Lettermark Logo Design: Creating Iconic Monogram Logos

1. What is a Lettermark logo?: Hey, and welcome to this mini course on lettermark Design for brand designers. In this course, I'm going to be taking an exclusive module from my brand designer Pro program to help you understand the world of letter Marks just a little bit better so that you, as a brand designer can create better letter maarks and logos for your clients so you can get paid more, get more exciting projects, and feel more confident as a brand designer. I'm going to show you my process for developing lettermark so you can understand exactly how I think about different decisions throughout the process. Now, this logo that we're about to design together is a real life project for a real life client, and I'm actually being hired through my branding agency Clementine House to design this logo for a real life business. So I Cannot wait the div in with you. Let's get started. 2. Amazing Lettermark Logo Examples: What makes a letter mark really great? Well, in this video, we're going to find out. We're going to look at three different logos, one from HBO, one from NASA and one from IBM. Three of probably the most famous lettermrks in the world. And let's start with HBO. Now, HBO is a lettermark. The typeface is not super distinctive or unique. However, within the O of the lettermrk, they do do something quite clever where they basically create, like, a little camera lens, which is obviously related to what HBO does and what they look to do in the future. So that is a little clever twist, which makes the logo a little bit more distinctive. But I think we can all agree that it isn't exactly groundbreaking. It isn't know, shattering, you know, people's creative minds when they see this logo. It's actually really simple. Most of the logos that standard test of time that are kind of timeless are overly simple. And I'm not sure if that's an approach that you personally want to take for your particular company and the work that you do, but it is something to take note of because usually clients like that type of approach, simply because they see big companies using that approach and they kind of want to emulate it. Now, NASA and the worm logo or for whatever reason they call it, that I'm not sure why. They kind of go for a more futuristic, sort of spacey type face, which is unique to NASA, but also as well, it's just super simple and modern. Now, the IBM logo is a little bit different. So IBM goes a little bit more above and beyond in regards to their logo design where they've basically created, and there's a couple of different stories in regards to why the logos created that way. Some people think it is to symbolize innovation and technology. I personally think it's actually to relate to computers and pixels. That's kind of my idea of it. Anyway, that's what I kind of assume it symbolizes from just looking at the logo a couple of times. Here that the actual logo, it is super simple. It's super down to worth. It's very professional, very refined, and it just says exactly what it is on the tin. So what can we kind of summarize from looking at these three logos? Well, simple is generally better keeping things simple, making sure that the letter mark can be used in many different environments and keeping it simple enough to allow it to do that. And the next video, we're going to actually develop a letter mark together, so I can actually show you the process and how I would personally do it using my process in Magars to logo design. So when I note, I will see you very soon. Take care. Bye. 3. Brief & Research: Okay, so designing lettermarks. The first step that I always take with a brand new clients, and this is a real client, by the way that we're designing a logo for is to understand the brief properly and do some discovery. Okay? So what is the brief for this particular project for this lettermark? I'm working with a company called Data Launch, and they ultimately would like a logo that is a D, but it showcases something about what makes the company special. So just to tell you a little bit about data launch, they essentially use data to help businesses to grow and make better decisions, okay? So there's tons of different ways that we can approach this from a visual standpoint, right? We've got making better decisions. We've got transparency of understanding the way to go forward, clarity. We have elevation, we have improvement. We have, making things bigger and better and kind of breaking through what you currently think about the business limitations and helping you break through them to discover new limitations for the business so that your business can grow and get better. And of all of those approaches, the one of breaking through makes the most sense for me personally. With the packages that I offer clients, we ultimately explore usually 4-6 different approaches. So we would have four to six different directions to explore together. And then we would choose the one that we like best. Okay? So we kind of have a couple of different options to choose from. For the purpose of this little mini course, we're going to focus on the breaking through message, okay? Because I think it could be really interesting. Okay? So the first thing that I'm going to do is now that I understand the brief, and I have one of the directions that I'm focusing on, at least for this particular minicurse is go over to Pinterest and Google and also to this website that I use called Flaticon, which is super, super useful. Okay, so the first thing I'm going to look at is I'm going to look at break through icon. Okay, let's have a little look at this. Okay, so we've got this kind of. Obviously, we're not going to use an aeroplane. It's got nothing to do with aeroplanes, but we have this kind of aeroplane breaking through image, and then what else do we have here? Let's go back. We've got this, which obviously doesn't really it's breakthrough, but not in a positive way. We also have this, which is like, okay, so we have some negative space thing going on here. Let's save that. I like this as well, to be honest. Let's save this as well. I'm looking at, there's some ds here, which is interesting. Let's look at this. I like how this is in three D. I take this, okay. Put this in here. Mm. That's int. Okay. Okay, okay, okay. So what I'm doing now is I'm just looking for ways to visually communicate breakthrough with a D, right? Breaking through with the D. Anyway, let's keep it clean, guys. It's a family show. So I think this is actually pretty interesting because it's not quite communicating break through, but I like how it's kind of like coming at me. It's coming through something, but it doesn't quite hit the nail on the head. This, as well. So I'm starting to see some opportunities here, and that's ultimately all what this phase is about discovery and research. So I'm just looking at, okay. How can I communicate this particular approach with shapes, with geometry, with letter D, and that particular message that we're trying to communicate of breaking through, adding clarity, that sort of thing. I've found a couple of options which I actually think are really cool. Um, we've got this one, particularly, which I think is kind of on the verge. It's very simple. It's very tech. So that's kind of one of the things that I like about it. It's kind of it's very clean and simple and minimal, which obviously relates to tech. I like how this is kind of breaking through, and it's a very visual representation of it. And I like the fact that these are nice and simple as well. I'm not too much of a fan of these two on these because obviously, these lines won't be very scalable, which basically means if we make this super small look, these lines almost become like, you know, we can't even see them. They're not even very visible. Whereas, something like this or something like this is, you know, it's very much scalable, and, you know, it can go any size, and we'd still understand exactly what it is. Okay, these here. I kind of like this. I'm not a huge fan of everything else, but that's all part of the research process. I'd love to see clarity icon? Like, how can we communicate clarity or breaking through and then finding more clarity on the other side? Kinda have something like that? I kind of like this. How it kind of feels like it's sort of breaking through there, as well. Okay. Cool, cool, cool. Okay, okay, okay. Okay. Yeah, I kind of like that. I kind of like how it's kind of got that extra line going through. This is kind of interesting as well, but I don't like having gradients. In a logo for some reason, it just doesn't sit well with me because it's not going to work on all backgrounds. It's just going to make it more complicated for the client, so I don't really like keeping it like that, to be honest. Okay, I feel like I have a good amount of stuff to work with for the sketching phase. I've got some really great inspiration, most predominantly this one, which is pretty cool, but I think we can do a little bit better for this particular brief. But yeah, let's dig into the sketching phase. Let's see what happens, and on that note, I will see you there. See you soon. Bye bye. 4. Sketching Your Logo Ideas: So now we understand the brief and we've done the research, and we have some inspiration that we've captured from Pinterest and Google, for example. Now it's time to start sketching our letter Mark. Okay, so if we're going to sketch the ideas for data launch, we need to first just section our sketch pad into phase one and two. So basically what I'm going to do is I'm going to get a really rough idea of how I want the icon to look and the letter mark, and then afterwards, we're going to ultimately refine it a little bit, okay? Now, usually, what I would do is I would do maybe like 20 different versions for phase one. For this particular direction, and then afterwards, I would refine maybe the one or two that I like best. For this mini course, we're only going to do a couple of kind of ideas for phase one, and then I'll basically just refine the one that I like best and do a final version here before taking this into Illustrator. Okay? So phase one, I remember looking at the icons and I think this one and this one kind of stood out to me. But again, I wasn't really, you know, like, bowled over by it. I just like how this looked like it was kind of coming out of the D. And I also liked how this one was kind of three D as well a little bit. But let's have a look. Let's just see what happens when we start sketching a D. So let's start there. Let's just sketch a D. Perfect. Okay, and then let's try and maybe make it look like it's sort of coming out of something or coming out of somewhere. Okay, let's at this point, like, I'm not trying to create anything super special here. I'm literally just sketching ideas and seeing what happens. Like, I'm not trying to do anything super unique or crazy. Just trying to see what ideas work and what ideas don't work. Okay, this is kind of I mean, it doesn't really look like anything just yet, but I mean, it doesn't look bad, obviously, but it doesn't look great either. Okay? I'm just trying too, I'm just filling around. Okay, we kind of get the idea, right? This looks kind of This is the inside of the D, and it kind of looks like it's sort of coming out a little bit, but also not too much, right? Yeah, I mean, May, it's alright. It doesn't look anything special, but let's continue and maybe try something else. Okay? Let's try. Let's do something a little bit thicker here. Let's do a thicker D here. Then let's do something like um let's put let's put this here like this, maybe. Okay. K. So we're putting the inside of the D here, then let's connect these two. Okay. And then let's do this. It's not really I mean, I'm not sure how this is going to work, to be honest, but let's see how it looks. Okay, let's just delete this a little bit here. Okay, so we've kind of got, like, the middle of the day kind of, like, busting out and bursting through and helping to kind of tie in with that message of, you know, improvement or breaking through limitations, kind of see where that's going. I definitely don't think from a execution standpoint, I don't think it looks very good. I like the idea of it. I can see the message of it kind of bursting through, but I also don't like either of them to be completely brutally honest. Like, something just doesn't feel quite right. See, I think the thing that's kind of throwing me off a little bit is the fact that this curve here, just kind of feels like it's I like the fact that this is negative space. I like the story, but I don't think that this curve and this curve matches well together. If we put this straight line here against this straight line, maybe that will work a little bit better. Let's just quickly sketch that and then we'll see what it looks like. Again, doesn't have to be fancy, doesn't have to be pretty. We're going to do that later on. We're going to refine that in phase two here. But at the moment, let's just see let's just do this. Let's let's try and break it a little bit first, and then we'll go from there. I already like how this is looking because we can kind of see the, we can kind of see how the lines make a lot more sense, as opposed to here where it's kind of like it feels like they're kind of fighting with each other. Here, we kind of have this here, then this here, and it just feels like it's a lot more consistent, right, okay? Okay, let's do that. And that? Oh, okay. I'm definitely lk him why this is going. And then let's do we color this in or this in? Let's definitely color this in obviously, 'cause this is the date. So this is, like, a non negotiable, really. Okay. Okay. Then, obviously, we would take this away, and we probably take this away, as well. And then we would probably have to obviously use the negative space here, and we would use this, right? Okay. I mean, I don't hear it. I don't hit it, but it's kind of like that, like, sort of that bursting through. Maybe it's just a little bit, like, too much. Maybe it's like popping out too much. Let's try and let's try and bring it in a little bit and just see how it looks. I mean, I can refine it. I like how this is going. So let's just refine this in phase two, and then we'll go from there just so I can do it properly. So let's draw the D. Let's keep it inside that line the moment if it's popping out, it doesn't really look that great. So let's make the day a little bit, wider as well, just so we've kind of got a little bit more base to work with. Okay. We go. And then let's just tie it down up a little bit. So again, in phase two, we can be a little bit more careful with our strokes and where we're going with things. Then on the top left, let's just curve that around here. Then here we've got this section. Okay. Then afterwards, we have this section. No, I think this is going to work a lot better for a couple of different reasons. The first thing is that before we had some of this middle D kind of overlapping with this, which kind of made it look like a little bit weird, especially if it's just in one single color, and obviously, every single logo needs to work in just one color. But with this, we kind of have this gap where it isn't overlapping. We don't want it to kind of be not lapping, but it just needs to touch very, very slightly. So let's look at this. And let's just see how this looked when it all, kind of slightly faded in. I think this could be a really good direction. Yeah, it's definitely got a lot more potential than the other ones. I'll tell you that for nothing. Okay. Okay. I mean, it's not perfect. We need to refiner and illustrator, but I like how this is coming around, and it's just got a much stronger feeling to it when it's been executed nicely. There we go. Okay, I'm actually really happy with how this letter Mark has came together. I love how it tells a story. I love how simple it is. I love it how it's not too techie, but it's also a techie just enough to, you know, meet the brief. I'm super excited. I don't think this is going to take a lot of cleaning up, to be honest, in Illustrator, but I think it's gonna be pretty straightforward. So on that note, let's dive in anillustrator. Let's digitize this bad boy, and then yeah, we'll see what happens afterwards, right? I'll see you in the next lesson. See you. 5. Digitising & Perfecting Your Design on Adobe Illustrator: It's finally time to take the lettermrk that we've designed for data launch and put it inside Illustrator. So we can just start tidying things up, having things super clean and precise, and just to help data launch look super professional. And so with that said, let's dive in Illustrator. Okay, so how can we take our sketch and now create a nice refined logo for a client? Now, to be honest with you, this one should be pretty easy. When you put the logo in Illustrator, most of the work should be done, okay, especially for something like this, which is ultimately a lettermark, right? The reason being is when you have a logo, most of the work is in the actual idea and the story, right? Afterwards, you're just executing on that story and that idea. So for example, here, all we would need to do is create this probably, I'm not sure if Montserrat is the best option to be honest. Let's just look at a couple of others that have, that could work. Awesome. That could work. Is there a more bold one? Okay, there isn't just work with this. It doesn't really matter too much, to be honest. So we have that. We have now duplicated it and we will now create a logo where the middle version matches with this. Now, all we need to do technically is to take this, and I'll color this something different just so you can see what it is. Move it to the top corner. And then basically, take the lines from here, match it to here, and take the line here and match it to here, and we should have our logo, basically. Let's do that. We have this. Let's save this. Let's now go to Let's now go to this tool, get this connected to that. Perfect. Then let's try, let's change the color of this actually just so we can see what we're doing. Okay. That didn't work, but it's okay. There we go. Actually, let's change it to something a little bit more colorful so you can see exactly where everything is going. So we've got this here. And we basically just need something that is going to have the same angle as this. So we don't really care about anything else apart from the angle that these two met at. So you've got this, we've got this. You can see here that's a perfect match. And this is going to give us that nice polished effect that we're looking for. Now I'm going to make this super thin. Just so we can see it. Well, not that thin. Okay. Let me do five. That's probably going to be better. Okay. It's still pretty hard to see. I want to make sure that you can see it. That's the most important thing. There we go. That's a little bit better. So I want to make sure that I get it right on the edge so that I'm basically cutting off this section. Okay? Now, I'm just going to get this section here, get this. I'm just going to make sure that this cuts off the entirety of the D. So I know where it needs to be now. Now I can just cut it. There we go. So now I've got that. Now I've got that. Now, all I need to do is just duplicate this D, turn it down. And I'll do the same with this one. So I know exactly where it needs to go. All I need to do is just clear that and we are good to go. So you see here it's not that perfect. Let me go. Perfect. Now, all I need to do is just literally use the Divide tool to take this away, and then we should be good to go. We just take this away. And we should have our logo. However, you'll see up here there's a little section which isn't quite working. So let's take this. Let's take this. Let's take this just move it up a little bit. Let's see if that works. It's working a little bit, but let's just add this here a little bit and just play around with it. So that's working way better now. It's still not quite right, I don't think. I'm going to fiddle around with this little bit. I'm going to figure out why it doesn't look quite right, whether I need to add this out, whether I need to adjust this slightly or maybe do I mean, that's looking a little bit better, but it still doesn't look 100%. I still need to pop a little bit more. Give me a little bit of time, and through the magic of time travel, I'm going to refine it a little bit. And yeah, we'll see how things look afterwards. And so we have the original logo, and then we also have this version as well, which I think looks a lot better. So you can see here it pops a little bit more. You can actually see that the middle of the D is kind of bursting out from the actual base of the D. So this looks a lot better, I think. It took a little bit of refinement and ultimately, that's one of the things with logo design, which you have to keep in mind. Sometimes you need to just take the time to get the logo looking and feeling right because you could have maybe sent that to the client and the idea is the same. But just taking some time just to get things nice and polished is always going to give you a better result. And then the client, when they see it, they're not just going to say, Oh, this is a good logo, or, you know, this isn't bad, they're going to be blown away by the end result because you've taken that time to refine it, it's going to put you in a position of power because you're not going to waste the client's time with tons of revisions. You're going to have done all the revisions yourself, right by taking the time to refine your taste and to get better at doing this sort of design. So hopefully this lesson was helpful. Hopefully you took something away from learning about my process and seeing a little bit of how I do things. But yeah, if you have any questions, please feel free to reach out. Yeah. Apart from that, I hopefully see you again very soon. Take care. 6. It's Project Time!: Teaching brand designers and working with them to improve their skills and help them build more profitable businesses is by far the thing that I'm most passionate about. And just seeing the designer become more confident and more capable and also see them have more success with their design business, it brings me so much fulfillment, and I'm so grateful to be in a position where I can help brand designers on a personal basis. Pretty much every single day. Now, if you are an ambitious brand designer and you really want to accelerate your learning and become the best brand designer you can be, I love to invite you into our community, the brand design abroad community, to help you to get to where you want to be as a brand designer and building your brand design business. I really do put a lot of effort into making the content look great and also trying to be as informative and as helpful as possible to help support brand designers to ultimately be the best version of themselves. I'd love you to share one of your logos that you've designed that you're super proud of as a project this course. That way I can give you some personalized feedback to really help to accelerate your learning and just add a little bit more value after you've taken the course. Anyway, I just want to really say that I'm super grateful for you spending the time, watching this course, and yeah, hopefully we'll connect again sometime in the future. Anyway, I'll see you very soon. Take.