ski club logo

[gemlog]

I'm involved with a non-profit (registered with the govt here) that is a x-country ski club. Their old website and logo was not all that great. Re-did the website and then was stuck for logo and colours. Here is the old logo:



Here are the sketches I was given to begin with. I picked inkscape as I wanted vector graphics, but I'd never used it for anything before. I normally use openoffice Draw. Here are the scans of the art I got:




Here was my first attempt. He hated it.



http://gemlog.ca/lgu/marek-16.svg

Click on the svg file to see it in firefox or inkscape. You'll need to scroll down to see the blue/gold version with ski tracks. The steps I took are in the svg as I knew I'd forget how I did what.

OK. Valley wasn't deep enough and tracks weren't "tracks" enough. Also, he hated the colours he'd dictated. I thought my calligraphy tool was broken. Turned out I just didn't know how to change the settings :-( Anyhow, that's why I took apart the lightbulb I got from CC and why I distorted my valley line to make ski tracks. Actually, I still haven't played around with the calligraphy tool yet.

Here is how it sits right now. It has stagnated for over a year.



The white things below are supposed to be parallel ski trails. Also, I'm supposed to make the valley symmetrical.

I live in a small town and this is a small ski club of only around 250 members shared between two towns 60km apart. This is the website http://tinyurl.com/2uqozw3

Tiny URL because I don't want to confuse google. Just beat out a large club in Alberta with a similar name for top hit recently :-)

Any interest here?

[Jaws]

Yep, leave this post up, there will be interest...

[gemlog]

thanks ed. inkscape is pretty wonderful. I was surprised what i got done with no previous experience with it. filters are very cool. anyhow, I've clearly (+1 yr!) ground to a halt. haven't touched the banner for the site since then either, which were just experiments. the rest seems ok though no?

[ms_meme]

Watching your progress.     Hope you get lots and lots of snow.  Just be sure you keep all of it up there.   

[MeeMaw]

Looks good so far!!!

(It amazes me when they say "It HAS to be this color...." and then they hate the color they picked.... go figure.)

I'm sure you can get it to something he loves..... maybe an 'ice' blue would be better..... and I'm thinking just a hint of the shape of the snowflake could be visible in the background?

Just throwing around ideas......  I'm sure you will do a wonderful job on it!

 

[janvl]

I once was looking for information on snowflakes and found this on the internet, maybe it helps you.

Kind regards,
Jan

[gemlog]

(It amazes me when they say "It HAS to be this color...." and then they hate the color they picked.... go figure.)

This.

And it's not only colours. I sat for 4.5 hours straight once with openoffice draw reproducing the sketch of a logo. The guy was right beside me the whole time dictating changes: bigger, smaller, redder, wrong font, more to the left etc. etc. Finally, for the umpteenth time I asked "So, that's it -- that's what you want?" "Yes." "You're sure this time?" "Yes. Absolutely. It's perfect." Yay! Saved it at various sizes and closed the program. Opened up the report I was really there to work on in the first place. Not even 5 minutes later "Paul..." "What?" "You're going to hate me." "What?" "I don't like the logo. I hate it..." Sigh. One hour later we had something COMPLETELY different! Not the same shapes, not even the same colours. Totally new idea.

To be fair, they do this to themselves all the time. They'll spend weeks on a canvas and then suddenly paint over top of it just when you think it's done. All of them are like this. Many famous paintings have a painting or two underneath.

[MeeMaw]

(It amazes me when they say "It HAS to be this color...." and then they hate the color they picked.... go figure.)

To be fair, they do this to themselves all the time. They'll spend weeks on a canvas and then suddenly paint over top of it just when you think it's done. All of them are like this. Many famous paintings have a painting or two underneath.

Thinking about it again, I don't know why it surprises me so much.... I've done that with projects of my own!
 

I'm sure it will be fine when they figure out what it is they actually want..........

(Nice graphics, janvl!)

[Jaws]

Just messing around for a while thinking what might look good. As your guys don't have a clue what they want, I figured I'd just do something I like.

The bitmap cabin picture is one from your ski clubs photos. Of course this isn't what you want, but it might help other folks for ideas.

[gemlog]

Neat idea. Same shapes, totally different :-)

[MeeMaw]

Nice, jaws!!!!

 

[Karti]

Hi,

I think you have done a great job. I have added some ideas that may help.

The first contains a skier (not Nordic) but the idea is there, actually skiing within the valley and the other is a small Nordic figure to the top right of the image.

Not sure about the copy-write but here are the image locations:

http://equipped.outdoors.org/2010/11/new-england-cross-country-ski-areas.html
http://chamberlin.sbschools.net/admin/users.htm

Finally, you could actually add the logo inside. You could have the capital letter of the SVN of the title in each if the snow flake arms cut out so it appears to be part of the flake.
Hope that helps

K
 

[gemlog]

Thanks karti! I like the left idea too. With the help of you guys pushing me along I will get back to it sooner than later. My next thing is I have to update my payroll program before the first...
The guy who did the sketches really hated the whole 3d/shield look. I was quite proud of it though myself, but that's the way it usually goes with me when I try to draw something. I sent jaws idea to a director (more because she's a friend than because she's a director) and haven't heard anything at all. I still think it's neat though.

[Karti]

Well done you

Try the letters in the snow flake, I think in 3d as you have it now it may be a success

Regards

K

[Jaws]

Sorry Gem, been tinkering with the logo but I'm not coming up big.

I really like Karti's designs though. You should send them along as they look great.

~ Ed