OUGD501 - Studio Brief 2 - Branding & Identity

The first thing I needed to sort for this organisation was a name.

I first thought of CEDO - Creative Ethics Defence Organisation.

However CEDO is already an organisation in spain for studies of oceans and deserts - Centro Intercultural de Estudios de Desiertos y Océanos.

I liked the ring of Creative Ethics so tried other ways of displaying that.

CEPO - Creative Ethical Protection Organisation.

OCE - Organisation of Creative Ethics.

I wasn't liking any of the other ones I came up with so just decided to bite the bullet and go with CEDO.

I decided to have a look at logos of socially and environmentally based organisations, the examples I found were strong in some ways but very visually weak. This would not be an option for my organisation as it is aimed at creatives directly.

I wanted to make the identity serious, creative based and well designed. I found out about a book called Branding Terror which focuses on how terrorist organisations have branded themselves. I thought this would be an interesting read as all terrorist organisations stand for something and believe in it and must represent that in their visuals (no matter how bad they are). Exactly what I want to do, however good rather than bad.

When I actually got the book, I was in a sense quite disappointed because of the amount of repetition throughout, no fault of the author or anything, terrorists just aren't the most creative individuals.

A concept that ran through all of them was using an image or symbol of a globe to represent their aims of their beliefs being followed everywhere. This would then be supported by other visual elements like guns or religious books.

This works completely for all of them, no matter how badly done they are. I took a photo of an example to show, no more than one was needed.

 This got me thinking about the elements I would need in the organisation's logo. A globe would be contextually relevant to represent the aim of world domination of good design. 

This lead to playing with ideas in my sketchpad at the same time as digitally. I started to develop a rather strong logo towards the end, below I have posted photos of what was created.

The sketches really helped me create an image from my head before creating it digitally, this sped up my development and motivated me to create something of a good quality.

When it came to deciding on a typeface, I made the decision to play with some different outcomes, sans serif originally looked a bit awkward because I wasn't executing it very well, without thinking to research into how I could make it look good, I decided to work with Big Caslon to give it a bit of a CIA feel, however upon finding out how to work type around a curve, I gave sans-serif another go which would give it a bit more of a non-governmental image. 

This looked much more relevant and also had a strong creative-esque feel to it.

From the development of the logo, the predominant typeface within the organisation's branding would be Futura Medium, and then for body copy or smaller type, Futura Light.

Colour was a clear option to me, after seeing other organisations logos and critically analysing them to determine what put them together, a lot of them use green to relate directly to the natural concerns they believe in. 

My organisation also benefitting the environment but also the economy, society and social welfare as a whole made me think further.

Growth and development is a key factor which runs through all of these elements, which again is a direct connotation with green, however not as bright and in your face as the 'eco-friendly' societies. A mid-tone green would be a good colour to complement the visuals.

For use of smaller spaces and such, this logo would be far too detailed to see, therefore I created an alternative logo for other uses.