idea of translating and transforming stories across languages. The use of red and blue, inspired by the Korean flag, emphasizes the balance and harmony the company aims to achieve between English and Korean. The three black lines in the top left wing mirror the trigram for “sky” (☰) from the Korean flag, symbolizing limitless potential and the expansive reach of translated works.
Initially, I considered only using a black-and-white color scheme to maintain a simple, mature, and modern feel. However, I ultimately decided that the contrast of red and blue not only represented the Korean flag but also reflected the American flag, subtly tying in both cultures and making the logo more unique and distinguishable. This choice made the design feel more dynamic and reflective of the vibrant exchange between the two languages. The decision to create two variations of the logo—one in English and one in Hangul (Korean alphabet)—was another way to emphasize this duality and the bridge between English and Korean readers.
Furthermore, I also thought about placing the trigram for “sky” (☰) seen on the top left butterfly wing in more of a centered postion within the wing rather than towards the top and side. It was a decision I spent a while on, going back and forth between the two positions, but ultimately I ended up visually preferring the non-centered postion in every version of the design. I kept the design of the buttefly wings more rounded and circular in shape to reflect the red and blue circle shapes (the Taegeuk) seen on the Korean flag itself. This is also why I decided to design the two halves of the butterfly to overlap.
I wanted to include Korean into my publishing company because I study Korean culture and language as one of my majors, and I am deeply passionate about and dedicated to that part of my studies. This personal connection to Korean culture is what drove me to create a brand that facilitates cross-cultural understanding and collaboration.
If I were to make any changes, I would experiment further with the typography. While I am satisfied with the clean and modern look of the Montserrat and the handwritten Hangul font I chose, I think there might be opportunities to enhance the visual connection between the butterfly’s organic shapes and the letters. Overall, though, I believe the logo successfully captures the essence of Nabi Publishing and its mission to bring stories to life in multiple languages.
Here is the reflection for my first project in J465. I promise that this will be real text before the end of this week!