Blue Heron Logo **FINAL ON PG 5**

[GeauxColonels]

i think you've done a pretty good job of rendering it, but theres a few things you can do to improve it.

Color - since you're already using black and blue, it would be more accurate to use blue in the beak and black in the neck. but, that's not a big deal. might be worth trying though as you would get a better contrast than you have with your current green and blue. if you're set on green and blue, i suggest going with a brighter green. maybe a 347C? hard to say without messing with it myself

Feathers - take a closer look at the illustration. the feathers start close together on the head, and fray out as they grow away from the head. your feather do the opposite. it might even be worth making those hairs/feathers much thiner, then drawing the keystroke around them.

Flow and composition - this is the weakest part. imagine a box drawn around the logo with the sides touching each outermost point on top/bottom/sides. you're left with a lot of space in that box in the upper right and lower left portions. even more if you did the same as a circle. you need to fill the space of that imaginary box to have a stronger composition. something that is "Strong in space". heres a few bad sketches of what i mean. maybe it will spark a better idea

Some very good points here. The empty space below the beak and above the tail of the neck were things that bothered me. I REALLY like the sketch you posed in the lower left. i may rework to something similar to that.

As far as the colors are concerned, since Griffinmarlins let the cat out of the bag, this is a "brand" update for my NCFA-FCS school - the Audubon Nature College Naturalists. I won't be changing the nickname to "Herons" or "Blue Herons" but thought that using a bird image would be a nice homage to John James Audubon (hence the use of one of his pieces as the initial inspration) especially since i've found it incredibly difficult to come up with a good graphic representation of the term "naturalist." That's why I'm somewhat stingy with the color palette and any suggestions to change it. It's possible that I MAY look at slightly altering the shade of green, but I really like the blue and yellow hues that I have right now.

Thanks again to everyone for the input. Hopefully I can get back to this before I go out of town for a week on the 11th. I'll definitely post an update ASAP. And PLEASE, keep the comments and critiques coming. They are definitely helping me understand design in a better light.

[GeauxColonels]

Right direction? My initial thoughts are that the beak seems a bit too long relative to the rest of the logo and maybe the eyes are too big. Thoughts?

[GriffinM6]

I reminds me way too much of a peacock now if you ask me.

[GeauxColonels]

I reminds me way too much of a peacock now if you ask me.

Yeah. I kind of see that. Is it because of the thin hairs on top of the head?

I may try to make them a little bit thicker and then come to points at the ends. Maybe eliminate one or 2 of them.

Any thoughts on the shape? Is the eye too big? Beak to look? I really do like Brandon's sketch and I'm using that as a base for the design. I think it's a strong overal shape than what I had. I still intend to had a wordmark across the bottom of the "neck" probably starting off to the left and partially covering the neck.

[Tyrano123]

I would try and fix the festers at the top of the head. It looks like it needs to be a little bolder but not too bold. Hope this helps.

[Vicious]

Be sure to pay attention to line width variation.Right now a lot of your lines are the same size, and they dont get larger, or smaller at one end.

Also, try as much as you can to not use strokes as lines, or at all if possible. Even the keystroke should be drawn using the pen tool.

Speaking of the pen tool, one tip i would give you is to make sure when you are making bezier curves, to pay attention where you are dragging your handle. I always try to drag my handle towards the middle of the curve that i am trying to make. For example, some of the hair on the head, i can tell that that is a stroke, and the handle is very much on the right side of the curve. If you drag the handle more towards the middle of your curve, you will get a much cleaner curve, where you cant really tell where the bend begins and ends. A little tip I learned from Fraser D.

Getting Better! Look forward to the updates.

[GeauxColonels]

Be sure to pay attention to line width variation.Right now a lot of your lines are the same size, and they dont get larger, or smaller at one end.

Also, try as much as you can to not use strokes as lines, or at all if possible. Even the keystroke should be drawn using the pen tool.

Speaking of the pen tool, one tip i would give you is to make sure when you are making bezier curves, to pay attention where you are dragging your handle. I always try to drag my handle towards the middle of the curve that i am trying to make. For example, some of the hair on the head, i can tell that that is a stroke, and the handle is very much on the right side of the curve. If you drag the handle more towards the middle of your curve, you will get a much cleaner curve, where you cant really tell where the bend begins and ends. A little tip I learned from Fraser D.

Getting Better! Look forward to the updates.

Thanks. Yeah, I have leaned on the strokes a lot with creating this. I do change them to paths and then alter them a bit when I think it's needed. But I was also thinking about reducing the size of the interior strokes or maybe even trying to make the face a bit more like my original logo with a rounded end to the bill near the eye as well as a more rounded eye.

I have tried using the pen tool but really can't figure out how it works (using Inkscape if it matters any).

[GeauxColonels]

OK, so I went back to the original head but modified the shape based on earlier feedback. Also, I reworked the head feathers to give them better overall curve shapes. Hopefully that looks better and it's getting away from the peacock look.

I know that I need to work on my line widths and I plan to do so once I have a good idea of how this may look finished. A few things I was thinking should be modified would be the black on the back side of the head (making it wider) with the black keystroke on the inside of the curve being much thicker. I probably will work to thicken the head feathers and probably bring each one to a pointed end. Other suggestions regarding line widths?

The other thing I'm concerned about is a good bit of the blue area with nothing breaking it up. Should I look into the black "feathered" look I had in my original? Should I incorporate a darker shade of the blue perhaps on the inner curve of the neck? I WILL be adding text - "ANC" or "AUDUBON" partially across the bottom. That should help to break up the big blue portion of the logo. But I feel like I still may need to do more to it.

[Whittier S]

This is a marked improvement. My one concern is that the feathers are so thin that they will shrink to nothing if the logo is shrunk very much.

[GeauxColonels]

I agree. I'm definitely going to thicken those up some, just not as much as I had originally.

[BigBird34]

i like the idea of a heron for a logo considering my last name is heron, but I'm not quite sure you hit the mark with the concept yet. Every time I've seen a heron ( a lot considering my family has them everywhere) i always see them with the long "s" like neck. when I see your logo as just a head it feels like it could be just about any water bird just recoloured. Perhaps trying to do a full body rendering of a heron and then trying to minimize that into a head logo would help? here are a few images that i feel are iconic look for herons.

[Vicious]

I think what might be throwing it off for me is the eye. It seems like it is too far up on the beak. according to the first pic that bigbird posted, the eye should sit well behind the beak. I also think that the eye is a bit large. I agree that the shape of the neck still lacks any sort of dynamic quality, and that a "S" shape could be really cool. Maybe play with placing the head/neck into a crest/shape? The hair still should be drawn out. The stroke makes it look weird because it terminates so abruptly. They should be thin spikes.

[AlexInHBurg]

I think what might be throwing it off for me is the eye. It seems like it is too far up on the beak. according to the first pic that bigbird posted, the eye should sit well behind the beak. I also think that the eye is a bit large. I agree that the shape of the neck still lacks any sort of dynamic quality, and that a "S" shape could be really cool. Maybe play with placing the head/neck into a crest/shape? The hair still should be drawn out. The stroke makes it look weird because it terminates so abruptly. They should be thin spikes.

This perfectly sums up what I had to say.

[derschwigg]

i think you've done a pretty good job of rendering it, but theres a few things you can do to improve it.

Color - since you're already using black and blue, it would be more accurate to use blue in the beak and black in the neck. but, that's not a big deal. might be worth trying though as you would get a better contrast than you have with your current green and blue. if you're set on green and blue, i suggest going with a brighter green. maybe a 347C? hard to say without messing with it myself

Feathers - take a closer look at the illustration. the feathers start close together on the head, and fray out as they grow away from the head. your feather do the opposite. it might even be worth making those hairs/feathers much thiner, then drawing the keystroke around them.

Flow and composition - this is the weakest part. imagine a box drawn around the logo with the sides touching each outermost point on top/bottom/sides. you're left with a lot of space in that box in the upper right and lower left portions. even more if you did the same as a circle. you need to fill the space of that imaginary box to have a stronger composition. something that is "Strong in space". heres a few bad sketches of what i mean. maybe it will spark a better idea

This is one of the most helpful posts I've seen on here.

[Patchez]

[McCraeWilliamsProductions]

I agree you need to fill more of the space in your "imaginary box". As of right now your logo is very spread out.

[GriffinM6]

Winner, winner Blue Heron dinner.

[GeauxColonels]

I think my biggest concern with going the route of a "S" neck would be that the logo would become too tall since the primary use of this logo is for the helmets on my NCFA-FCS team. I like the shape that I'm going with right now (again, thanks to the suggestion) and the empty space to the bottom left of the logo will be occupied by text (either "ANC" or "Audubon").

I will work on making the eye a bit smaller, but I think for the sake of it being an athletic logo that it probably needs to be slightly bigger, proportionally speaking, than it would be on an actual heron.

[RiverCityLax]

Hi there, new to this board. I actually stumbled upon this forum looking for logo ideas for a heron mascot that I am considering for a lacrosse organization where I am in Illinois. Wanted to say excellent work to everyone involved here esp. the OP for the ideas. I also wanted to share this image that I found online in the hopes that it will help you GeauxColonels. I have a company working on our re-brand, and I will post an update when they get back to me. Good luck!

[GeauxColonels]

UPDATE: I modified the head feathers using the pen tool. Is this more what you all had in mind?