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Elsinore - Wooden Houses - Animated Music Video




Thursday, October 29, 2009

The Plant Logo

Before I started the Elsinore video I took on an animated logo project for a vertical farm in Chicago called "The Plant." The Plant is an old industrial building that has been turned into an indoor farm. I will be posting updates pertaining to the music video in the near future, but I just wanted to spend a some time to get this project finished up. The first version I put together was not exactly what the client had in mind.  I am waiting to hear back on the revisions. Here is my most recent version:



The difference between the two versions is just the smooth vs. rough outline of the building. When I animate this I am planning to have the corn husks open up while the building outline draws on. I thought that the rough outline would help to give the outline a sort of hand drawn look, as though it were drawn with a charcoal pencil or something like that. I have not yet definitely decided on one version or the other and welcome all input. here are some close up versions of the outhlines:
















I can see the merits of both. I suppose ultimately it will be the person using the logo who decides, But I certainly appreciate feedback.

So, the logo will start with the ear of corn. The husks will peel back. I am trying to decide if I want to have the corn already appear with the kernels missing to form the letter P or if I instead want to start with an intact ear of corn and have the kernels come off of the cob, either as kernels of corn or as popcorn.

I started out by hand tracing the kernels on an ear of corn from a photo:


















 I then removed the photo and added a yellow fill to the corn:


















and then added shading to each kernel individually:













 



Before I put this together, though I  had a very different version going. My plan was to have an industrial building. The lights in the windows would turn on to form the lowercase letters. they would then shift from orange to green to kind of mirror how projects like this vertical farm are a part of the trend towards sustainability and environmentally friendly or "green" businesses. Simultaneously a leaf would sprout from the smokestack of the building to form a capital "P". I also made a simpler version without the window idea.


The client felt that these versions were too cartoony and too "night time." They also pointed out that they would be limited in their uses. It would be difficult to incorporate into a business card for instance. There were earlier versions which were plainer. but were ultimately leading towards this. The client also wanted something that included something the plant might grow, specifically something edible. In writing they say, "write what you know." So, I guess since I grew up across the street from a corn field I drew (or traced) what i know.

I also owe a great deal to my sister, Lauren, for helping me with this design. based on an earlier version of this she whipped the following logo up in just a few minutes:



And of course, as always some credit goes to Batman:

2 comments:

  1. Well, okay, you're starting to win me over on the charcoal outline business. When the logo size is smaller, I think it provides an interesting contrast. And now I can better visualize it being drawn on. What I was having trouble with before was the size of it, I think; it felt like the outline was overpowering it. But I think it works pretty well both ways now.

    Love,
    your Faithful Reader #2 (?)

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  2. I am a big fan of the charcoal outline. And I love that you added corn with some kernels missing, that is a nice touch. Nice job, Nod!!

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