Inspiring Concepts
/It's been a while since I've done a concept post. But as you know I've been busy redesigning the blog this weekend (again). Before I get into today's artwork — and there's a lot of it — I wanted to share my inspiration for this latest round of design upgrades.
A reader and graphic artist named Guillaume Bellemare emailed me a couple of weeks ago about the design of Icethetics. He said he had some ideas for improving it and I asked him to send me whatever he came up with. I just wanted to show you guys what he sent.
First of all, Guillaume obviously does really great work. You can check out his web site for more like it. You can click on the images above to enlarge them. On the left is the logo he created. I don't plan on using it (not a big fan of the font) but I do like the concept a lot. And on the right you can see the site design he came up with. So I have to credit Guillaume with putting the idea of a pollbar in my head. It wasn't until I saw his design that it really clicked with me.
One of the main focuses of this site is the polls. Why am I letting them get buried in pages of posts? It didn't make any sense. Now you have a quick at-a-glance way of seeing what you can vote on — and how long you have left to do so. That was the main element I took away from his demo here.
As for the rest of it, like I told him, the majority of the people who visit Icethetics are designers or otherwise artsy people who tend to use higher resolution monitors. Tiny text is difficult to read so I prefer large text and lots of spacing. I also widened the page for the same reason. Anyway, there's no need to beat this to death, so I'm not going to go into anymore details unless specifically asked.
If you have any questions, email me or comment. Now for today's concept art...
We're beginning with the Ducks because I have two great logo designs for them.
This one I like a lot but it's funny to me that, like the Canucks, the uniform would feature a prominent color not in the actual logo itself. The designer created orange uniforms for this concept. Still a great logo. The next one, I don't know.
It is quite duck-like, but I'm not sure that's winning it points. A little detailed perhaps, it makes great use of Anaheim's new colors. Moving on now to the Coyotes.
I think this logo would be improved by filling in the moon with a color. And while I like Phoenix's actual logo better, in this one, the coyote actually appears to be howling.
Another interesting Sabres design to add to the pile.
Simple, straightforward, traditional. Nothing wrong with that.
The next piece is based off an Islanders concept logo I posted here about a month ago.
Those are some nice jerseys and I can't see how the club from Long Island could go wrong with a logo like that.
We'll finish things off with a little something for the Quebecois population out there still missing the Nordiques. Here's what the old club might've looked like in today's Rbk EDGE sweaters.
Not bad at all.
Buffalo Sabres
Quebec Nordiques