Truce Logo by Turner Duckworth

Truce Packaging by Turner Duckworth

I have found my new logo design hero: Turner Duckworth. Duckworth is a logo, brand, and package designer. You may have seen some of his work: the Amazon.com logo, the Palm logo, Dolby logo refresh, packaging for Coca-Cola and PopChips, as well as many others. The above logo was created to brand a new vodka and cognac liqueur mix. As you can see the word truce is cleverly flipped and able to fit perfectly inside itself. This is an example of a great conceptual design using carefully crafted type treatment. I think it is just brilliant. Be sure to check out the rest of his amazing portfolio.

Popchips Logo

Popchips Packaging

I came across this logo and package design in a fitness magazine advertisement last month. I think this design made some great use of the Gestalt Law of closure. The letter “o” and “i” are entirely created using only negative space and the edges of the surrounding letters. I think the letter “i” is especially clever while still being easily legible. What do you think of the Popchips logo?

Can with Pepsi Logo

The introduction of the new Pepsi logo caused quite the stir in the logo design community last year. Everyone has offered their two cents on the logo refresh, as well they should. Pepsi is one of the most recognizable brands in the world and when they decide to change their logo you better believe people will take notice. (I, for one, grew up in a Pepsi household so I have a certain amount of Pepsi bias). One of the best breakdowns of the new Pepsi logo is over at Before & After Magazine as part of their Design Talks. While I don’t want to rehash what others have said, I would like to share a observation I made this week on the new logo, and more specifically on the stylized font used for the word Pepsi.

A few reviews I have read disliked the width of the letters “pep” which were wider than the last two letters “si”. I had to agree that the “pep” had three almost perfectly round letters followed by two thinner letters, which didn’t seem to be cohesive, but still somehow worked. I couldn’t put my finger on why it worked until a few days ago. Walking down a busy street I saw a Pepsi truck with the new logo strewn across its side. This larger than life application of the logo made me see the logo in a new way.  I saw that careful consideration was made in regards to how the letters were laid out.

Pepsi Logo with Stylized Font

Below you will see that the descenders of the two letter p’s are what break the word into two equal sections. So instead of seeing the word “Pepsi” as just a series of disproportionate letters, you are actually viewing two individual sections with the same width and weight. I think this is why the typography works in this particular instance. This probably can occur with a mature brand where viewers are not necessarily reading the word “Pepsi” each time but viewing the word as a graphic in it’s entirety.

Pepsi Logo Sections

I wanted to share this because I think it goes to show how every aspect of a logo needs to be examined and addressed in order for it to be successful. Wether people realize it or not they are taking in all sorts of visual cues from a logo. As a logo designer we must be aware of this and design appropriately. And maybe its just my fascination with logos, but I think it’s always rewarding to find carefully crafted elements of a logo that aren’t always immediately noticeable. Discovery within a logo always makes it more interesting.

Baseline: The line upon which most letters “sit” and below which descenders extend.

Typography Breakdown

Cap Height: The height of a capital letter that goes above the median.

Descender (height): The portion of a letter in a Latin alphabet that extends below the baseline of a font.

Median (Also known as Mean Line or Mid-Line): The line that determines where non-ascending lowercase letters terminate in a typeface.

x-Height: The distance between the baseline and the mean line in a typeface. Typically, this is the height of the letter x in the font (which is where the terminology comes from).

Sans-Serif: A san-serif (san meaning without) is a letterform that does not have serifs as part of its design. Popular san-serif fonts include Helvetica, Arial, and Futura.

Serif: A slight projection found at the ends of a letterform. Popular serif fonts include Garamond, Times, and Bodoni.

Examples of Sans-Serif and Serif fonts

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